Beauty lies at the heart of the tea ceremony. Each object used must be beautiful. Special cups are made for this ceremony. Even to look on these cups is to be brought into a wider, calmer realm of the self.
The tea master Okakura KaKuzo has said that beauty evokes harmony and the mystery of mutual charity... . All that we call beautiful is a kind of vessel, like love, that holds what we know.
Truth is within ourselves; it takes no rise
From outward things, what'ere you may believe.
There is an inmost centre in us all,
Where truth abides in fulness; and around,
Wall upon wall, the gross flesh hems it in,
This perfect, clear perception -- which is truth ...
and to KNOW,
Rather consists in opening out a way
Whence the imprisoned splendor may escape,
Than in effecting entry for a light
Supposed to be without.