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Old 06-23-2007, 04:34 PM   #15
Morthoron
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Originally Posted by Boromir88
So, the Orcs simply committed evil because they took pleasure from it and they got a kick out of it; rather pathetic wouldn't you say? And where is the controlled slave without their Dark Lord to order them around?

Quote:
As when death smites the swollen brooding thing that inhabits their crawling hill and holds them all in sway, ants will wander witless and purposeless than feebly die, so the creatures of Sauron, orc or troll or beast spell-enslaved, ran hither and thither mindless; and some slew themselves, or cast themselves in pits, or fled wailing back to hide in holes and dark lightless places far from hope.~The Field of Cormallen
Hmm...interesting.
Interesting though, that there were pockets of men, Easterlings and Haradrim, who fought on without quarter while others sued for mercy. Tolkien puts the slant on their actions that they were 'longest in evil servitude'; however, even with such authorial shading, one cannot help but see valor in these 'men proud and bold' a courage no less than that exhibited by the 'Captains of the West' when certain defeat and death stared hungrily at them.

Certainly, the Orcs were ruled out of fear -- of that there can be no doubt; yet, left to their own devices (as when ruled by Bolg to the North), they retained a malevolence and hatred for all things which is perhaps a calculated matter of breeding over countless generations.

In regards to Forodrim's new thought regarding the complimentary balance of evil, I would suggest that evil in Middle-earth was a pattered digression that mirrored in many ways the descent of the the free peoples from greatness to mundanity (the fading of Elves, the waning of the Numenoreans/Dunedain, etc.). Evil diminishes from Vala (Morgoth) to Maia (Sauron or Saruman) and eventually such great power disseminates into Men, the Aftercomers.
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