The Mirrors of Vanity
Émilie had passed through the Hall of Mirrors, perhaps emboldened by the beauty of her new gown—hued like that famously vain creature. She questioned the room's thousand mirrors: "Oh, my sweet mirrors, who is the fairest?" And the reflections answered as one: "Me, of course."
Flattered and feeling coquettish, she pressed on, stoking her own vanity: "Who is the queen?" "Me, me, me," they replied again. Smiling, she strolled through the aisles of reflections. "Who is the leading lady? The fairest of queens? The sweetest of friends?" And tirelessly, fervently, they answered: "Me, of course."
Yet each was convinced it alone spoke truth. They began to argue: "Me—no, me—it's me—me, the queen—not you—me." Émilie stopped, taken aback. The reflections no longer paid her any heed. Soon they were vying and bickering, the hubbub swelling into a deafening clamor of competing egos, a whirlwind of narcissistic shouting that left her nauseous.
That was enough; she could no longer bear such ugly outbursts. "I do not belong here anymore," she told herself, though her heart grew heavy at leaving a place she had loved so dearly. Those echoes drew from her a single, pure tear—part sorrow, part pity for their sheer arrogance. So she chose to close the magnificent hall forever, never again to seek her own image there.
Farewell to reflections and gilding, to admiring gazes and flattery. The hubbub carried on inside, the mirrors still bickering—but at least the toxic poison of pride stayed contained. Émilie sighed: "Stay in your hall, gaze at yourselves for eternity, and as long as you remain there, you shall trouble no one else." She cast aside the peacock-hued gown and turned her back on that intoxicating ego.
Alas, there is no moral to this fable. Each will find their own meaning in this old tale—and perhaps a lesson too, provided vanity's reflection does not deny it to them.
x3