Today’s quotes:
Money sometimes makes fools of important persons, but it may also make important persons of fools.
– Walter Winchell
To fulfill a dream, to be allowed to sweat over lonely labor, to be given a chance to create, is the meat and potatoes of life. The money is the gravy.
– Bette Davis
The chief value of money lies in the fact that one lives in a world in which it is overestimated.
-H. L. Mencken
..and now, Kabir Day 24
The couplet , transliterated
Sabad barabar dhan nahin, jo koi janai bol |
Heere to daamai milai, sabad hi mol naa tol ||
Translation:
Speech is beyond price, if used sensibly |
Diamonds can be bought, speech cannot ||
My understanding:
Here, Kabir places money in perspective when compared to the value of speech (expression, the true reflection of a man’s core).
In very simple words, Kabir is telling us that honest speech is priced beyond all tender. Even the most expensive diamond has a price, for the real value of the diamond lies in the desire it arouses in the buyer. Desire demands satisfaction, which limits the value it generates (for if it is beyond reach, over a point of time it loses its value since the target will shift attention to something more attainable).
Speech, on the other hand, when reflecting the core values and beliefs of a person, is valueless since it is not being used to attract but rather as a statement for a purpose. History stands witness to the fact that it has always been the leader’s speech, not weapons or technology, that eventually won undying loyalty and the world’s various lands and riches.
So Kabir is exhorting us to nurture and build that treasure that can never be torn away from us!