Once there was a king
who had presented his daughter, the princess, with a beautiful diamond
necklace. The necklace was stolen and his people in the kingdom
searched everywhere but could not find it. Some said a bird might have
stolen it. The king then asked them all to search for it and put a reward of 50,000 gold coins for anyone who found it.

One day a clerk was walking home
along a river next to an industrial area. This river was completely
polluted, filthy and smelly. As he was walking, the clerk saw a
shimmering in the river and when he looked, he saw the diamond
necklace. He decided to try and catch it so that he could get the 50,000 gold coin reward. He put his hand in the filthy, dirty river and grabbed
at the necklace, but some how missed it and didn't catch it. He took
his hand out and looked again and the necklace was still there. He
tried again, this time he walked in the river and dirtied his pants in
the filthy river and put his whole arm in to catch the necklace. But
strangely, he still missed the necklace! He came out and started
walking away, feeling depressed.

Then again he saw the necklace, right
there. This time he was determined to get it, no matter what. He
decided to plunge into the river, although it was a disgusting thing to
do as the river was polluted, and his whole body would become filthy.
He plunged in, and searched everywhere for the necklace and yet he
failed. This time he was really bewildered and came out feeling very
depressed that he could not get the necklace that would get him50,000 gold coin.

Just then a saint who was walking by,
saw him, and asked him what was the matter. The clerk didn't want to
share the secret with the saint, thinking the saint might take the
necklace for himself, so he refused to tell the saint anything. But the
saint could see this man was troubled and being compassionate, again
asked the clerk to tell him the problem and promised that he would not
tell anyone about it. The clerk mustered some courage and decided to
put some faith in the saint. He told the saint about the necklace and
how he tried and tried to catch it, but kept failing. The saint then
told him that perhaps he should try looking upward, toward the branches
of the tree, instead of in the filthy river. The clerk looked up and
true enough, the necklace was dangling on the branch of a tree. He had
been trying to capture a mere reflection of the real necklace all this
time.

Moral of the story:

Material happiness is just like the filthy, polluted river; because it is a mere reflection of the TRUE happiness in the spiritual world.