In Quest of the Beautiful

There was once a woman who worked for the queen. The queen trusted her immensely. While sweeping the queen’s room, the woman would sometimes find pearls or gold beads that had fallen from the queen’s various necklaces and other jewelry. She faithfully restored them to the queen, and in gratitude, the queen allowed her to keep a few precious items for herself.

The woman’s little son lived with his maternal uncle in a distant village because the uncle was a teacher, and several boys lived with him for their education. One day, the boy returned to his parents. At night, he saw the pearls and gold beads his mother had stored. “How beautiful these are!” he exclaimed, handling the glittering objects. “They are beautiful, my son, but only if you see the queen adorned with similar and more precious things will you know what true beauty is,” his mother remarked. “She is the most beautiful of anything I’ve known.”

The boy fell silent and seemed lost in thought. He was missing the next morning, and his anxious parents began to search for him. The neighbors also joined in the search for the boy, but he was nowhere to be found.

Years later, the mother received a message from her lost son: “Mother, I have heard from my uncle that the sun, the moon, the stars, and the sky are all ornaments of God. Your statement about the queen being more beautiful than her ornaments inspired me in a different way. If the sun, the moon, and the stars are so beautiful, how magnificent must God be, who created them! I went out in search of Him, and you will be happy to learn that I have found Him. He is so magnificent that words cannot describe His charm.”

The mother wept, but she was also happy that her son had achieved what very few could.