Some people believe that money and greed seem to be the root of all evil. This in fact may be true, but, what causes people to behave in such a manner to where money controls their behavior? Manipulating and deceiving people out of their hard earned money is very frowned upon but somehow people get away with it and it still happens like nothing. Money and greed bring out the darkest part out of people’s souls and make them think in such an evil devilish way that they have never thought before. Some people will do anything for money and commit such crimes to the point where they do not care as long as their pockets are looking very healthy. In “The Pardoner’s Tale” by Geoffrey Chaucer from the Canterbury Tales, he tells a story about a corrupt
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He states that, “At once the three young rioters began / To run, and reached the tree, and there they found / A pile of golden florins on the ground, / New-coined, eight bushels of them as they thought. / No longer was it Death those fellows sought” (lines 190-194). The original plan is to find Death and to kill him as soon as they encounter him. That plan changes as soon as they find all of those golden coins lying by the tree, they no longer want to find Death but instead find a way to take it back to their homes because their greedy unperceptive minds get in the way of the original plan. The story takes a little twist when one of the three rioters tells another: “Now let me tell you where your profit lies; / You know our friend has gone to get supplies / And here’s a lot of gold that is to be / Divided equally amongst us three. / Nevertheless, if I could shape things thus / So that we shared it out – the two of us - / Wouldn’t you take it as a friendly act?” (lines 231-237). The greediness of one of the rioters hit him as soon as the youngest one leaves for town to fetch bread and wine for the other two rioters. Instead of splitting it equally in between the three of them, he now wants to split it in between him and the other rioter that stays behind by the tree to protect the treasure. The greed is getting into the rioter’s heads and now there are no limits on how they are going to act in order to split the wealth they encounter as they wish. A critic states, “Or did he realize that there was gold there that would result in their finding death, but not how they expected? If we take the last option to be true, the old man deliberately sent the three 'brothers' to the gold, knowing how it would corrupt them and that their love for money would result in their deaths” (King). King is insisting that the Old Man in “The Pardoner’s Tale” knows what he is doing when he sends the three rioters to the
He states that, “At once the three young rioters began / To run, and reached the tree, and there they found / A pile of golden florins on the ground, / New-coined, eight bushels of them as they thought. / No longer was it Death those fellows sought” (lines 190-194). The original plan is to find Death and to kill him as soon as they encounter him. That plan changes as soon as they find all of those golden coins lying by the tree, they no longer want to find Death but instead find a way to take it back to their homes because their greedy unperceptive minds get in the way of the original plan. The story takes a little twist when one of the three rioters tells another: “Now let me tell you where your profit lies; / You know our friend has gone to get supplies / And here’s a lot of gold that is to be / Divided equally amongst us three. / Nevertheless, if I could shape things thus / So that we shared it out – the two of us - / Wouldn’t you take it as a friendly act?” (lines 231-237). The greediness of one of the rioters hit him as soon as the youngest one leaves for town to fetch bread and wine for the other two rioters. Instead of splitting it equally in between the three of them, he now wants to split it in between him and the other rioter that stays behind by the tree to protect the treasure. The greed is getting into the rioter’s heads and now there are no limits on how they are going to act in order to split the wealth they encounter as they wish. A critic states, “Or did he realize that there was gold there that would result in their finding death, but not how they expected? If we take the last option to be true, the old man deliberately sent the three 'brothers' to the gold, knowing how it would corrupt them and that their love for money would result in their deaths” (King). King is insisting that the Old Man in “The Pardoner’s Tale” knows what he is doing when he sends the three rioters to the