Just Words, No Action
These days, paper is so common that wherever you look you will find at least one bit of it lying about. But these scraps of paper have no value. A currency note is also a bit of paper, but it has a definite value. Its value is so certain that no one can doubt it in the least. The difference between a currency note and any ordinary piece of paper is that in the case of the latter, no one has undertaken a guarantee to honour it, while the former carries a guarantee from the Government’s Bank. Every note has, printed on it, the promise that its bearer would be entitled to the full value that is printed on it. It is this guarantee that the Bank will honour the value of the note that provides value to the bit of paper that is the currency note.
The same is true for words. Today, we are surrounded by words all around us. But much of what we speak has no value at all. That is because these words are not accompanied by the guarantee of firm determination and sincerity. Someone promises to do some work for you, but when, at the appointed time, you ask him for help, he makes some excuse or the other, and in this way does not honour the value of his words. He had given you a bit of ‘paper’ in the form of a verbal promise, but when the time came, he was unwilling to engage in the action that was the true value of the words that formed his promise. His words were useless scraps of paper, and not a genuine bank-note.
People revel in the torrent of words that they let out, in the lofty promises that they make. But they are simply not willing to pay the practical price of their words, to honour their value. And so their utterances become just bits of scrap paper, like the waste paper that litters the streets, which people simply ignore.
Some people excel in passing resolution after resolution and issuing statement after statement in support of the oppressed, but when a single suffering person comes to their door asking for their help, they become as cold as an iceberg. How often it is that people’s words are not matched by their intentions! How often it is that people say things that they don’t really mean! How many people present themselves as models of decency and humility, but when their egos are bruised, they vent their jealousy and pride with a vengeance!
