A drunkard’s remedy

"Things sweet to taste prove in digestion sour."
-William Shakespeare

Once upon a time, in a far away kingdom there lived a man, a drunkard, who spent all his rich inheritance on alcohol, parties and in the end, found himself in poverty. Only thing left to him was an old blanket to cover and protect him from winter frost. One day, dead drunk, he stumbled in front of the king walking through the city. The king, seeing his sorry state started cussing him “Shame on you! Look what you look like!”
“Why do you care?” answered the drunkard. “If I am drinking, I am buying with my own money! If you think that I am poor, tell me for how much are you going to sell me your kingdom?”
The king hearing this thought that maybe somebody has set him up, somebody could send this drunkard to cheat him out of kingdom. “I can not sell you entire kingdom” he told him “but I will sell you one half for a ten wagons of gold!”
“Good” responded the drunkard. “Early in the morning I will bring you the gold!”

Since he didn’t showed at the agreed time in the morning, the king send guards to bring him. Now sober, the drunkard admitted that he had no single coin, let alone ten wagons of gold. The king, enraged, ordered his execution for this offense. Seeing that the king is going to go through with this the drunkard asked for a favor. “Before you execute me, please do me one favor. Find three men in your kingdom, a beggar who has nothing, a blind man that cannot see and a cripple with no legs. Dine them and wine them, and two of us will watch what happens.” The king agreed to this and immediately ordered that such three men be found. He then placed them at the king’s table and best food and best wines were brought in front of them.

Black door of fear

"If you listen to your fears, you will die never knowing what a great person you might have been."

- Robert H. Schuller

Once upon a time, a terrible and ruthless king waged war on neighboring kingdoms. During war, all captured spies were treated the same. Any captured spy was sentenced to death, but the king had fallen upon a strange custom. He permitted the condemned spy to make a choice. He could either face a firing squad or pass through the big black door covered in engravings of gruesome scenes of torture.

As the moment of execution drew near, the king ordered the spy brought before him for a short, final interview, the primary purpose of which was to receive the answer to his query. "You can choose, either you will die by the arrows of the firing squad, or ... you can pass through those big black door and never have a chance to walk back. Which shall it be?"

If I had known this...

O! What men dare do! What men may do! What men daily do, not knowing what they do!

- William Shakespeare

Once upon a time, king with his large entourage went sailing across the sea. On the second night of a journey, a terrible storm struck and the ship sunk. Only the king, his queen and youngest daughter managed to wash ashore at some small village in a far away land.

In this land, nobody has ever heard about his kingdom and he had no money with which to support the family. They were even afraid to acknowledge that they were a royal family. Since they had to eat, the king went looking for work and, being the king, he did not have any usable skill. Only job he managed to get was a shepherd, taking care of the village’s sheep.

Several years passed and the prince of this country arrived in the village where they lived. He noticed the king’s daughter, which has grown into a very beautiful girl, and vowed that he will marry no other girl but the shepherd's daughter.

His father, the king, tried to dissuade him, but seeing that the prince was unwavering, he sent envoys to the shepherd, asking his daughter to marry a prince. The shepherd received the envoys, thanked them for this offer and asked what handcraft was the prince skilled in? The envoys were outraged. “What need does the prince and future king have for a craft? He has lands and servants!”