(urth) Serpents and Undines

[David Stockhoff]

Vodalus also desired to be autarch (per Thea's remarks). If Vodalus 
simply wants to put the exultants in charge, is everything else he says 
bullshit? And how do we know?

Jeff Wilson wrote:
> On 7/31/2010 1:03 PM, David Stockhoff wrote:
>> I wonder, given the way Vodalus talks, if his path isn't almost the
>> better one. He speaks of the sun hiding the stars that are our proper
>> heritage, of how his masters wait until humanity is purified, and how
>> vile are the actions of the Autarch.
>>
>> So although, yes, one side is nominally "white" and the other nominally
>> "black" (as Vodalus himself puts it), the outcome seems pretty win-win,
>> or equal parts lose-lose. Is it surprising the undines help Severian and
>> Erebus/Abaia don't kill him? Doesn't Vodalus win when Severian is on the
>> throne, and is not the Commonwealth thus defeated and occupied?
>
> Vodalus fails in his ambition to upset the rule of the Autarch and put 
> the Exultants in charge. The rest of the counter-changed patchwork of 
> good deeds by evil forces and misfortunes at the hands of the 
> righteous is the inevitable consequence of created existence, 
> selectively played up by Vodalus to propagandize the uncommitted.
>
> It's basic Qabbalism that in every good thing on earth there is some 
> evil, but likewise some good can come of any evil act, and this 
> "impurity" is in fact vital to give things balance and what we call 
> tropisms today. The renewed sun does hide the stars, yes, but only 
> during the day, they remain visbile at night as is proper, and their 
> limited accessibility makes them all the more precious for their use 
> in navigation, time-keeping, and divination. To serve the good at the 
> cost of evil and misfortune is part of what gives it value; if to help 
> others had an immediate prospect of repayment in kind it wouldn't be 
> kindness so much as commerce, which is why kindness to animals was 
> seen as the higher virtue, without hope of reward.
>