The world famous Paganini was scheduled to begin his violin recital, one evening, when he found that his Stradivarius violin had been stolen from its case and had been replaced with an old, ordinary violin. The audience was already seated and there was no time to go elsewhere and bring in another violin worthy of the maestro.
Undaunted , Paganini took the old instrument, tuned it to concert pitch and began to perform as if nothing untoward had happened. When he finished his recital, the audience gave him a standing ovation. Paganini then announced, “Friends, today I’ve performed on an old, ordinary violin; and, I’ve proved to you that the music is not in the instrument but in the maestro!”
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Abraham Lincoln as the newly elected president of America stood up for his first presidential address on the first day. As he was about to begin one of the aristocrats in the senate got up and said: “Mr President, you should not forget that your father used to make shoes for my family.” The whole senate laughed, thinking that they had made a fool of Abraham Lincoln.
Lincoln with his usual humility and wit looked at the man and said, “Sir, I know that my father used to make shoes for your family and many others here…He was an unmatched cobbler who put the heart into his work. I want to ask you, have you got any complaint? If you have any complaint I can make another pair of shoes because I too am a good cobbler. But I know that nobody has ever complained about my father’s shoes and so I am proud of my father and my lineage!” The whole senate was speechless.
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