Painting the Mirror

The Chinese said to the sultan, "We are the better artists" and the Rumis rejoined, "We have greater skill and aesthetic sense."
The sultan decided to set them a challenge to settle the matter and gave each a room with a curtain separating them. The Chinese asked the sultan for a hundred different colors, gold and silver and gems. The Rumis asked only for polish and polishing cloth and shut themselves in their room and polished industriously. When the Chinese finished their work, the sultan entered and looked at the pictures they had painted. He was awed by the sight. Then the Rumis raised the curtain that seperated the rooms. The reflection of the Chinese paintings fell on their polished walls and all that the sultan had seen before seemed even more beautiful there. The Rumis are the Sufis who without formal learning, have purified their hearts from every trace of greed, lust, envy and hatred.
The Masnavi, Volume I:3467-84