One day Falsehood was arguing with Pravda: which is better to live - falsehood or truth? Krivda said: it is better to live in lies, but Truth argued: it is better to live in truth. They argued and argued, but no one could argue.
Krivda says:
- Let's go to the clerk, he will judge us!
“Let’s go,” Pravda answers. So we came to the clerk.
“Settle our dispute,” says Krivda, “what is better to live - by lies or by truth?”
The clerk asked:
-What are you fighting about?
- About a hundred rubles.
- Well, you, Pravda, made a bet: in our time it is better to live in lies.
Pravda took a hundred rubles out of her pocket and gave it to Krivda, but she still stood her ground that it was better to live by the truth.
- Let's go to the judge, how will he decide? - says Krivda. “If it’s your opinion, I’ll pay you a thousand rubles, but if it’s my opinion, you must give me both eyes.”
- Okay, let's go.
They came to the judge and began to ask: what is the best way to live?
The judge said the same thing:
- Nowadays it is better to live in lies.
- Give me your eyes! - says Krivda to Pravda; she gouged out her eyes and went wherever she knew.
Truth remained, eyeless, fell face down to the ground and crawled gropingly. She crawled to the swamp and lay down in the grass. At midnight, an infidel force gathered there. The big one began to ask everyone: who did what? Who says - I lost my soul; whoever says that I embarrassed him; and Krivda, in turn, boasts:
“I bet Pravda a hundred rubles and gouged out my eyes!”
- What eyes! - says the big one. - If you rub it with local grass, your eyes will appear again!
The truth lies and listens.
Suddenly the roosters crowed, and the faithless force disappeared at once. True, I picked some grass and started rubbing my eyes: I rubbed one, rubbed the other - and I began to see as before; I took this herb with me and went on my way.
At this time, one king’s daughter became blind, and he made a cry: whoever cures the princess will give her in marriage. Truth applied the grass to her eyes, rubbed it and cured it; the king was delighted, married Pravda to his daughter and took her to his house...
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru