The Greatest Jewel of All

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At the beginning of the eighteenth century, a soldier belonging to one of the French garrisons in India became enamored of the eyes of Brahma, in the Temple of Seringham. These eyes were diamonds, and were the most brilliant in all the East. Their luster captivated the soldier’s soul. He haunted the temple and pretended to yield to the might of the god, and become a convert to his worship. The priests so far believed in him that he was admitted to some care of the temple. They doubtless thought Brahma would be able to protect his own eyes. But on a stormy night the soldier disappeared, and with him one of the idol’s eyes, the other having resisted all his efforts to dislodge it. So Brahma was left squinting, and the treacherous Frenchman sold his prize to a captain in the English navy for ten thousand dollars. A shrewd Armenian merchant paid fifty thousand dollars for it, and sold it to County Gregory for Catherine of Russia for four hundred thousand dollars. That was the origin of the famous Orloff diamond. The most splendid jewel in the world, however, is not a diamond, but a pearl. Jesus calls it the Pearl of Great Price (Matt. 13:45–49). He declares that a man is wise who sells all he has in order to purchase that pearl. It is the Pearl of Salvation, and the poorest man in the world may purchase it as easily as a king on his throne, but the conditions are always the same, the surrender of the whole heart and life to Jesus.

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