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A man planted a rose and watered it faithfully, and before it blossomed, he
examined it. He saw the bud that would soon blossom and also the thorns.
And he thought, "How can any beautiful flower come from a plant burdened
with so many sharp thorns?" Saddened by this thought, he neglected to water
the rose, and before it was ready to bloom, it died.
So it is with many people. Within every soul there is a rose. The God like
qualities planted in us at birth growing amid the thorns of our faults.
Many of us look at ourselves and see only the thorns, the defects. We despair,
thinking that nothing good can possibly come from us. We neglect to water
the good within us, and eventually it dies. We never realize our potential.
Some people do not see the rose within themselves; someone else must show
it to them. One of the greatest gifts a person can possess is to be able
to reach past the thorns and find the rose within others.
This is the characteristic of love, to look at a person, and knowing his
faults, recognize the nobility in his soul, and help him realize that he
can overcome his faults. If we show him the rose, he will conquer the thorns.
Then will he blossom, blooming forth thirty, sixty, a hundred-fold as it
is given to him.
Our duty in this world is to help others by showing them their roses and
not their thorns. Only then can we achieve the love we should feel
for each other; only then can we bloom in our own garden.
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