Consider the lilies,
they neither toil nor spin;
yet Solomon's bride in all her glory
was not arrayed like one of those.
The famous silence of the Buddha:
Before a waiting, expectant congregation of monks
he came and stood before them silently
holding up a flower for them to contemplate.
The sage Teu-tzu one day pointed to a stone
lying near the temple gate, and remarked,
"Therein reside all the Buddhas
of the past, the present, and the future."
"Tongues in trees, books in running brooks,
sermons in stones....."
"An old pine tree preaches wisdom,
and a wild bird is crying out truth."
The flower is.
Beauty is not its own excuse for being;
it needs none.
{J.T.}
