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  "work": {
    "slug": "rumi-masnavi",
    "name": "Masnavi-i-Manavi (Rumi)"
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  "parents": [
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      "slug": "sufism",
      "name": "Sufi Poets",
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  "chapter": {
    "num": 4,
    "slug": "04-the-masnavi-book-iv",
    "title": "The Masnavi Book IV",
    "of": 6,
    "words": 15676,
    "text": "## The Masnavi Book IV\n\n\n\nTHE SPIRITUAL COUPLETS\nOF\nMAULANA JALALU-'D-DlN MUHAMMAD RUMI\n\nBook IV.\n\nSTORY I.\nThe Lover and his Mistress.\n\nTHE fourth book begins with an address to Husamu-'d-Din, and this is followed by the story of the lover and his mistress, already commenced in the third book. A certain lover had been separated from his mistress for the space of seven years, during which he never relaxed his efforts to find her. At last his constancy and perseverance were rewarded, in accordance with the promises \"The seeker shall find,\" and \"Whoso shall have wrought an atom's weight of good shall behold it.\" 1 One night, as he was wandering through the city, he was pursued by the patrol, and, in order to escape them, took refuge in a garden, where he found his long-sought mistress. This occasioned him to reflect how often men \"hate the things that are good for them,\" 2 and led him to bless the rough patrol who had procured him the bliss of meeting with his mistress.\nApropos of this, an anecdote is told of a preacher who was in the habit of blessing robbers and oppressors, because their evil example had turned him to righteousness. The moment the lover found himself alone with his mistress, he attempted to embrace her, but his mistress repulsed him, saying, that though no men 'were present, yet the wind was blowing and that showed that God, the mover of the wind, was also present. The lover replied, \"It may be I am lacking in good manners, but I am not lacking in constancy and fidelity towards you.\" His mistress replied, \"One must judge of the hidden by the manifest; I see for myself that your outward behavior is bad, and thence I cannot but infer that your boast of hidden virtues is not warranted by actual facts. You are ashamed to misconduct yourself in the sight of men, but have no scruple to do so in the presence of the All-seeing God, and hence I doubt the existence of the virtuous sentiments which you claim to possess, but which can only be known to yourself.\" To illustrate this, she told the story of a Sufi and his faithless wife. This wife was one day entertaining a paramour, when she was surprised by the sudden return of her husband. On the spur of the moment she threw a woman's dress over her paramour and presented him to her husband as a rich lady who had come to propose a marriage between her son and the Sufi's daughter, saying she did not care for wealth, but only regarded modesty and rectitude of conduct. To this the Sufi replied, that as from her coming unattended it was plain that the lady had not the wealth she pretended to have, it was more than probable that her pretensions to extraordinary modesty and humility were also fictitious. The lover then proceeded to excuse himself by the plea that he had wished to test his mistress, and ascertain for himself whether she was a modest woman or not. He said he of course knew beforehand that she would prove to be a modest woman, but still he wished to have ocular demonstration of the fact. His mistress reproved him for trying to deceive her with false pretences, assuring him that, after he had been detected in a fault, his only proper course was to confess it, as Adam had done. Moreover, she added that an attempt to put her to the test would have been an extremely unworthy proceeding, only to be paralleled by Abu Jahl's attempt to prove the truth of the Prophet's claims by calling on him to perform a miracle.\nThe soul of good in things evil. Evil only relative.\nThe lover invoked blessings on that rough patrol,\nBecause their harshness had wrought bliss for him.\nThey were poison to most men, but sweets to him,\nBecause those harsh ones had united him with his love.\nIn the world there is nothing absolutely bad;\nKnow, moreover, evil is only relative.\nIn the world there is neither poison nor antidote,\nWhich is not a foot to one and a fetter to another;\nTo one the power of moving, to another a clog;\nTo one a poison, to another an antidote.\nSerpents' poison is life to serpents,\nIn relation to mankind it is death.\nTo the creatures of the sea the sea is a garden,\nTo the creatures of the land it is fatal.\nIn the same way, O man, reckon up with intelligence\nThe relations of these things in endless variety.\nIn relation to this man Zaid is as Satan,\nIn relation to another he is as a Sultan.\nThe latter calls Zaid a sincere Mussulman,\nThe former calls him a Gueber deserving to be killed.\nZaid, one and the same person, is life to the one,\nAnd to the other an annoyance and a pest.\nIf you desire that God may be pleasing to you,\nThen look at Him with the eyes of them that love Him.\nLook not at that Beauty with your own eyes,\nLook at that Object of desire with His votaries' eyes;\nShut your own eyes from beholding that sweet Object,\nAnd borrow from His admirers their eyes;\nNay, borrow from Him both eyes and sight,\nAnd with those eyes of His look upon His face,\nIn order that you may not be disappointed with the sight.\nGod says, \"Whoso is God's, God also is his.\"\nGod says, \"I am his eye, his hand, his heart,\" 3\nThat his good fortune may emerge from adversity.\nWhatsoever is hateful to you, if it should lead you\nTo your beloved, at once becomes agreeable to you.\nWhy God is named \"Hearing,\" \"Seeing\" and \"Knowing\".\nGod calls himself \"Seeing,\" to the end that\nHis eye may every moment scare you from sinning.\nGod calls himself \"Hearing,\" to the end that\nYou may close your lips against foul discourse.\nGod calls himself \"Knowing,\" to the end that\nYou may be afraid to plot evil.\nThese names are not mere accidental names of God,\nAs a negro may be called Kafu'r (white);\nThey are names derived from God's essential attributes,\nNot mere vain titles of the First Cause.\nFor if so, they would be only empty pleasantries,\nLike calling the deaf a hearer and the blind a seer,\nOr a name like \"impudent\" for a modest man,\nOr \"beautiful\" for an ugly negro,\nOr such a title as \"Haji\" for a new-born boy,\nOr that of \"Ghazi\" applied to a noble idler.\nIf such titles as these are used in praising persons\nWho do not possess the qualities implied, 'tis wrong;\n'Twould be jesting or mockery or madness.\n\"God is exalted above\" what is said by evil men. 4\nI knew you before I met you face to face;\nThat you had a fair face but an evil heart;\nYea, I knew you before I saw you,\nThat you were rooted in iniquity through guile.\nWhen my eye is red owing to inflammation,\nI know 'tis so from the pain, though I see it not.\nYou regarded me as a lamb without a shepherd;\nYou fancied that I had no guardian.\nLovers have suffered chastisement for this cause,\nThat they have cast ill-timed looks at fair ones.\nThey have supposed the fawn to have no shepherd,\nThey have supposed the captive to be going a begging;\nTill in the twinkling of an eye an arrow pierces them,\nSaying, \"I am her guardian; look not at her rashly!\"\nWhat! am I less than a lamb or a fallow deer,\nThat I should have none to shepherd me?\nNay, I have a Guardian worthy of dominion,\nWho knows every wind that blows upon me.\nHe is aware whether that wind is chill or mild,\nHe is not ignorant nor absent, O mean one.\nThe carnal soul is made by God blind and deaf;\nI saw with the heart's eye your blindness afar off.\nFor this cause I never inquired about you for eight years\nBecause I saw you filled with ignorance and duplicity.\nWhy indeed should I inquire about one in the furnace,\nWho is bowed down with reproach, like yourself?\nComparison of the world to a bath stove,\nand of piety to the hot bath.\nThe lust of the world is like a bath stove,\nWhereby the bath of piety is heated;\nBut the lot of the pious is purity from the stove's filth,\nBecause they dwell in the bath and in cleanliness.\nThe rich are as those that carry dung\nTo heat the furnace of the bath withal.\nGod has instilled into them cupidity,\nThat the bath may be warmed and pleasant.\nQuit this stove and push on into the bath;\nKnow quitting the stove to be the bath itself.\nWhoso is in the stove-room is as a servant\nTo him who is temperate and prudent.\nYour lust is as fire in the world,\nWith a hundred greedy mouths wide open.\nIn the judgment of reason this gold is foul dung,\nAlthough, like dung, it serves to kindle the fire.\nWhoso was born in the stove-room and never saw purity,\nThe smell of sweet musk is disagreeable to him.\nIn illustration of this, a story follows of a tanner who was accustomed to bad smells in the course of his trade, and who was half killed by the smell of musk in the bazaar of the perfumers, but was cured by the accustomed smell of dung.\n*NOTES:\n1. Koran xcix. 7.\n2. Koran ii. 213.\n3. \"My servant draws nigh to me by pious deeds till I love him, and, when I love him, I am his eye, his ear, his tongue, his foot, his hand, and by me he sees, hears, talks, walks, and feels.\" Hadis.\n4. Cp. Koran xvi 3.\n\nSTORY II.\nThe Building of the \"Most Remote Temple\" at Jerusalem.\nKing David purposed to build a temple at Jerusalem, but was forbidden to do so by a divine voice, because he had been a man of blood. But, it was added, the work should be accomplished by his son Solomon, and Solomon's work would be reckoned the same as David's, in accordance with the texts, \"The faithful are brethren,\" and \"Sages are as a single soul,\" and \"We make no distinction between any of the apostles.\" 1 Accordingly, when Solomon came to the throne, he set about the building, which was attended with many miraculous circumstances, e.g., the stones in the quarry crying out and moving of themselves to the site of the temple. Bilqis, Queen of Saba, sent Solomon a present of forty camels laden with ingots of gold; but Solomon would not receive them, and sent her messengers back with a letter commanding her to abandon the worship of the sun and embrace Islam. 2 At the same time he charged the messengers to report fully to the Queen all they had seen in his kingdom, and to urge her to comply with his commands to renounce her sovereignty and present herself in all humility at his court. As she delayed to come, Solomon again sent to assure her that he had no sinister views regarding her, and desired her attendance at his court solely for her own spiritual benefit. At last Bilqis renounced her royal state and cast away all care for worldly things, and, impelled by earnest desire to learn the true faith, presented herself at the court of King Solomon. Then Solomon commanded that the throne of Bilqis should be brought from Saba, and an 'Afrit offered to fetch it, but Asaf, the vizier anticipated him. 3 Afterwards Solomon proceeded with the building of the temple, wherein he was assisted by devils and fairies. Then God tried Solomon by placing on his throne a false counterpart of him. His miracle working signet was stolen by a devil named Sakhar who thereupon assumed his shape and personated him for forty days, during which Solomon had to wander about and beg his bread. After this he regained his throne, and having completed the temple, began to worship therein. One day he observed that a tuft of coarse grass had sprung up in a corner of the temple, and he was greatly distressed because he thought it portended the ruin of the building, but he took comfort from the thought that while he himself lived the temple would not be allowed to fall into ruin; so long as he lived, at least, he would root up all evil weeds that threatened the safety of the temple, as well the temple built with hands as the spiritual temple in his heart.\nIn the course of this story, which is told at great length, there occur anecdotes of the beginning of the reign of 'Othman, of the miracles of 'Abdullah Moghrabi, and others, of which abstracts are given below.\nThough philosophers call man the microcosm, divines call him the macrocosm.\nIn outward form thou art the microcosm,\nBut in reality the macrocosm. 4\nSeemingly the bough is the cause of the fruit, 5\nBut really the bough exists because of the fruit.\nWere he not impelled by desire of fruit,\nThe gardener would never have planted the tree.\nTherefore in reality the tree is born from the fruit,\nThough seemingly the fruit is born from the tree.\nFor this cause Mustafa said, \"Adam and all prophets\nAre my followers and gather under my standard.\nThough to outward view I am a son of Adam,\nIn reality I am his first forefather,\nBecause the angels worshipped him for my sake,\nAnd 'twas in my footsteps that he ascended to heaven.\nHence in reality our first parent was my offspring,\nAs in reality the tree is born of its own fruit.\"\nWhat is first in thought is last in act.\nThought is the special attribute of the Eternal.\nThis product goes forth from heaven very swiftly,\nAnd comes to us like a caravan. 6\n'Tis not a long road that this caravan travels;\nCan the desert stop the deliverer?\nThe heart travels to the Ka'ba every moment,\nAnd by divine grace the body acquires the same power.\nDistance and nearness affect only the body,\nWhat do they matter in the place where God is?\nWhen God changes the body,\nIt regards not parasangs or miles.\nEven on earth there is hope of approaching God.\nPress on like a lover, and cease vain words, O son!\nIn the course of his rebuke to the messengers of Bilqis for bringing him mere gold instead of a humble heart, Solomon tells the story of the druggist who used soapstone or Persian earth for a weight. A man came to him to buy sugar-candy, and as he had no weight at hand, he used a lump of soapstone instead; but, while his back was turned, the purchaser stole a bit of the soapstone. The druggist, though he saw what he was doing, would not interrupt him, for he knew that the more soapstone the purchaser stole, the less sugar-candy he would get. In like manner the more men grasp at the transitory wealth of this world, the less they will obtain of the stable wealth of the world to come.\nPart of Soloman's message to Bilqis.\nReport to Bilqis what marvels ye have seen,\nAnd what plains of gold belong to Solomon;\nHow ye beheld forty mansions faced with gold,\nAnd how ye were ashamed of your presents;\nThat she may know Solomon is not covetous of gold;\nHe has received gold from the Creator of gold.\nThe moment he wills it, every grain of earth's dust\nIs changed into gold and precious pearls.\nFor this cause, O thou that lovest gold,\nOn the last day God will make earth all silver (white). 7\nQuit thy wealth, even if it be the realm of Saba;\nThou wilt find many realms not of this earth.\nWhat thou callest a throne is only a prison;\nThou thinkest thyself enthroned, but art outside the door.\nThou hast no sovereignty over thine own passions,\nHow canst thou sway good and evil?\nThy hair turns white without thy concurrence,\nTake shame to thyself for thy evil passions.\nWhoso bows his head to the King of kings\nWill receive a hundred kingdoms not of this world;\nBut the delight of bowing down before God\nWill seem sweeter to thee than countless glories.\"\nAn anecdote follows of a darvesh who saw in a dream some saints, and prayed them to provide him with his daily bread without obliging him to mix in worldly affairs. The saints ordered him to go to the forest, and there he found that all the wild fruits were rendered fit for his food. Having a few grains of gold by him, which he had gained by worldly labour before this miracle had been wrought for him, he was about to give them to a poor woodcutter who was passing that way. But this woodcutter was a saint, and at once read his thoughts, and to show, like Solomon, that he had no need of worldly wealth, he offered up a short prayer to God, and straightway his bundle of firewood was changed into gold, and immediately after, at another prayer, was changed back again into firewood.\nIbrahim bin Adham aud his fondness for music. 8\n\nHaste to renounce thy kingdom, like Ibrahim bin Adham,\nTo obtain, like him, the kingdom of eternity.\nAt night that king would sleep on his throne,\nWith his guards of state surrounding his palace,\nThough he needed no guards for the purpose\nOf warding off robbers and vagabonds;\nFor he who is a just king knows everything,\nAnd is safe from harm and his mind is at peace.\nJustice is the guardian of his steps,\nNot guards with drums round his palace.\nHis purpose in having this band of music was this,\nTo recall to his longing heart that call of God. 9\nThe wailing of horn and the thunder of drum\nResemble in some sort that dread \"trumpet blast.\" 10\nWherefore philosophers say that we have learned\nOur melodies from those of the revolving spheres.\nThe song of the spheres in their revolutions\nIs what men sing with lute and voice.\nThe faithful hold that the sweet influences of heaven\nCan make even harsh voices melodious.\nAs we are all members of Adam,\nWe have heard these melodies in Paradise;\nThough earth and water have cast their veil upon us,\nWe retain faint reminiscences of those heavenly songs.\nBut while we are thus shrouded by gross earthly veils,\nHow can the tones of the dancing spheres reach us? 11\nHence it is that listening to music is lovers' food,\nBecause it recalls to them their primal union with God.\nThe inward feelings of the mind acquire strength,\nNay, are shown outwardly, under influence of music.\nThe fire of love burns hotter under stimulus of music,\nEven as occurred in the case of the nut-gatherer.\nIbrahim's abdication.\nOnce that noble Ibrahim, as he sat on his throne,\nHeard a clamour and noise of cries on the roof,\nAlso heavy footsteps on the roof of his palace.\nHe said to himself, \"Whose heavy feet are those?\"\nHe shouted from his window, \"Who goes there?\n'Tis no man's step; surely 'tis a fairy.\"\nHis guards, filled with confusion, bowed their heads,\nSaying, \"It is we who are going the rounds in search.\"\nHe said, \"What seek ye?\" They said \"Our camels\" 12\nHe said, \"Who ever searched for camels on a housetop?\"\nThey said, \"We follow thy example,\nWho seekest union with God while sitting on a throne.\"\nThis was all, and no man ever saw him again,\nJust as fairies are invisible to men.\nHis substance was hid from men, though he was with them,\nFor what can men see save the outward aspect and dress?\nAs he was removed from the sight of friends and strangers,\nHis fame was noised abroad like that of the 'Anka.\nFor the soul of every bird that reaches Mount Qaf\nConfers glory on the whole family of birds. l3\nThe anecdote of the nut-gatherer, introduced in the above story, is only another version of the story of the thirsty man who threw bricks into the water in order to hear the sound of the splash. 14 This is followed by an address to Husamu-'d-Din, in which the poet says that his object in writing the Masnavi was to elicit words from Husam, as his words were the same as the words of God.\nSolomon's preaching to the people of Bilqis. The art of preaching.\nI tell the tale of Saba in lovers' style.\nWhen the breeze bore Solomon's words to that garden,\n'Twas as when bodies meet souls at the resurrection,\nOr as when boys return to their loved homes.\nThe people of love are hidden amongst the peoples,\nAs a liberal man encompassed by the contumely of the base.\nSouls are disgraced by union with bodies,\nBodies are ennobled by union with souls.\nArise, O lovers; this sweet draught is yours;\nYe are they that endure; eternal life is yours.\nHo! ye that seek, arise and take your fill of love,\nSnuff up that perfume of Yusuf!\nApproach, O Solomon, thou that knowest birds' language,\nSound the note of every bird that draws near; 15\nWhen God sent, thee to the birds,\nHe taught thee first the notes of all the birds.\nTo the predestinarian bird talk predestination,\nTo the bird with broken wings preach patience,\nTo the patient well-doer preach comfort and pardon,\nTo the spiritual 'Anka relate the glories of Mount Qaf,\nTo the pigeon preach avoidance of the hawk,\nTo the lordly hawk mercy and self-control;\nAs for the bat, who lingers helpless in the dark,\nAcquaint him with the society of the light;\nTo the fighting partridge teach peace,\nTo the cock the signs of dawning day.\nIn this way deal with all from the hoopoo to the eagle.\nThen follows a long account of various miraculous incidents that occurred during the childhood of the Prophet, how he was suckled by Halima, a woman of the Bani Sa'ad, how the idols bowed down before him, how he strayed from home, how his grandfather, Abd ul Muttalib, prayed to God that he might be found, and how he was at last found in the Ka'ba and restored to his grandfather.\nNext a story is told of a cur who attacked a blind man (Kur) in the street, rather than hunt the wild ass (Gor) on the mountains in company with well-bred dogs. This is an illustration of the thesis that mankind is prone to run after mean earthly objects, and to neglect aspiring to the spiritual world.\nSolomon's admonitions to Bilqis.\nAh! Bilqis, bestir thyself now the market is thronged,\nFlee away from them whose traffic is unprofitable! 16\nArise, Bilqis, now that thou hast the choice,\nBefore that death lays his heavy hand upon thee.\nSoon will death pull thy ears, as if thou wert\nA thief dragged before the officer in deadly fear.\nHow long wilt thou steal shoes from asses of the world?\nIf thou must steal, steal pearls of the world above.\nThy sisters have found the kingdom that lasts forever,\nThou cleavest to the kingdom of darkness.\nHappy is he who quits this earthly kingdom,\nWhich sooner or later death will destroy.\nArise! O Bilqis, at least behold\nThe kingdom of the royal kings of the faith!\nIn reality they are seated in the garden of the spirit,\nThough to outward view they are guiding their friends.\nThat spiritual garden accompanies them everywhere,\nYet it is never revealed to the eyes of the people,\nIts fruits ever asking to be gathered,\nIts fount of life welling up to be drunk!\nGo round about the heavens without aid of wings,\nLike sun or full moon or new moon!\nThou wilt move as a spirit without aid of feet,\nThou wilt eat sweet viands without mouth or palate.\nNo crocodile of sorrow will attack thy bark,\nNor will sad thoughts of death assail thee.\nThou wilt be at once queen, army, and throne,\nEndued with good fortune and fortune itself. 17\nThou sayest thou art a great queen of good fortune;\nBut thy fortune is apart from thee and will soon fade,\nThou wilt be left like a, beggar without sustenance;\nTherefore, O chosen one, become thy own fortune.\nWhen, O spiritual one, thou hast become thy own fortune,\nThen, being thyself thy fortune, thou wilt never lose it.\nHow. O fortunate one, canst thou ever lose thyself,\nWhen thy real self is thy treasure and thy kingdom?\nHow men and demons helped Solomon in building the temple.\nWhen Solomon laid the foundations of the temple,\nMen and Jinns came and lent their aid to the work,\nSome of them with good-will, and others on compulsion,\nEven as worshippers follow the road of devotion.\nMen are as demons, and lust of wealth their chain,\nWhich drags them forth to toil in shop and field.\nThis chain is made of their fears and anxieties.\nDeem not that these men have no chain upon them.\nIt causes them to engage in labor and the chase,\nIt forces them to toil in mines and on the sea,\nIt urges them towards good and towards evil.\nGod saith, \"On their necks is a rope of palm fibre,\" 18\nAnd \"Verily on their necks have we placed ropes,'' 19\n\"We make this rope out of their own dispositions;\nThere is none either impure or intelligent,\nBut we have fastened his work about his neck.\" 20\nThy lust is even as fire burning in thy evil deeds;\nThe black coal of these deeds is lighted by the fire;\nThe blackness of the coal is first hidden by the fire,\nBut, when it is burnt, the blackness is made visible.\nThe building of the prophets was without lust,\nAnd accordingly its splendor ever increased.\nYea, many are the noble temples they have raised,\nThough all were not named \"The Most Remote Temple.\"\nThe Ka'ba, whose renown waxes greater every moment,\nOwed its foundation to the piety of Abraham.\nIts glory is not derived from stones and mortar,\nBut from being built without lust or strife.\nNeither are the prophets' writings like other writings;\nNor their temples, nor their works, nor their families;\nNor their manners, nor their wrath, nor their chastisements;\nNor their dreams, nor their reason, nor their words.\nEach one of them is endued with a different glory,\nEach soul's bird winged with different feathers.\nHo! pious ones, build the lively temple of the heart,\nThat the Divine Solomon may be seen, and peace be upon you!\nAnd if your demons and fairies be recalcitrant,\nYour good angels must place collars on their necks.\nIf your demons go astray through guile and fraud,\nChastisement must overtake them swift as lightning.\nBe like Solomon, so that your demons\nMay dig stones for your spiritual edifice.\nBe like Solomon, free from evil thoughts and guile,\nSo that carnal demons and Jinns may be submissive to you.\nYour heart is as Solomon's signet; take good care\nThat it falls not a prey to demons,\nFor then demons will rule over you as over Solomon.\nGuard then your signet from the demons, and be at peace.\nThen follows a story of a poet who recited a panegyric in honor of a liberal king. The king commanded that he should receive one thousand pieces of gold, but the vazir, named Abul-Hasan, gave him ten thousand. The poet went to his home well contented, but after some years fell into poverty, and naturally bethought him of the generous king and his vazir, who had before assisted him. Sibawayh, the grammarian of Shiraz says \"Allah\" is derived from \"Alah\" (fleeing for refuge) and thus we see all creatures, and even the elements themselves, ever looking to Allah to sustain them in existence. The poet, therefore, again presented himself to the king with a new panegyric, and the king, on hearing it, commanded as before that a thousand pieces of gold should be given him. But the new vazir, who was also named Abul-Hasan, persuaded the king that the exchequer could not afford this large outlay, and kept the poet waiting so long for his money, that at last he was glad to get away with only one hundred pieces of gold. These two vazirs recall Asaf, the good vazir of King Solomon, who deserves the title \"Light upon light,\" 21 and Haman, the evil vazir of Pharaoh, who turned his he,art against Moses, and brought many plagues upon the kingdom of Egypt.\nHow all creatures cry to God for sustenance.\n\nYea, all the fish in the seas,\nAnd all feathered fowl in the air above,\nAll elephants, wolves, and lions of the forest,\nAll dragons and snakes, and even little ants,\nYea, even air, water, earth, and fire,\nDraw their sustenance from Him, both winter and summer.\nEvery moment this heaven cries to Him, saying,\n\"O Lord, quit not Thy hold of me for a moment!\nThe pillar of my being is Thy aid and protection;\nThe whole is folded up in that right hand of Thine.\" 22\nAnd earth cries, \"O keep me fixed and steadfast,\nThou who hast placed me on the top of waters!\"\nAll of them are waiting and expecting His aid,\nAll have learned of Him to represent their needs.\nEvery prophet extols this prescription,\n\"Seek ye help with patience and with prayer.\" 23\nHo! seek aid of Him, not of another than Him\nSeek water in the ocean, not in a dried-up channel.\nThe next anecdote is that of the raven who taught Cain the art of digging graves and burying corpses, as told in Koran v. 34. This is designed to illustrate the thesis that unaided human reason can discover no now truth, unless inspired by Divine wisdom, of which the prophets, and especially \"Universal Reason,\" or the Prophet Muhammed, are the channels. Thus physicians and herbalists have derived their knowledge of the virtues of plants from the instructions originally given by King Solomon when he classified the plants that grew in the court of the temple. The inner eye sees more than is visible to the sight of the vulgar. To illustrate this, an anecdote is told of a Sufi who had accompanied his friends to a beautiful garden, but instead of looking about and enjoying the fragrance of the flowers and fruits, sat with his head sunk on his breast in Sufi fashion. His friends said to him, in the words of the Koran, \"Look at the signs of God's mercy, how after its death He quickeneth the earth!\" 24 He answered them that these signs were far more plainly visible to him in his heart than in the outward creation, which was merely as it were a blurred reflection from the spiritual creation enshrined in his heart. For God says, \"The life of the world is naught but a cheating fruition.\" 25 In other words, \"Nature conceals God, but the supernatural in man reveals Him.\" 26\nOn cleansing the inward temple of the heart from self-conceit and reliance on carnal reason.\nWhen the body bows in worship, the heart is a temple,\nAnd where there is a temple, there bad friends are weeds\nWhen a liking for bad friends grows up in you,\nFlee from them, and avoid converse with them.\nRoot up those weeds, for, if they attain full growth,\nThey will subvert you and your temple together.\nO beloved, this weed is deviation from the \"right way,\"\nYou crawl crookedly, like infants unable to walk.\nFear not to acknowledge your ignorance and guilt,\nThat the Heavenly Master may not withhold instruction.\nWhen you say, \"I am ignorant; O teach me,\"\nSuch open confession is better than false pride.\nO ingenuous one, learn of our father Adam,\nWho said of yore, \"O Lord, we have dealt unjustly.\" 27\nHe made no vain excuses and prevaricated not,\nNor did he raise the standard of guile and craft.\nOn the other hand, Iblis raised arguments, saying,\n\"I used to be honorable; Thou hast disgraced me.\nMy stain is owing to Thee; Thou art my dyer;\nThou hast caused my sin and transgression.\"\nRead the text, \"Lord, Thou hast caused me to err,\" 28\nThat you plead not compulsion, and so err (like Iblis).\nHow long will you climb into that tree of compulsion?\nHow long cast out of sight your own freewill?\nHow long, like Iblis and his evil crew,\nThrow the blame of your own sins upon God?\nHow were you compelled to sin when you took such pleasure\nAnd pride in engaging in those sins?\nDoes a man feel such pleasure in acting on compulsion\nAs he exhibits when committing wrong actions?\nYou battle like twenty men against those\nWho give you good advice not to do that act;\nSaying to them, \"This is right and quite proper;\nWho dissuades me from it but men of no account?\"\nDoes a man acting on compulsion talk like this?\nOr rather one who is erring of his own freewill?\nWhatever your lust wills you deem freewill,\nWhat reason demands you deem compulsion.\nWhoso is wise and prudent knows this,\nThat cleverness comes from Iblis, but love from Adam.\nCleverness is like Canaan's swimming in the ocean; 29\n'Tis no river or small stream; 'tis the mighty ocean.\nAway with this attempt to swim; quit self-conceit.\n'Twill not save you; Canaan was drowned at last.\nLove is as the ark appointed for the righteous,\nWhich annuls the danger and provides a way of escape.\nSell your cleverness and buy bewilderment;\nCleverness is mere opinion, bewilderment intuition.\nMake sacrifice of your reason at the feet of Mustafa,\nSay, \"God Sufficeth me, for He, is sufficient for me.\" 30\nDo not, like Canaan, hang back from entering the ark,\nBeing puffed up with vain conceit of cleverness.\nHe said, \"I will escape to the top of high mountains,\nWhy need I put myself under obligation to Noah?\"\nAh! better for him had he never learnt swimming!\nThen he would have based his hopes on Noah's ark.\nWould he had been ignorant of craft as a babe!\nThen like a babe he would have clung to his mother.\nWould he had been less full of borrowed knowledge!\nThen he would have accepted inspired knowledge from his father.\nWhen, with inspiration at hand, you seek book-learning,\nYour heart, as if inspired, loads you with reproach. 31\nTraditional knowledge, when inspiration is available,\nIs like making ablutions with sand when water is near.\nMake yourself ignorant, be submissive, and then\nYou will obtain release from your ignorance.\nFor this cause, O son, the Prince of men declared,\n\"The majority of those in Paradise are the foolish.\" 32\nCleverness is as a wind raising storms of pride;\nBe foolish, so that your heart may be at peace;\nNot with the folly that doubles itself by vain babble,\nBut with that arising from bewilderment at \"The Truth.\"\nThose Egyptian women who cut their hands were fools 33\nFools as to their hands, being amazed at Yusuf's face.\nMake sacrifice of reason to love of \"The Friend,\"\nTrue reason is to be found where He is.\nMen of wisdom direct their reason heavenwards,\nVain babblers halt on earth where no \"Friend\" is.\nIf through bewilderment your reason quits your head,\nEvery hair of your head becomes true reason and a head.\nThen follow commentaries on the text, \"O thou enfolded in thy mantle;\" 34 on the proverb, \"Silence is the proper answer to a fool;\" on the Hadis, \"God created the angels with reason and the brutes with lust, but man he created with both reason and lust; the man who follows reason is higher than the angels, and the man who follows lust is lower than the brutes;\" on the text, \"As to those in whose heart is a disease, it will add doubt to their doubt, and they shall die infidels,\" 35 and a comparison of the struggle between reason and lust to that between Majnun and his she-camel, he trying to get to his mistress Laila, and the she-camel trying to run home to her foal.\n*NOTES:\n1. Koran xlix. 10; xxxi. 27; ii. 285.\n2. The letter is given in Koran xxvii. 30.\n3. All these legends are derived from Koran xxi., xxvii., and xxxviii. See Sale's notes.\n4. This refers to Muhammad, who is at once the \"First reason\" (Logos) and the \"Perfect man,\" who is \"the sum of all the worlds\" and the \"Great world.\" See Notices et Extraits des MSS., x. p. 86.\n5. He was also the final cause of creation. \"If it had not been for thee, the world had not been created.\"\n6. Muhammad as the Logos is the channel by which divine grace is conveyed to man. The \"change of the body\" is an allusion to the ascension of Muhammad (Mi raj).\n7. A Hadis.\n8. Music is much used in the religious services of the \"Maulavi\" order of Darveshes, founded by Jalalu -d-Din Rumi. See \"The Dervishes,\" by J.P. Brown, p. 197.\n9. \"Am not I your lord?\" (Koran vii. 171).\n10. \"When there shall be a trumpet blast, that shall be a dreadful day\" (Koran lxxiv. 7).\n11. The so-called Pythagorean doctrine of the \"Harmony of the spheres\" was as well known to Persian poets as to Shakespeare.\n12. This is an allusion to the story of the \"Believer's lost camel.\" Book ii., Story xi.\n13. This alludes to the well-known poem of Faridu-d-Din 'Attar the \"Mantiqu-t-Tair.\"\n14. Book ii. Story v.\n15. Koran xxvii. 16. There is a Hadis, \"Speak to men according to the amount of their intelligence.\"\n16. \"These are they who have bought error at the price of guidance, but their traffic hath not been gainful\" (Koran ii. 15).\n17. Union attained, all duality and separate phenomenal existence are swallowed up in the One (Noumenon). (See Gulshan i Raz, I. 835 and 845).\n18. Koran iii. 5.\n19. Koran xxxvi. 7.\n20. \"And every man's work have we fastened about his neck, and on the last day will we bring forth to him a book, which shall be shown to him wide open. Read thy book; there needeth none but thyself to make out an account against thee that day \" (Koran xvii. 14).\n21. Koran xxiv. 35.\n22. Koran xxxix. 67.\n23. Koran ii. 148.\n24. Koran xxx. 49.\n25. Koran iii. 182.\n26. \"But is it unreasonable to confess that we believe in God, not by reason of the nature which conceals him, but by reason of the supernatural in man, which alone reveals him and proves him to exist? \" (Jacobi, quoted in Sir W. Hamilton's Lectures on Metaphysics, vol. i. p. 40).\n27. Koran vii. 22.\n28. He said, \"That thou hast caused me to err\" (Koran vii. 15). This is the burden of many of 'Omar Khayyam's poems.\n29. Koran xi. 43. See Book iii., Story 5.\n30. Koran ix. 130.\n31. Knowledge of \"The Truth\" is to be attained not by exercise of the reason, but by illumination from above. When the light of \"The Truth\" is revealed, reason is drowned in bewilderment. Gulshan i Raz, Answer ii.\n32. Freytag, Arabum Proverbia, vol. ii. p. 898; 1 Cor. iv. 10.\n33. \"They were amazed at Yusuf, and cut their hands, and said, 'God keep us, this is no man!'\" (Koran xii. 31).\n34. Koran lxxiii. 1.\n35. Koran ix. 126.\n\nSTORY III.\nThe Youth who wrote a letter of complaint\nabout his rations to the King.\nA certain youth in the service of a great king was dissatisfied with his rations, so he went to the cook and reproached him with dishonoring his master by his stinginess. The youth would not listen to his excuses, but wrote off an angry letter of complaint to the king, in terms of outward compliment and respect, but betraying an angry spirit. On receiving this letter, the king observed that it contained only complaints about meat and drink, and evinced no aspirations after spiritual food, and therefore needed no answer, as \"the proper answer to a fool is silence.\" 1 When the youth received no answer to his letter, he was much surprised, and threw the blame on the cook and on the messenger, ignoring the fact that the folly of his own letter was the real reason of its being left unanswered. He wrote in all five letters, but the king persisted in his refusal to reply, saying that fools are enemies to God and man, and that he who has any dealings with a fool fouls his own nest. Fools only regard material meat and drink, whereas the food of the wise is the light of God, as it is said by the Prophet, \"I pass the night in the presence of my Lord, who giveth me meat and drink,\" 2 and again, \"Fasting is the food of God,\" i.e., the means by which spiritual food is obtained. 3\nExplanation of the text \"And Moses conceived a secret fear within him. We said 'Fear not, for thou shalt be uppermost (over Pharaoh's magicians) '\". 4\nMoses said, \"Their sorcery confuses them;\nWhat can I do? These people have no discernment.\"\nGod said, \"I will generate in them discernment;\nI will make their undiscerning reason to see clearly.\nAlthough like a sea their waves cast up foam,\nO Moses, thou shalt prevail over them; fear not!\"\nThe magicians gloried in their own achievements,\nBut when Moses' rod became a snake, they were confounded.\nWhoso boasts of his beauty and wit,\nThe stone of death is a touchstone of his boasts.\nSorcery fades away, but the miracles of Moses advance.\nBoth resemble a dish falling from a roof:\nThe noise of the dish of sorcery leaves only cursing;\nThe noise of the dish of faith leaves edification.\nWhen the touchstone is hidden from the sight of all,\nThen come forth to battle and boast, O base coin!\nYour time for boasting is when the touchstone is away;\nThe hand of power will soon crush your exaltation.\nThe base coin says to me with pride every moment,\n\"O pure gold, how am I inferior to you?\"\nThe gold replies, \"Even so, O comrade;\nBut the touchstone is at hand; be ready to meet it!\"\nDeath of the body is a benefaction to the spiritual;\nWhat damage has pure gold to dread from the shears?\nIf the base coin were of itself far-sighted,\nIt would reveal at first the blackness it shows at last.\nIf it had showed its blackness at first on its face,\n'Twould have avoided hypocrisy now and misery at last.\n'Twould have sought the alchemy of grace in due time;\nIts reason would have prevailed over its hypocrisy.\nIf it became broken-hearted through its own bad state,\n'Twould look onward to Him that heals the broken;\n'Twould look to the result and be broken-hearted\nAnd be made whole at once by the Healer of broken hearts.\nDivine grace places base copper in the alembic,\nAdulterated gold is excluded from that favor.\nO adulterated gold, boast not, but see clearly\nThat thy Purchaser is not blind to thy defects.\nThe light of the judgment-day will enlighten his eyes\nAnd destroy the glamour of thy fascinations.\nBehold them that have regard to the ultimate result,\nAnd also the regrets of foolish souls and their envy.\nBehold them that regard only the present,\nAnd cast away thoughts of evil to come from their minds.\n*NOTES:\n1. See Freytag, Arabum Proverbia, i. 551, for a parallel.\n2. Koran xxvi. 79.\n3. See Mishkat ul Masabih, vol. i. p. 463.\n4. Koran xx. 70.\n\nSTORY IV.\nBayazid and his impious sayings when beside himself.\nThe holy saint Bayazid before his death predicted the birth of the saint Abul-Hasan Khirqani, and specified all the peculiar qualities which would be seen in him. And after his death it came to pass as he had predicted, and Abul-Hasan, hearing what Bayazid had said, used to frequent his tomb. One day he visited the tomb as usual, and found it covered with snow, and a voice was heard saying, \"The world is fleeting as snow. I am calling thee! Follow me and forsake the world!\"\nHow Bayazid cried out, when beside himself, \"Glory be to me!\" and how his disciples were scandalized at this saying, and how Bayazid answered them.\n\nOnce that famous saint Bayazid came to his disciples,\nSaying, \"Lo, I myself am God Almighty.\"\nThat man of spiritual gifts being visibly beside himself;\nSaid, \"There is no God beside me; worship me!\"\nNext morning, when his ecstatic state had passed,\nThey said, \"You said so and so, which was impious.\"\nHe answered, \"If I do so again,\nStraightway slay me with your knives!\nGod is independent of me; I am in the body.\nIf I say that again you must kill me!\"\nWhen that holy person had given this injunction,\nEach of his disciples made ready his knife.\nAgain that overflowing cup became beside himself,\nAnd his recent injunctions passed from his mind.\nAlienation came upon him, reason went astray,\nThe dawn shone forth and his lamp paled at its light.\nReason is like an officer when the king appears;\nThe officer then loses his power and hides himself.\nReason is God's shadow; God is the sun.\nWhat power has the shadow before the sun?\nWhen a man is possessed by an evil spirit\nThe qualities of humanity are lost in him.\nWhatever he says is really said by that spirit,\nThough it seems to proceed from the man's mouth.\nWhen the spirit has this rule and dominance over him,\nThe agent is the property of the spirit, and not himself;\nHis self is departed, and he has become the spirit.\nThe Turk without instruction speaks Arabic; 1\nWhen he returns to himself he knows not a word of it.\nSeeing God is lord of spirits and of man,\nHow can He be inferior in power to a spirit?\nWhen the eagle of alienation from self took wing,\nBayazid began to utter similar speeches;\nThe torrent of madness bore away his reason,\nAnd he spoke more impiously than before.\n\"Within my vesture is naught but God,\nWhether you seek Him on earth or in heaven.\"\nHis disciples all became mad with horror,\nAnd struck with their knives at his holy body.\nEach one, like the assassins of Kardkoh, 2\nWithout fear aimed at the body of his chief.\nEach who aimed at the body of the Shaikh,\nHis stroke was reversed and wounded the striker.\nNo stroke took effect on that man of spiritual gifts,\nBut the disciples were wounded and drowned in blood.\nEach who had aimed a blow at his neck,\nSaw his own throat cut, and gave up the ghost;\nHe who had struck at his breast\nHad cleft his own breast and killed himself.\nThey who knew better that lord of felicity,\nWho had not courage enough to strike a deadly blow,\nTheir half-knowledge held their hands back;\nThey saved their lives but slightly wounded themselves.\nOn the morrow those disciples, diminished in number,\nRaised lamentations in their houses.\nThey went to Bayazid, thousands of men and women,\nSaying, \"The two worlds are hidden in thy vesture;\nIf this body of thine were that of a man,\nIt would have perished of sword-wounds, like a man's.\"\nThe man in his senses fought with him 'beside himself,\nAnd thrust the thorn into his own eyes.\"\nAh! you who smite with your sword him beside himself,\nYou smite yourself therewith; Beware!\nFor he that is beside himself is annihilated and safe;\nYea, he dwells in security forever.\nHis form is vanished, he is a mere mirror;\nNothing is seen in him but the reflection of another.\nIf you spit at it, you spit at your own face,\nAnd if you hit that mirror, you hit yourself;\nAnd if you see an ugly face in it, 'tis your own,\nAnd if you see an 'Isa there, you are its mother Mary.\nHe is neither this nor that he is void of form;\n'Tis your own form which is reflected back to you.\nBut when the discourse reaches this point, lip is closed;\nWhen pen reaches this point, it is split in twain.\nClose then your lips, though eloquence be possible.\nKeep silence; God knows the right way!\nThis is followed by an anecdote of the Prophet appointing an Hudhaili youth to be captain of a band of warriors amongst whom were many older and more experienced soldiers, and of the objections made to this appointment, and of the Prophet's answer to the objectors.\nWhy the Prophet promoted the youth to command his seniors.\nThe Prophet said, \"O ye who regard only the outside,\nRegard him not as a youth void of talents.\nMany are they whose beards are black yet are old,\nMany too have white beards and hearts like pitch.\nI have made trial of his wisdom often and often,\nAnd that youth has shown himself old in his actions.\nAge consists in maturity of wisdom, O son,\nNot, in whiteness of the beard and hair.\nHow can any one be older than Iblis?\nYet, if he has no wisdom, he is naught.\nSuppose him an infant, if he has 'Isa's soul,\nHe is pure from pride and from carnal lust.\nThat whiteness of the hair is a sign of maturity\nOnly to purblind eyes whose vision is limited.\nSince that shortsighted one judges by outward signs,\nHe seeks the right course by outward tokens.\nFor his sake I said that if ye desire counsel\nYe ought to make choice of an old man.\nHe who has emerged from the veil of blind belief\nBeholds by the light of God all things that exist.\nHis pure light, without signs or tokens,\nCleaves for him the rind and brings him to the kernel.\nTo the regarder of externals, genuine and base coin are alike.\nHow can he know what is inside the basket?\nMany are the gold coins made black with smoke,\nSo that they elude the clutches of greedy thieves;\nMany are the copper coins gilded with gold,\nAnd sold as gold to men of slender wits.\nWe who regard the inside of the world,\nWe look at the heart and disregard the outside.\nThe judges who confine their view to externals\nAnd base their decisions on outward appearances,\nAs they testify and make outward show of faith, 3\nAre straightway dubbed faithful by men of externals.\nTherefore these heretics, who regard only externals,\nHave secretly shed the blood of many true believers.\nStrive then to be old in wisdom and in faith,\nThat, like Universal Reason, you may see within.\" 4\n*NOTES:\n1. Alluding to the story of the Kurd, Syad Abul-Wafa, Book i Story xiv. note.\n2. A hill in Mazandaran.\n3. \"And some there are who say, 'We believe in God and in the last day,' yet they are not believers\" (Koran ii. 7).\n4. Universal Reason, here applied to Muhammad. \"The first thing which God created was ('aql) Reason or Intelligence,\" i.e., the Logos.\n\nSTORY V.\nThe Three Fishes.\nThis story, which is taken from the book of Kalila and Damnah,1 is as follows. There was in a secluded place a lake, which was fed by a running stream, and in this lake were three fishes, one very wise, the second half wise, and the third foolish. One day some fishermen passed by that lake, and having espied the fish, hastened home to fetch their nets. The fish also saw the fishermen and were sorely disquieted. The very wise fish, without a minute's delay, quitted the lake and took refuge in the running stream which communicated with it, and thus escaped the impending danger. The half wise fish delayed doing anything till the fishermen actually made their appearance with their nets. He then floated upon the surface of the water, pretending to be dead, and the fisherman took him up and threw him into the stream, and by this device he saved his life. But the foolish fish did nothing but swim wildly about, and was taken and killed by the fishermen.\nThe marks of the wise man, of the half wise, and of the fool.\nThe wise man is he who possesses a torch of his own;\nHe is the guide and leader of the caravan.\nThat leader is his own director and light;\nThat illuminated one follows his own lead.\nHe is his own protector; do ye also seek protection\nFrom that light whereon his soul is nurtured.\nThe second, he, namely, who is half wise,\nKnows the wise man to be the light of his eyes.\nHe clings to the wise man like a blind man to his guide,\nSo as to become possessed of the wise man's sight.\nBut the fool, who has no particle of wisdom,\nHas no wisdom of his own, and quits the wise man.\nHe knows nothing of the way, great or small,\nAnd is ashamed to follow the footsteps of the guide.\nHe wanders into the boundless desert,\nSometimes halting and despairing, sometimes running.\nHe has no lamp wherewith to light himself on his way,\nNor half a lamp which might recognize and seek light.\nHe lacks wisdom, so as to boast of being alive,\nAnd also half wisdom, so as to assume to be dead?\nThat half wise one became as one utterly dead\nIn order to rise up out of his degradation.\nIf you lack perfect wisdom, make yourself as dead\nUnder the shadow of the wise, whose words give life.\nThe fool is neither alive so as to companion with 'Isa,\nNor yet dead so as to feel the power of 'Isa's breath.\nHis blind soul wanders in every direction,\nAnd at last makes a spring, but springs not upwards.\nThe counsels of the bird.\nA man captured a bird by wiles and snares;\nThe bird said to him, \"O noble sir,\nIn your time you have eaten many oxen and sheep,\nAnd likewise sacrificed many camels;\nYou have never become satisfied with their meat,\nSo you will not be satisfied with my flesh.\nLet me go, that I may give you three counsels,\nWhence you will see whether I am wise or foolish.\nThe first of my counsels shall be given on your wrist,\nThe second on your well-plastered roof,\nAnd the third I will give you from the top of a tree.\nOn hearing all three you will deem yourself happy.\nAs regards the counsel on your wrist, 'tis this.\n'Believe not foolish assertions of any one!'\"\nWhen he had spoken this counsel on his wrist, he flew\nUp to the top of the roof, entirely free.\nThen he said, \"Do not grieve for what is past;\nWhen a thing is done, vex not yourself about it.\"\nHe continued, \"Hidden inside this body of mine\nIs a precious pearl, ten drachms in weight.\nThat jewel of right, belonged to you,\nWealth for yourself and prosperity for your children.\nYou have lost it, as it, was not fated you should get it,\nThat pearl whose like can nowhere be found.\"\nThereupon the man, like a woman in her travail,\nGave vent to lamentations and weeping.\nThe bird said to him, \"Did I not counsel you, saying,\n'Beware of grieving over what is past and gone?'\nWhen 'tis past and gone, why sorrow for it?\nEither you understood not my counsel or are deaf.\nThe second counsel I gave you was this, namely,\n'Be not misguided enough to believe foolish assertions.'\nO fool, altogether I do not weigh three drachms,\nHow can a pearl of ten drachms be within me?\"\nThe man recovered himself and said, \"Well then,\nTell me now your third good counsel!\"\nThe bird replied, \"You have made a fine use of the others,\nThat I should waste my third counsel upon you.\nTo give counsel to a sleepy ignoramus\nIs to sow seeds upon salt land.\nTorn garments of folly and ignorance cannot be patched.\nO counselors, waste not the seed of counsel on them!\"\n*NOTES:\n1. Anvar i Suhaili. Book i. Story 15.\n\nSTORY VI.\nMoses and Pharaoh. 1\nThen follows a very long account of the dealings of Moses, an incarnation of true reason, with Pharaoh, the exponent of mere opinion or illusion. It begins with a long discussion between Moses and Pharaoh. Moses tells Pharaoh that both of them alike owe their bodies to earth and their souls to God, and that God is their only lord. Pharaoh replies that he is lord of Moses, and chides Moses for his want of gratitude to himself for nurturing him in his childhood. Moses replies that he recognizes no lord but God, and reminds Pharaoh how he had tried to kill him in his infancy. Pharaoh complains that he is made of no account by Moses, and Moses retorts that in order to cultivate a waste field it is necessary to break up the soil; and in order to make a good garment, the stuff must first be cut up; and in order to make bread, the wheat must first be ground in the mill, and so on. The best return he can make to Pharaoh for his hospitality to him in his infancy is to set him free from his lust-engendered illusions, like a fish from the fish-hook which has caught him. Pharaoh then twits Moses with his sorceries in changing his staff into a serpent, and thereby beguiling the people. Moses replies that all this was accomplished not by sorcery, like that of Pharaoh's own magicians, but by the power of God, though Pharaoh could not see it, owing to his want of perception of divine things. The ear and the nose cannot see beautiful objects, but only the eye, and similarly the sensual eye, blinded by lust, is impotent to behold spiritual truth. On the other hand, men of spiritual insight, whose vision is purged from lust, become as it were all eyes, and no longer see double, but only the One sole real Being. Man's body, it is true, is formed of earth, but by discipline and contrition it may be made to reflect spiritual verities, even as coarse and hard iron may be polished into a steel mirror. Pharaoh ought to cleanse the rust of evil-doing from his soul, and then he would be able to see the spiritual truths which Moses was displaying before him. The door of repentance is always open. Moses then promised that if Pharaoh would obey one admonition he should receive in return four advantages. Pharaoh was tempted by this promise, and asked what the admonition was. Moses answered that it was this, that Pharaoh should confess that there is no God except the One Creator of all things in heaven and on earth. Pharaoh then prayed him to expound the four advantages he had promised, saying that possibly they might cure him of infidelity, and cause him to become a vessel of mercy, instead of one of wrath. Moses then explained that they were as follows:\n(1) Health.\n(2) Long life, ending in the conviction that death is gain.\nEven as one who knows of a treasure hid in a ruined house pulls down the house to find that treasure, so does the wise man, full of years and experience, pull down the house of the body to gain the treasure of eternal life. The tradition \"I was a hidden treasure,\" bears on this matter.\n(3) A better kingdom than that of Egypt, one of peace in place of one of enmity and contention.\n(4) Perpetual youth.\nPharaoh then proceeded to take counsel with his wife, Asiya, whether it would be advisable to quit his infidelity and believe in the promises of Moses. Asiya, being a pious woman and well inclined to Moses, whom she had nurtured in his infancy, urged him to do so, but Pharaoh said he would first consult his vazir Haman. Asiya had a bad opinion of Haman, whom she knew to be as blind to spiritual truths as Pharaoh himself, and she did her best to dissuade Pharaoh from consulting him. To illustrate Haman's spiritual blindness, she told the story of a royal falcon who fell into the hands of an ignorant old woman. This old woman knew nothing of the virtues of a falcon, and was displeased at the falcon's appearance, and said to it, \"What was your mother about to leave your claws and beak so long?\" She then proceeded to trim them short, according to her fancy, and of course spoiled the falcon for all purposes of falconry. Pharaoh, however, would not be diverted from his purpose of consulting Haman, and Asiya was fain to console herself with the reflection that like always herds with like, and so Pharaoh must needs consort with Haman, who was in so many respects a duplicate of himself. To illustrate this she recalled the story of a woman whose infant had crawled to the brink of a canal, where it persisted in remaining, at the imminent peril of its life, despite all her calls and entreaties. In her distress she asked aid of Ali, who told her to place another infant on the top of the bank. She did so, and her own infant, seeing its playfellow, left the brink of its own accord and came to join its fellow. The spirit of man is of like genus with the holy prophets, but man's animal lust with the demons. And as things of like nature attract one another, so unlike things repel one another. Thus it is said that when holy men pray to be delivered from hell, hell also prays that they may be kept away from it. Pharaoh then proceeded to consult Haman, and Haman, on hearing that Moses had proposed to Pharaoh to humble himself and confess the supreme lordship of Allah, was indignant and rent his clothes, saying, \"Is not the kingdom of Egypt thine? Art thou not mightier than this despicable fellow? 2 Who is he to degrade Pharaoh from his 'supreme lordship?'\" So Pharaoh listened to Haman and refused to be converted to the true faith. Then Moses was much discouraged, but he was consoled by a voice from heaven assuring him that he was well-beloved of God, because in spite of disappointments and through good and evil he clung to God.\nOn the tradition, \"I was a hidden treasure and I desired to be known, and I created the world in order to be known\".\nDestroy your house, and with the treasure hidden in it 3\nYou will be able to build thousands of houses.\nThe treasure lies under it; there is no help for it;\nHesitate not to pull it down; do not tarry!\nFor with the coin of that treasure\nA thousand houses can be built without labor.\nAt last of a surety that house will be destroyed,\nAnd the divine treasure will be seen beneath it.\nBut 'twill not belong to you, because in truth 4\nThat prize is the wages for destroying the house.\nWhen one has not done the work he gets no wages;\n\"Man gets nothing he has not worked for.\" 5\nThen you will bite your finger, saying, \"Alas!\nThat bright moon was hidden under a cloud.\nI did not do what they told me for my good;\nNow house and treasure are lost and my hand is empty.\"\nYou have taken your house on lease or hired it;\n'Tis not your own property to buy and sell.\nAs to the term of the lease, it is till your death;\nIn that term you have to turn it to use.\nIf before the end of the term of the lease\nYou omit to derive profit from the house,\nThen the owner puts you out of it,\nAnd pulls it down himself to find the gold-mine.\nWhile you are now smiting your head in deep regret,\nAnd now tearing your beard to think of your folly,\nSaying, \"Alas! that house belonged to me;\nI was blind and did not derive profit from it.\nAlas! the wind has carried off my dwelling\nForever! 'O misery that rests on slaves!' 6\nIn that house of mine I saw but forms and pictures;\nI was enchanted with that house so fleetin!\nI was ignorant of the treasure hidden beneath it,\nOtherwise I would have grasped an axe as a perfume.\nAh! if I had administered the justice of the axe,\nI should now have been quit of sorrow.\nBut I fixed my gaze on outward forms,\nLike an infant I sported with playthings.\nWell said the famous Hakim Sanai,\n'Thou art a child; thy house is full of pictures.'\nIn his divine poem he gives this advice,\n'Sweep away the dust from thy house!'\"\nThey who recognize the almighty power of God do not ask where heaven is or where hell is.\n\"O Pharaoh, if you are wise, I show you mercy;\nBut if you are an ass, I give you the stick as an ass.\nSo I will drive you out of your stable,\nEven as I make your head and ears bleed with my stick.\nIn this stable asses and men alike\nAre deprived of peace by your oppressions.\nSee! I have brought a staff for the purpose of correcting\nEvery ass who does not prove tractable.\nIt turns into a serpent in vengeance against you,\nBecause you have become a serpent in deed and character.\nYou are an evil serpent, swelled to the size of a hill.\nYet look at the Serpent (constellation) in heaven.\nThis staff is a foretaste to you of hell,\nSaying, 'Ho, take refuge in the light!\nOtherwise you will fall into my jaws,\nAnd will find no escape from my clutches!'\nThis staff even now became a serpent,\nSo that you need not ask, 'Where is God's hell?'\nGod makes a hell wheresover He wills;\nHe makes the very sky a snare and trap for birds.\nHe produces pains and aches in your teeth,\nSo that you say, \"Tis a hell and serpent's bite.'\nOr again He makes your spittle as honey,\nSo that you say, ''Tis heaven and wine of Paradise.'\nHe makes sugar to grow in your mouth,\nThat you may know the might of the divine decrees.\nTherefore, bite not the innocent with your teeth;\nBear in mind the divine stroke that tarries not.\"\nGod made the Nile blood to the Egyptians,\nHe preserved the Israelites from the peril,\nThat you might know how God discerns\nBetween the wise and the foolish wayfarers.\nThe Nile learned of God discernment\nWhen it let the ones through and engulphed the others.\nGod's mercy made the Nile wise,\nHis wrath made Cain foolish.\nOf His mercy He created wisdom in inanimate things,\nAnd of His wrath He deprived the wise of wisdom.\nOf His mercy wisdom accrued to inanimate things,\nAs a chastisement He took wisdom from the wise.\nHere at His command wisdom was shed down like rain,\nWhilst there wisdom saw His wrath and fled away.\nClouds and sun, and moon and lofty stars,\nAll come and go in obedience to His ordinance;\nNo one of them comes save at His appointed time;\nIt lingers not behind nor anticipates that time.\nWhereas you understood not this secret, the prophets\nHave instilled this knowledge into stone and staff;\nSo that you may infer that other inanimate things\nWithout doubt resemble in this stones and staves.\nThe obedience of stone and staff is shown to you,\nAnd informs you of that of other inanimate things.\nThey cry, \"We are all aware of God and obey Him;\nWe are not destructive by mere fortuitous chance.\"\nThus you know the water of the Nile when in flood\nMade distinction between the Egyptians and the Israelites.\nYou know the others are wise as earth, who, when cleft,\nKnew Qarun and swallowed him up in vengeance.\nOr like the moon, who heard the command and hasted\nTo sever itself into two halves in the sky. 7\nOr like the trees and stones, which in all places\nWere seen to bow down at the feet of Mustafa.\nThe arguments between a Sunni and a Materialist 8 (Dahri) decided by the arbitrament of fire.\nLast night a Sunni said, \"The world is transitory;\nThe heavens will pass away; 'God will be the heir.'\" 9\nA philosopher replied, \"How know you they are transitory?\nHow knows the rain the transitory nature of the cloud?\nAre you not a mere mote floating in the sunbeams?\nHow know you that the sun is transitory?\nA mere worm buried in a dung-heap,\nHow can it know the origin and end of the earth?\nIn blind belief you have accepted this from your father,\nAnd through folly have clung to it ever since.\nTell me what is the proof of its transitoriness,\nOr else be silent and indulge not in idle talk.\"\nThe Sunni said, \"One day I saw two persons\nEngaged in argument on this deep question,\nYea, in dispute and controversy and argument.\nAt last a crowd was gathered round them.\nI proceeded towards that company\nTo inform myself of the subject of their discourse.\nOne said, 'This sky will pass away;\nDoubtless this building had a builder.'\nThe other said, 'It is eternal and without period;\nIt had no builder, or it was its own builder.'\nThe first said, 'Do you then deny the Creator,\nThe Bringer of day and night, the Sustainer of men?'\nHe answered, 'Without proof I will not listen\nTo what you say; 'tis only based on blind belief.\nGo! bring proof and evidence, for never\nWill I accept this statement without proof.'\nHe answered, 'The proof is within my heart,\nYea, my proofs are hidden in my heart.\nFrom weakness of vision you see not the new moon;\nIf I see it, be not angry with me!'\nMuch talk followed, and the people were perplexed\nAbout the origin and end of the revolving heavens.\nThen the first said, 'O friend, within me is a proof\nWhich assures me of the transitoriness of the heavens.\nI hold it for certain, and the sign of certainty\nIn him who possesses it is entering into fire.\nKnow this proof is not to be expressed in speech,\nAny more than the feeling of love felt by lovers.\nThe secret I labor to express is not revealed\nSave by the pallor and emaciation of my face.\nWhen the tears course down my cheeks,\nThey are a proof of the beauty and grace of my beloved.'\nThe other said, \"I take not these for a proof,\nThough they may be a proof to common people.\"\nThe Sunni said, \"When genuine and base coin boast,\nSaying, 'Thou art false, I am good and genuine,'\nFire is the test ultimately,\nWhen the two rivals are cast into the furnace.\"\nAccordingly both of them entered the furnace,\nBoth leapt into the fiery flame;\nAnd the philosopher was burnt to ashes,\nBut the God-fearing Sunni was made fairer than before.\n*NOTES:\n1. This story is an expansion of Koran xliii. 50 and following verses, and of Koran xi.\n2. See Koran xliii. 50.\n3. Compare the Hadis, \"Die before you die,\" i.e., mortify your carnal desires, and you will find spiritual treasure.\n4. The Turkish commentator translates ruh by Haqq Yoluna, \"for the sake of truth,\" \"in the way of truth.\" The Lucknow commentator, as usual, shirks the difficulty.\n5. Koran liii. 40.\n6. Koran xxxvi, 29.\n7. Koran liv. 1.\n8. Ghazzali divides the ancient Greek philosophers into three classes: Dahriyun, Tabayiun, and Ilahiyun. Schmolders, Ecoles Philosophiques, p. 29.\n9. Koran xv. 23.\n\nSTORY VII.\nThe Courtier who quarreled with his Friend for saving his Life.\nA king was enraged against one of his courtiers, and drew his sword to slay him. The bystanders were all afraid to interfere, with the exception of one who boldly threw himself at the king's feet and begged him to spare the offender. The king at once stayed his hand, and laid down his sword, saying, \"As you have interceded for him, I would gladly pardon him, even if he had acted as a very demon. I cannot refuse your entreaties, because they are the same as my own. In reality, it is not you who make these entreaties for him, but I who make them through your mouth. I am the real actor in this matter and you are only my agent. Remember the text, 'You shot not when you shot;' 1 you are, as it were, the foam, and I the mighty ocean beneath it. The mercy you show to this offender is really shown by me, the king.\" The offender was accordingly released and went his way; but, strange to say, he showed no gratitude to his protector, but, on the contrary, omitted to greet him when he met him, and in other ways refused to recognize the favor he had received from him. This behavior excited remark, and people questioned him as to the cause of his ingratitude to his benefactor. He replied, \"I had offered up my life to the king when this man intervened. It was a moment when, according to the tradition, 'I was with God in such a manner that neither prophet nor angel found entrance along with me,' 2 and this man intruded between us. I desired no mercy save the king's blows; I sought no shelter save the king. If the king had cut off my head he would have given me eternal life in return for it. My duty is to sacrifice my life; it is the king's prerogative to give life. The night which is made dark as pitch by the king scorns the brightness of the brightest festal day. He who beholds the king is exalted above all thoughts of mercy and vengeance. Of a man raised to this exalted state no description is possible in this world, for he is hidden in God, and words like 'mercy' and 'vengeance' only express men's partial and weak views of the matter. It is true 'God taught Adam the names of all things,' 3 but that means the real qualities of things, and not such names as ordinary men use, clad in the dress of human speech. The words and expressions we use have merely a relative truth, and do not unfold absolute truth.\"\nHe illustrates this by the reply made to the angel Gabriel by Abraham when he was cast into the fire by Nimrod. 4 Gabriel asked him if he could assist him, and Abraham answered, \"No! I have no need of your help.\" When one has attained union with God he has no need of intermediaries. Prophets and apostles are needed as links to connect ordinary men with God, but he who hears the \"inner voice\" within him has no need to listen to outward words, even of apostles. Although that intercessor is himself dwelling in God, yet my state is higher and more lovely than his. Though he is God's agent, yet I desire not his intercession to save me from evil sent me by God, for evil at God's hand seems to me good. What seems mercy and kindness to the vulgar seems wrath and vengeance to God-intoxicated saints. God's severity and chastisements serve to exalt his saints, though they make the vulgar more ungodly than before, even as the water of the Nile was pure water to the Israelites, but blood to the Egyptians.\nMoses asks the Almighty, \"Why hast Thou made men to destroy them?\" 5\nMoses said, \"O Lord of the day of account,\nThou makest forms; wherefore, then, destroyest Thou them?\nThou makest charming forms, both men and women;\nWherefore, then, dost Thou lay them waste?\"\nGod answered, \"I know that this query of thine\nProceeds not from negation or vain curiosity.\nOtherwise I should chastise and punish thee;\nYea, I should rebuke thee for this question.\nBut thou seekest to discover in my actions\nThe ruling principle and the eternal mystery,\nIn order to inform the people thereof,\nAnd to make 'ripe' every 'raw' person.\nYea, O messenger, thou questionest me that I may reveal\nMy ways to the people, though thou knowest them.\nO Moses, go and sow seed in the ground\nIn order to do justice to this question.\"\nWhen Moses had sowed and his seed had grown up,\nHe took a sickle and reaped the corn,\nAnd then a divine voice reached his ears:\n\"Why hast thou sown and nurtured the corn,\nAnd then cut it down directly it was ripe?\"\nMoses replied, \"Lord, I cut it and lay it low\nBecause here I have grain and straw.\nGrain is out of place in the straw-yard,\nAnd straw is useless in the wheat-barn.\n'Tis wrong to mix these two,\nIt is needful to sift them one from the other.\"\nGod said, \"From whom learnest thou this knowledge\nWhereby thou hast constructed a threshing-floor?\"\nMoses said, \"O Lord, Thou hast given me discernment.\"\nGod said, \"Then have not I also discernment?\nAmongst my creatures there are pure spirits,\nAnd also dark and befouled spirits.\nThe oyster-shells are not all of the same value;\nSome contain pearls, and others black stones.\nIt is needful to discern the bad from the good,\nJust as much as to sift wheat from straw.\nThe people of this world exist in order to manifest\nAnd to disclose the 'hidden treasure.'\nRead, 'I was a hidden treasure, and desired to be known;\nHide not the hidden treasure, but disclose it.\nYour true treasure is hidden under a false one,\nJust as butter is hidden within the substance of milk.\nThe false one is this transitory body of yours,\nThe true one your divine soul.\nLong time this milk is exposed to view,\nAnd the soul's butter is hidden and of no account.\nStir up your milk assiduously with knowledge,\nSo that what is hidden in it may be disclosed;\nBecause this mortal is the guide to immortality,\nAs the cries of revellers indicate the cup-bearer.\"\n*NOTES:\n1. Koran viii. 17.\n2. See Gulshan i Raz, I. 120.\n3. Koran ii. 29.\n4. See Koran xxi. 68, and the Commentators thereon.\n5. So Job x. 8: \" Thy hands have made me, yet Thou dost destroy me.\"\n\nSTORY VIII.\nThe Prince who, after having been beguiled by\na Courtesan, returned to his True Love.\nA certain king dreamed that his dearly beloved son, a youth of great promise, had come to an untimely end. On awaking he was rejoiced to find that his son was still alive; but he reflected that an accident might carry him off at any moment, and therefore decided to marry him without delay, in order that the succession might be secured. Accordingly he chose the daughter of a pious Darvesh as a bride for his son, and made preparations for the wedding. But his wife and the other ladies of his harem did not approve of the match, considering it below the dignity of the prince to marry the daughter of a beggar. The king rebuked them, saying that a Darvesh who had renounced worldly wealth for the sake of God was not to be confounded with an ordinary beggar, and insisted on the consummation of the marriage. After the marriage the prince refused to have anything to do with his bride, though she was very fair to look on, and he carried on an intrigue with an ugly old woman who had bewitched him by sorcery. After a year, however, the king found some physicians who succeeded in breaking the spell, and the prince returned to his senses, and his eyes were opened to the superior attractions of his wife, and he renounced his ugly paramour and fell in love with his wife. This is a parable, the true wife being the Deity, the old paramour the world, and the physicians the prophets and saints. Another illustration is a child who played at besieging a mimic fort with his fellows, and succeeded in capturing it and keeping the others out. At this moment God \"bestowed on him wisdom, though a child,\" 1 and it became to him a day \"when a man flees from his brethren,\" 2 and he recognized the emptiness of this idle sport, and engaged in the pursuit of holiness and piety. This is followed by an anecdote of a devotee who had so concentrated his thoughts on things above that he was utterly careless of all earthly troubles, and was cheerful and rejoicing even in the midst of a severe famine.\nThe world is the outward form of \"Universal Reason\" (Muhammad), and he who grieves him must expect trouble in the world. 3\nThe whole world is the outward form of Universal Reason,\nFor it is the father of all creatures of reason.\nWhen a man acts basely towards Universal Reason,\nIts form, the world, shows its teeth at him.\nBe loyal to this father and renounce disobedience,\nThat this earthy house may furnish you golden carpets.\nThen the judgment-day will be the \"cash of your state,\"\nEarth and heavens will be transfigured before you. 4\nI am ever in concord with this father of ours,\nAnd earth ever appears to me as a Paradise.\nEach moment a f1~esh form, a new beauty,\nSo that weariness vanishes at these ever-fresh sights.\nI see the world filled with blessings,\nFresh waters ever welling up from new fountains.\nThe sound of those waters reaches my ears,\nMy brain and senses are intoxicated therewith.\nBranches of trees dancing like fair damsels,\nLeaves clapping hands like singers.\nThese glories are a mirror shining through a veil;\nIf the mirror were unveiled, how would it be?\nI tell not one in a thousand of them,\nBecause every ear is stopped with doubt.\nTo men of illusions these tales are mere good tidings,\nBut men of knowledge deem them not tidings, but ready cash.\nThis is illustrated by an anecdote of Ezra or 'Uzair and his sons.5 On his return from Babylon, whither he had been carried captive by Nebuchadnezzar, Ezra beheld the ruins of Jerusalem, and he said, \"How shall God give life to this city after it hath been dead?\" And God caused him to die for a hundred years, and then raised him again to life, and said to him, \"How long hast thou waited?\" He said, \"I have waited a day.\" God said, \"Nay, thou hast waited a hundred years. Look at the dead bones of thine ass; we will raise them and clothe them with flesh.\" Ezra was raised from the dead as a young man, whereas his sons were then, of course, very old men. They met him, and asked if he had seen their father. He replied, \"I have seen him; he is coming.\" Some of them rejoiced, considering this good news; but others, who had loved him more dearly, knew him and fainted with joy. What was mere good tidings to the men of opinion was the \"ready money of their state\" to men of real knowledge.\n*NOTES:\n1. Koran xix. 13.\n2. Koran lxxx. 34.\n3. \"Aql i Kull, Universal Reason, or the Logos, was identified with the prophet Muhammad.\"\n4. Koran xiv. 49.\n5. This story comes from Koran ii. 261.\n\nSTORY IX.\nThe Mule and the Camel.\nA mule said to a camel, \"How is it that I am always stumbling and falling down, whilst you never make a false step?\" The camel replied, \"My eyes are always directed upwards, and I see a long way before me, while your eyes look down, and you only see what is immediately under your feet.\" The mule admitted the truth of the camel's statement, and besought him to act as his guide in future, and the camel consented to do so. Just so partial reason cannot see beyond the grave, but real reason looks onward to the day of judgment, and, therefore, is enabled to steer a better course in this world. For this cause, men having only partial reason or mere opinion of their own ought to follow the guidance of the saints, according to the text, \"O believers, enter not upon any affair ere God and his Apostle lead the way.\" 1\nThen follows another anecdote of an Egyptian who asked an Israelite to draw water for him from the Nile, because the water of the Nile turned to blood when drawn by an Egyptian. Afterwards the Egyptian asked the Israelite to pray for him, and the Israelite admonished him to renounce his egotism and conceit of his own existence, which blinded his eyes to divine verities. In illustration of this he tells the same story of an adulterous woman, which is known as the \"Merchant's Tale\" in Chaucer. This woman, desiring to carry on an intrigue with her paramour, climbed up a pear-tree to gather the fruit, and when she had reached the top she looked down, and pretended that she saw her husband misconducting himself with another woman. The husband assured her there was no one but himself there, and desired her to come down and see for herself. She came down and admitted there was no one there. Her husband then, at her request, ascended the tree, and she at once called her paramour, and began to amuse herself with him. Her husband saw her from his post in the tree, and began to abuse her; but she declared there was no man with her, and that the pear-tree made her husband see double, just as it had made her see double previously.\nThe evolution of man.\nFirst he appeared in the class of inorganic things, 2\nNext he passed therefrom into that of plants.\nFor years he lived as one of the plants,\nRemembering naught of his inorganic state so different;\nAnd when he passed from the vegetive to the animal state\nHe had no remembrance of his state as a plant,\nExcept the inclination he felt to the world of plants,\nEspecially at the time of spring and sweet flowers.\nLike the inclination of infants towards their mothers,\nWhich know not the cause of their inclination to the breast,\nOr the excessive inclination of young disciples\nTowards their noble and illustrious teachers.\nThe disciple's partial reason comes from that Reason,\nThe disciple's shadow is from that bough.\nWhen the shadows in the disciples cease,\nThey know the reason of their attachment to the teachers.\nFor, O fortunate one, how can the shadow move,\nUnless the tree that casts the shadow move as well?\nAgain, the great Creator, as you know,\nDrew man out of the animal into the human state.\nThus man passed from one order of nature to another,\nTill he became wise and knowing and strong as he is now.\nOf his first souls he has now no remembrance,\nAnd he will be again changed from his present soul.\nIn order to escape from his present soul full of lusts\nHe must behold thousands of reasonable souls.\nThough man fell asleep and forgot his previous states,\nYet God will not leave him in this self-forgetfulness;\nAnd then he will laugh at his own former state\nSaying, \" What mattered my experiences when asleep?\nWhen I had forgotten my prosperous condition,\nAnd knew not that the grief and ills I experienced\nWere the effect of sleep and illusion and fancy?\nIn like manner this world, which is only a dream.\nSeems to the sleeper as a thing enduring for ever\nBut when the morn of the last day shall dawn,\nThe sleeper will escape from the cloud of illusion;\nLaughter will overpower him at his own fancied grieves\nWhen he beholds his abiding home and place.\nWhatever you see in this sleep, both good and evil,\nWill all be exposed to view on the resurrection day.\nWhatever you have done during your sleep in the world\nWill be displayed to you clearly when you awake.\nImagine not that these ill deeds of yours exist not\nIn this sleep of yours, and will not be revealed to you.\nBut your present laughter will turn to weeping and woe\nOn the day of revealing, O you who oppress captives!\nYour present wailing and sorrow and grieves,\nOn the other hand, will be joy when you awake,\nO you, who have rent the garments of many Josephs,\nYou will rise from your heavy sleep as a wolf.\nYour bad qualities will rise in the shape of wolves\nAnd rend you limb from limb in vengeance.\nBy the law of retaliation blood sleeps not after death;\nSay not, \"I shall die and obtain pardon.\"\nThe retaliation of this world is illusive,\nIt is mere sport compared to the retaliation to come.\nTherefore God calls the world \"a pastime and a sport,\" 3\nFor punishment in this world is sport compared to that.\nHere punishment is as the repression of quarrels,\nThere it is as castration or circumcision.\n\nBut this discourse is endless, O Moses,\nGo and leave these asses to their grazing!\nLet them fatten themselves with the food they love,\nFor they are very wolves and objects of my wrath.\nZu'l Qarnain at Mount Qaf. 4\nZu'l Qarnain journeyed to Mount Qaf;\nHe saw it was formed of a bright emerald,\nForming as it were a ring round the world,\nWhereat all people are filled with wonder.\nHe said, \"Thou mighty hill, what are other hills?\nBefore thee they are mere playthings.\"\nThe Mount replied, \"Those hills are my veins,\nBut they are not like me in beauty and importance.\nA hidden vein from me runs to every city,\nThe quarters of the world are bound to my veins.\nWhen God desires an earthquake under any city,\nHe bids me shake one of my veins.\nThen in anger I shake that vein\nWhich is connected with that particular city.\nWhen He says, 'Enough,' my vein remains still,\nI remain still, and then haste to perform my work.\nNow still like a plaster, and now operating;\nNow still like thought, and then speaking my thought.\nBut they who are void of reason imagine\nThat these earthquakes proceed from earth's vapors.\"\n\nJust so an ant who saw a pen writing on paper,\nDelivered himself to another ant in this way\n'That pen is making very wonderful figures,\nLike hyacinths and lilies and roses.'\nThe other said, 'The finger is the real worker,\nThe pen is only the instrument of its working.'\nA third ant said, ' No; the action proceeds from the arm,\nThe weak finger writes with the arm's might.'\nSo it went on upwards, till at last\nA prince of the ants, who had some wit\nSaid, 'Ye regard only the outward form of this marvel,\nWhich form becomes senseless in sleep and death.\nForm is only as a dress or a staff in the hand,\nIt is only from reason and mind these figures proceed.'\nBut he knew not that this reason and mind\nWould be but lifeless things without God's impulsion.\nThe angel Gabriel appears to the Prophet Muhammad.\nMustafa said to the angel Gabriel,\n\"O friend, show me thy form as it really is;\nShow it to me openly and perceptibly,\nThat I may behold thee with my eyes.\"\nGabriel said, \"Thou canst not do so, thou art too weak,\nThy senses are exceeding weak and frail.\"\nMuhammad said, \"Show it, that this body of mine may see\nTo what extent its senses are frail and impotent.\nTrue, man's bodily senses are frail,\nBut he possesses within him a mighty property. 5\nThis body resembles flint and steel,\nBut like them it has the power of kindling fire.\nFlint and steel are able to generate fire,\nFrom them springs fire which can destroy its parents.\"\nAs he continued importuning him, Gabriel displayed\nHis awful form, whereat the mountains were rent asunder.\nIt occupied the sky from east to west.\nAnd Mustafa swooned with fear.\nWhen Gabriel beheld him swooning with fear,\nHe came and clasped him in his arms.\nAddress to Husamu-'d-Din.\nO light of God, Husamu-'d-Din, admit\nThis ass's head into that melon-garden!\nFor when this ass is killed in the slaughter-house\nThat kitchen will bestow upon him a new existence.\nFrom me proceeds the form, from thee the spirit;\nNay, form and spirit both proceed from thee!\nThou art as Muhammad in heaven, O brilliant Sun!\nBe also as Muhammad on earth forever and ever!\nSo that earth and heaven on high may be united\nWith one heart, one worship, one aspiration!\nAnd schism and polytheism and duality disappear,\nAnd Unity abide in the Real Spiritual Being!\nWhen my spirit recognizes thy spirit,\nWe remember our essential union and origin.\n*NOTES:\n1. Koran xlix. 1.\n2. See the parallel passage in Gulshan i Raz, I. 317, and the note. It is based on the Aristotelian doctrine of the ascending grades of the soul, or vital principle.\n3. Koran xxix. 64.\n4. Zu'l Qarnain, Chaucer's Dulkarn, means \"He of the two horns,\" and here denotes Alexander the Great.\n5. See the parallel passage in Gulshan i Raz, I. 431, and the note thereon. This property is the mystic \"inner light\" or spiritual intuition.",
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