“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” Leonardo da Vinci. Adopted by Steve Jobs.
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A Cock scratched about to find a grain of food to eat for himself and his family, when he turned up a precious jewel.
“Alas!” said the Cock. “I am sure you are something valued by your owner, but I would rather have a single grain of barleycorn than all the jewels in the world.”
Moral of the Story: No benefit, no value. Value, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.
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Introduction – The Essential Aesop – Epilogue
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Why We Loved It: Oh, the powerful simplicity of these fables! This little fable is like a log cabin or straw manger: not an adorned grandiose tome, just a humble little story. But from it a great truth.
This teaching is a powerful reminder about value being a function of demand, and demand being a function of benefit to another. This concept is repeated over and over by the The Essential Aesop co-author Arnold Zegarelli as, “Don’t sell an empty bag,” meaning to give substantive benefits to others, and always give equal to or greater than the price. That is, don’t cheat anyone. Some people have phrased this concept as, “The Profitable Servant,” [1] which teaches to go beyond the even money, and beyond the expectation (something like, there’s no profit created for another in doing only what is expected). Some people call this, “going the extra mile.“
Perhaps it is more discretely viewed in world of business where money is tangible form of measure, but the concept is everywhere: fulfilling a need or a desire that creates demand. This fable reminds us that it’s not about our own profit, it’s about creating the profit for someone else, and, in this profit for another, the other finds value in us.
No art is perfect unto itself. Art does not serve itself. It just sits on the wall, until someone looks at it, feels it, and laughs or cries. Only then has art done its job.
“Water, water, everywhere, And all the boards did shrink; Water, water, everywhere, Nor any drop to drink.” ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” ~ Jesus, ONE: 576, [183]
“Nulla ars in se ipsa perfecta est.“; “Ars non servit sibi.”* ~grz
“Nulla ars in se ipsa perfecta est.” (“No art is perfect unto itself.”) “Ars non servit sibi.” (“Art does not serve itself.”) ~grz
[1] The ONE LinkedIn Reference Set [#GRZ_183]
© 2013 Arnold Zegarelli and Gregg Zegarelli, Esq. Gregg can be contacted through LinkedIn. Arnold Zegarelli can be contacted through Facebook.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/value-does-28-cock-jewel-essential-aesop-back-gregg-zegarelli-esq-
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