Lear's lack of self-knowledge at the beginning of the play has devastating consequences. In the first scene we see the strongest statement reflecting a lack of self-knowledge. In order to share his kingdom, the largest piece in the middle going to Cordelia, with her future husband. King Lear thinks up a sophisticated plan. He organizes a public “love contest” between his daughters, and the one who says she loves him the most gets the most land. Thinking about it, his favorite daughter, Cordelia, will declare that she loves him the most. With this plan, King Lear is trying to prevent his country from collapsing, and through this competition he believes he will gain the public support he needs for this plan. Only the truth is irreconcilable with the demands of Lear's ego. When Cordelia does not say what Lear wants to hear, he bursts into anger and swears violently, disavowing Cordelia's fatherly care: “…by the sacred radiance of the sun, The mysteries of Hecat and of the night; By all the operations of the orbs by which we exist and cease to be.” Lear chases Cordelia from his heart, calling her a "barbaric Scythian." His hatred goes beyond the notion of equality in love, it testifies to an egocentric love which demands more from the other than from oneself. With Lear's actions we can see that he cannot recognize betrayal, loyalty, lies and truth, and that no one can tell him about them. Here, his lack of self-knowledge is the greatest in the play. The only one who can hold up a mirror and tell the king the truth about his behavior is the Fool. He is authorized to make any criticism without fear of reprisal. He is in fact Lear's outer conscience, telling the truth about his three daughters. The Fool has greater wisdom about the world and... middle of paper... he has the same needs as others. He learns the physical and moral needs of all humanity. Lear undresses and begins to see his status as king in a new way; “you are the thing itself; man without accommodation is nothing more than such a poor naked and forked animal…”. He now realizes that as king he is responsible for the social welfare of the state and that his actions have a political effect. The political effects of lacking self-knowledge in having “the contest of love” at the beginning of the play are as follows: King Lear fails politically. Cordelia's refusal to participate in the test destroys King Lear's public persona. In doing so, it destroys the public support King Lear needed for his plan. In addition to this political consequence, it destroys King Lear as a king, first outraged and then going mad, and it destroys his family.