Letters from a Farmer in Kaedrin (1741)

[Esterlen 4499]

 

 

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LETTERS FROM A FARMER IN KAEDRIN

to

The Inhabitants and Subjects of the Empire

on

The Brotherhood of Mankind

 

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10 S.E 1741

 

My dear countrymen,

 

I am a farmer, perhaps much more of a hobbyist than a subsistencer, settled with small-hold in the western reaches of the old Commonwealth. What I grow with the harvest, I mostly sell or supply to the militia, for I have been blessed to receive an education in jurisprudence and history, and have made a comfortable living as a solicitor-at-law. I am grateful to the Almighty for this privileged position, but I fear that many have not the same enthusiasm for the days of yore as I do. This I worry about, for as goes the old adage; those who do not study their history are doomed to repeat it. 

 

Since my youth, I have been a patriot, for not simply the land upon which I happen to reside but humanity as a whole. No student of history can finish his letters without becoming such, because when humanity is united and working towards a shared goal, anything is possible. The only circumstance in which this can be done is through a central, governing authority that both charters the rights of its subjects while also requiring them to, in part, defer their own interests to that of the collective and the whole. This is the purpose of Oren - a collaboration to achieve greatness. 

 

But what is Oren? In Flexio, ‘Orenia’ simply means ‘humanity’. To be an Orenian means nothing other than to be a human. This is an incontrovertible, undeniable state of being that cannot be muddied by denial or obfuscation: ergo, like it or not, if you are a human, you are an Orenian. There can be nothing less partisan or factional.

 

There are those unfortunate souls who persist to undermine this, to shift the definition of something that by nature is fixed for short-sighted political purposes. 

 

They will speak of Haense, Kaedrin, Curon, Helena and then Oren, as if Oren is some external entity and not the fatherland from which these other entities have sprung. 

 

There are those who wonder why Oren would rush to defend Haense from Nordling aggression, when they very easily could have stood aside and done nothing so as to save themselves the trouble. 

 

This is the most curious and ***** fiction that I have ever heard propagated. Because the Haeseni people, just like the Kaedreni people and the Curonian people and the Crownlander people, are all Orenians. An attack on one singular Haeseni from a singular pagan devil-worshipper is an attack on us all. It is the responsibility of the fatherland to protect its children, just as it is the responsibility of the children to contribute to the household and show filial piety. 

 

There exists a social contract between the governed party and the governing party, and our humanity is one comprised of constituent parts that are governed. Make no mistake, this is not some federation that can be simply torn apart by partisan interests, where the parties involved pick and choose which statutes they shall obey and which they shall find more convenient to ignore. We are an empire, one country, under one sovereign, with one law and the blessing of one deity. 

 

All of the heroes of yore, the figures of greatness that we hold aloft as our paragons, accept this. From Saint Thomas to Mirtok DeNurem to Andrik Vydra to Olivier de Savoie to Emperor Augustus, all believed in the brotherhood of humanity over all. 

 

 

(INSET: The Battle of Seahelm, where the Rurikid-Nordlings were defeated in the mid 16^th century by the army of John II. Marie-Antoine Dujardin, c. 1707)

 

We must protect our own to the very end, but we must also accept that we are in this together: before we are anything else, we must be Orenian and Imperial, working together and not against each other. Since the demise of the Fifth Empire, this dream has degraded, and so too has our quality of life. We are meaner, crueler, our living conditions smaller and more destitute. We are bitter, torn up between grudges and provincial rivalries, having lost sight of our common goal. The cities of Helena and Reza are, combined, only three-quarters as large as Johannesburg was by all historical accounts. 

 

We have become obsessed with titles, peerages, pride and systems of deference to nobility. That is not what to be Orenian ought to be about. It is about ordinary people, working together as a ship’s crew do, under the one captain who establishes its direction. Without the crew working together, there is mutiny and collapse. Without the captain’s direction, the ship is aimless and listless as it drifts across the great oceans of the world. 

 

We must depart, at last, from conflict between dynastic ambitions and feuding families. Many may read this letter and think of writing back to me with an excuse, justifying what is tantamount to race treason through rhetoric or legal fiction. To say ‘my rival did this first, and so I am righteous’ is no argument at all. That is tribalism of the greatest form. 

 

There are some who have become so caught up in the force of arms that they believe to kill is to be inherently right. There has never been a more dangerous fiction in our history. Without law and righteousness, to take up arms and shed blood is nothing more than tribal warfare. If we do not protect those who must be protected from undue harm or if we raise our blades merely because we can, we are no different to animals. If we do not conduct ourselves with true righteousness, lawful integrity and patriotism above all, we are damned souls who shall burn for all eternity. 

 

I believe in our country and the betterment of humanity above all. I implore you as my countrymen to heed this philosophy.

 

Yours sincerely,

A farmer in Kaedrin.

[The King Of The Moon 7016]

“Ave Kaedrin, Ave Orenia.” cites the young prince, Leopold Helvets.

[Axelu 4333]

Anabel, the young Ruberni Princess in purposeful exile, peruses the missive keenly within the apartments in her mother Ester’s homestead. She’d smile, keeping the text to her bosom. ”Perhaps if Marius reads this, he’ll come to his senses..” 

[wolfdwg 2677]

A Renatian Landschneckt named Joah,  whilst campaigning in the Kaedrin-Ves, would come across this parchment and read it over, “The farmer has heart, but I fear this will not come true until a strong man like John the First comes around. Perhaps then I would pledge my sword to a man like that.”

[Cracker 4570]

It was in Varoche Hall where Simon Basrid mused to his young cupbearer, Henrietta of Alstion, the truth in the Kaedreni farmer’s words.

 

“Men will study Armas and lament he was not born but a century earlier.” 

[Ajax 335]

Amathion is proud to know even farmers learnedto read

[Reckless Banzai Screamer 15456]

“Wipe the slate clean and kill all the blue bloods!” Shouts less educated farmer.