The changing of work into play is effected as a consequence of the presence of a "zone of perpetual silence," where one draws from a sort of secret and intimate respiration, whose sweetness and freshness accomplishes the anointing of work and transforms it into play. For the "zone of silence" not only dignifies the soul at rest; there is contact with the heavenly or spiritual world, which works together with the soul. Those who find silence in the solitude of meditation without effort are never alone.
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.