Just like a glorious flower

that’s both colorful and fragrant,

eloquent speech is fruitful

for one who acts on it.

Just as one would create many garlands

from a heap of flowers,

when a person has come to be born,

they should do many skillful things.

The fragrance of flowers doesn’t spread upwind,

nor sandalwood, pinwheel, or jasmine;

but the fragrance of the good spreads upwind;

a true person’s virtue spreads in every direction.

Among all the fragrances—

sandalwood or pinwheel

or lotus or jasmine—

the fragrance of virtue is supreme.

Faint is the fragrance

of sandal or pinwheel;

but the fragrance of the virtuous

floats to the highest gods.

For those accomplished in ethics,

meditating diligently,

freed through the highest knowledge,

Māra cannot find their path.

From a heap of trash

discarded on the highway,

a lotus might blossom,

fragrant and delightful.

So too, among those thought of as trash,

a disciple of the perfect Buddha

outshines with their wisdom

the blind ordinary folk.

Minor Collection Sayings of the Dhamma 60–75 5. The Fool