Your thought is a tree
rooted deep in the soil of tradition and whose branches grow in the
power of continuity.
My thought is a cloud moving in the space. It turns into drops
which, as they fall, form a brook that sings its way into the sea.
Then it rises as vapour into the sky.
Your thought is a fortress that neither gale nor the lightning can
shake.
My thought is a tender leaf that sways in every direction and finds
pleasure in its swaying.
Your thought is an ancient dogma that cannot change you nor can you
change it.
My thought is new, and it tests me and I test it morn and eve.
You have your
thought and I have mine.
Your thought allows
you to believe in the unequal contest of the strong against the weak,
and in the tricking of the simple by the subtle ones.
My thought creates in me the desire to till the earth with my hoe, and
harvest the crops with my sickle, and build my home with stones and
mortar, and weave my raiment with woollen and linen threads.
Your thought urges you to marry wealth and notability.
Mine commends self-reliance.
Your thought advocates fame and show.
Mine counsels me and implores me to cast aside notoriety and treat it
like a grain of sand cast upon the shore of eternity.
Your thought instils in your heart arrogance and superiority.
Mine plants within me love for peace and the desire for independence.
Your thought begets dreams of palaces with furniture of sandalwood
studded with jewels, and beds made of twisted silk threads.
My thought speaks softly in my ears, �Be clean in body and spirit even
if you have nowhere to lay your head.�
Your thought makes you aspire to titles and offices.
Mine exhorts me to humble service.
You have your
thought and I have mine.
Your thought is
social science, a religious and political dictionary.
Mine is simple axiom.
Your thought speaks of the beautiful woman, the ugly, the virtuous, the
prostitute, the intelligent, and the stupid.
Mine sees in every woman a mother, a sister, or a daughter of every man.
The subjects of your thought are thieves, criminals, and assassins.
Mine declares that thieves are the creatures of monopoly, criminals are
the offspring of tyrants, and assassins are akin to the slain.
Your thought describes laws, courts, judges, punishments.
Mine explains that when man makes a law, he either violates it or obeys
it. If there is a basic law, we are all one before it. He
who disdains the mean is himself mean. He who vaunts his scorn of
the sinful vaunts his disdain of all humanity.
Your thought concerns the skilled, the artist, the intellectual, the
philosopher, the priest.
Mine speaks of the loving and the affectionate, the sincere, the honest,
the forthright, the kindly, and the martyr.
Your thought advocates Judaism, Brahmanism, Buddhism, Christianity, and
Islam.
In my thought there is only one universal religion, whose varied paths
are but the fingers of the loving hand of the Supreme Being.
In your thought there are the rich, the poor, and the beggared.
My thought holds that there are no riches but life; that we are all
beggars, and no benefactor exists save life herself.
You have your
thought and I have mine.
According to your
thought, the greatness of nations lies in their politics, their parties,
their conferences, their alliances and treaties.
But mine proclaims that the importance of nations lies in work � work
in the field, work in the vineyards, work with the loom, work in the
tannery, work in the quarry, work in the timberyard, work in the office
and in the press.
Your thought holds that the glory of the nations is in their heroes.
It sings the praises of Rameses, Alexander, Caesar, Hannibal, and
Napoleon.
But mine claims that the real heroes are Confucius, Lao-Tse, Socrates,
Plato, Abi Taleb, El Gazali, Jalal Ed-din-el Roumy, Copernicus, and
Pasteur.
Your thought sees power in armies, cannons, battleships, submarines,
aeroplanes, and poison gas.
But mine asserts that power lies in reason, resolution, and truth.
No matter how long the tyrant endures, he will be the loser at the end.
Your thought differentiates between pragmatist and idealist, between the
part and the whole, between the mystic and materialist.
Mine realizes that life is one and its weights, measures and tables do
not coincide with your weights, measures and tables. He whom you
suppose an idealist may be a practical man.
You have your
thought and I have mine.
Your thought is
interested in ruins and museums, mummies and petrified objects.
But mine hovers in the ever-renewed haze and clouds.
Your thought is enthroned on skulls. Since you take pride in it,
you glorify it too.
My thought wanders in the obscure and distant valleys.
Your thought trumpets while you dance.
Mine prefers the anguish of death to your music and dancing.
Your thought is the thought of gossip and false pleasure.
Mine is the thought of him who is lost in his own country, of the alien
in his own nation, of the solitary among his kinfolk and friends.
You have your
thought and I have mine.
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