A Parable of Sorts

One day in the jungle a cobra slithered up to the river's edge. An alligator swam by and offered to let the cobra ride on his back to the other side.

"No thank you," said the cobra. "If I leave dry land I will be at your mercy, and you will eat me once we are in the middle of the river."

"I promise to you that I will not," said the alligator. Grudingly, the cobra agreed and slithered onto the alligator's back.

"If you try to eat me, it is my nature to defend myself. I will bite you," warned the cobra. "If you do not honor your promise we'll both die."

The alligator pushed off of the bank and began swimming to the other side. At the halfway point, the alligator spun around and trapped the cobra in his jaws. The cobra began biting the alligator, filling him with venom.

"Why?" asked the cobra, bloody and bitten nearly in half. "We are both doomed now because you did not keep your word. Why would you attack me knowing that if you did it would destroy us both?"

The alligator, his veins filled with deadly poison, said simply, "Because it is my nature." He rolled over once weakly and they both floated helplessly downstream.