12 July 2026
Sunday
A great painter once came to a Prince and offered to do a fresco on the palace wall; behind him came another, who declared that he would paint on the wall opposite, whatever painting the first one drew, even if a curtain hid it from view and even if he was not told the subject of the fresco! Both were commissioned to the tasks they had accepted. The second man finished his work at the very moment, the first one announced that he had completed the task! The Prince arrived in the hall, where a thick curtain partitioned off the two artists and their paintings. He saw the fresco and admired it very much. Then he ordered that the curtain be removed, and lo, on the wall facing the fresco, there was an exact duplicate of the picture that the first man had so laboriously painted! Exact... because what he had done was polishing the wall and making it a fine big mirror! Make your hearts too clean and pure and smooth, so that the Glory of the Lord might be reflected therein, so that the Lord might see His own image thereon.
From Swami’s discourse of February 1963
A great painter once came to a Prince and offered to do a fresco on the palace wall; behind him came another, who declared that he would paint on the wall opposite, whatever painting the first one drew, even if a curtain hid it from view and even if he was not told the subject of the fresco! Both were commissioned to the tasks they had accepted. The second man finished his work at the very moment, the first one announced that he had completed the task! The Prince arrived in the hall, where a thick curtain partitioned off the two artists and their paintings. He saw the fresco and admired it very much. Then he ordered that the curtain be removed, and lo, on the wall facing the fresco, there was an exact duplicate of the picture that the first man had so laboriously painted! Exact... because what he had done was polishing the wall and making it a fine big mirror! Make your hearts too clean and pure and smooth, so that the Glory of the Lord might be reflected therein, so that the Lord might see His own image thereon.