The Value Of A Pearl

In a garden a rooster saw an iridescent pearl hidden on the ground. He greedily pounced on it, dug it out and tried to force it down his gullet.

When he noticed that the shiny object was not the queen of the grains of rice, he spit the pearl out. He had certainly checked the pearl, but what kind of rice was it?

The pearl cried out to the rooster and said, “I am a lustrous, precious pearl. By chance I fell from a wonderful necklace and landed in this garden. There aren’t pearls like me everywhere. Not every ocean has marvelous pearls like me. Only chance threw me at your feet. One doesn’t find me like sand at the seashore. If you would look at me with the eyes of reason, you would see thousands of wonders and beauties.”

But the rooster crowed with a proud voice, “I’d give you away if someone would just trade me a grain of rice.”

The ego of the rooster, fell flat. Truly, the value of anything is determined by the need of the user. For a man dying of thirst, the most valuable thing would be a sip of water!