There was a Rajpurohit. He was highly respected in the state due to his knowledge of many disciplines. Great scholars had respect for him, but he did not have the slightest ego of his knowledge.
He believed that the combination of knowledge and character is the only true path to worldly and spiritual progress.
Not only about the subjects, did the king himself also respect him and when he came, he used to get up and provide a seat.
Once there was a curiosity in the mind of the royal priest that he gets respect and respect in the court because of his knowledge or because of his character?
To solve this curiosity, he made a plan.
To execute the plan, the Rajpurohit went to see the king’s treasury.
While returning after seeing the treasure, he picked up five precious pearls from the treasure and kept them with him. The cashier just kept watching. There may be greed for money in the mind of Rajpurohit. The cashier had not even thought of it in a dream. His day passed in the same mess.
On the second day, while returning from the court, the royal priest again turned to the treasury and he again picked up five pearls and kept them with him. Now the reverence which was earlier in the mind of the treasurer towards the Rajpurohit started getting eroded.
On the third day when the same incident happened again, the dam of his patience was broken. His suspicion turned into a belief that the Rajpurohit’s intentions were definitely spoiled. He informed the king about the incident. The king was shocked by this information. The statue of respect for the Rajpurohit which was already established in his mind was shattered to pieces.
On the fourth day when the Rajpurohit came to the meeting, the king did not rise from the throne as before, nor did he greet the Rajpurohit, even the king did not even look at him. Rajpurohit immediately understood that now the plan is paying off. The purpose for which he had picked up the pearls seemed to be being fulfilled now.
Thinking this, Rajpurohit quietly sat down on his seat. After the completion of the proceedings of the Rajya Sabha, when the Rajpurohit, like other courtiers, got up and started going to his house, the king ordered him to stay for some time.
After all the members had left, the king asked them – ‘I have heard that you have done something wrong in the treasury’.
When the Rajpurohit remained silent on this question, the king’s anger increased further.
This time he said in a loud voice – ‘Have you picked up some pearls from the treasure?’
Rajpurohit accepted the matter of lifting the pearl.
The next question of the king was – ‘How many pearls did you pick up and how many times?’
The king again asked – ‘Where are those pearls?’
The priest took out a cauldron from his pocket and placed it in front of the king, which contained fifteen pearls in total.
Feelings of anger, sadness and surprise emerged simultaneously in the mind of the king.*
The king said – ‘Rajpurohit ji, why did you do such a wrong thing?
Have you not paid even the slightest attention to the dignity of your position?
Are you not ashamed of doing this?
You have lost your life long reputation by doing this.
Tell me something, why did you do this?
Seeing the king’s indifference and eagerness, the Rajpurohit explained the whole thing to the king in detail and, expressing happiness, said to the king –
‘Rajan, just to test who is great in knowledge and character, I picked up pearls from your treasury now. I have become incapacitated. Not only this, today my faith in the character has increased more than before.
The love and respect I have received so far from you and your people. All that was not because of knowledge but because of character. The most valuable thing in your treasure is character, not gold or silver or diamonds and pearls.
Therefore, I want you to give more and more encouragement to the people of character in your state so that the value of character keeps increasing progressively. That’s why it is said that -*
Money gone, nothing gone,
Health gone, something gone.
If the character is gone, everything is gone.