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    "endpoint": "/api/sources/sufism/saadi-gulistan/02-chapter-ii-the-morals-of-dervishes.json"
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  "work": {
    "slug": "saadi-gulistan",
    "name": "Gulistan (Saadi)"
  },
  "parents": [
    {
      "slug": "sufism",
      "name": "Sufi Poets",
      "url": "/sources/sufism/"
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  ],
  "chapter": {
    "num": 3,
    "slug": "02-chapter-ii-the-morals-of-dervishes",
    "title": "Chapter II: The Morals of Dervishes",
    "of": 9,
    "words": 8758,
    "text": "## Chapter II: The Morals of Dervishes\n\n\nTHE MORALS OF DERVISHES\n\n Story 1\n\n One of the great devotees having been asked about his opinion\nconcerning a hermit whom others had censured in their conversation, he\nreplied: 'I do not see any external blemishes on him and do not know\nof internal ones.'\n\n Whomsoever thou seest in a religious habit\n Consider him to be a religious and good man\n And, if thou knowest not his internal condition,\n What business has the muhtasib inside the house?\n\n Story 2\n\n I saw a dervish who placed his head upon the threshold of the\nKa'bah, groaned, and said: 'O forgiving, 0 merciful one, thou\nknowest what an unrighteous, ignorant man can offer to thee.'\n\n I have craved pardon for the deficiency of my service\n Because I can implore no reward for my obedience.\n Sinners repent of their transgressions.\n Arifs ask forgiveness for their imperfect worship.\n\n Devotees desire a reward for their obedience and merchants the price\nof their wares but I, who am a worshipper, have brought hope and not\nobedience. I have come to beg and not to trade. Deal with me as thou\ndeemest fit.\n\n Whether thou killest me or forgivest my crime,\n my face and head are on thy threshold.\n A slave has nothing to command; whatever thou commandest I obey.\n\n I saw a mendicant at the door of the Ka'bah\n Who said this and wept abundantly:\n 'I ask not for the acceptance of my service\n But for drawing the pen of pardon over my sins.'\n\n Story 3\n\n I saw A'bd-u-Qader Gaillani in the sanctuary of the Ka'bah with\nhis face on the pebbles and saying: 'O lord, pardon my sins and, if\nI deserve punishment, cause me to arise blind on the day of\nresurrection that I may not be ashamed in the sight of the righteous.'\n\n With my face on the earth of helplessness\n I say Every morning as soon as I become conscious:\n O thou whom I shall never forget\n Wilt thou at all remember thy slave?\n\n Story 4\n\n A thief paid a visit to the house of a pious man but, although he\nsought a great deal, found nothing and was much grieved. The pious\nman, who knew this, threw the blanket upon which he had been\nsleeping into the way of the thief that he might not go away\ndisappointed.\n\n I heard that men of the way of God\n Have not distressed the hearts of enemies.\n How canst thou attain that dignity\n Who quarrelest and wagest war against friends?\n\n The friendship of pure men, whether in thy presence or absence, is\nnot such as Will find fault behind thy back and is ready to die for\nthee before thy face.\n\n In thy presence gentle like a lamb,\n In thy absence like a man-devouring wolf.\n\n Who brings the faults of another to thee and enumerates them\n Will undoubtedly carry thy faults to others.\n\n Story 5\n\n Several travellers were on a journey together and equally sharing\neach other's troubles and comforts. I desired to accompany them but\nthey would not agree. Then I said: 'It is foreign to the manners of\ngreat men to turn away the face from the company of the poor and so\ndeprive themselves of the advantage they might derive therefrom\nbecause I for one consider myself sufficiently strong and energetic to\nbe of service to men and not an encumbrance. Although I am not\nriding on a beast, I shall aid you in carrying blankets.' One of\nthem said: 'Do not be grieved at the words thou hast heard because\nsome days ago a thief in the guise of a dervish arrived and joined our\ncompany.'\n\n How can people know who is in the dress?\n The writer is aware what the book contains.\n\n As the state of dervishes is safe, they entertained no suspicion\nabout him and received him as a friend.\n\n The outward state of Arifs is the patched dress.\n It suffices as a display to the face of the people.\n\n Strive by thy acts to be good and wear anything thou listest.\n Place a crown on thy head and a flag on thy back.\n The abandoning of the world, of lust, and of desire\n Is sanctity, not the abandonment of the robe only.\n It is necessary to show manhood in the fight.\n Of what profit are weapons of war to an hermaphrodite?\n\n We travelled one day till the night set in during which we slept\nnear a fort and the graceless thief, taking up the water-pot of a\ncompanion, pretending to go for an ablution, departed for plunder.\n\n A pretended saint who wears the dervish garb\n Has made of the Ka'bah's robes the covering of an ass.\n\n After disappearing from the sight of the dervishes, he went to a\ntower from which he stole a casket and, when the day dawned, the\ndark-hearted wretch had already progressed a considerable distance. In\nthe morning the guiltless sleeping companions were all taken to the\nfort and thrown into prison. From that date we renounced companionship\nand took the road of solitude, according to the maxim: Safety is in\nsolitude.\n\n When one of a tribe has done a foolish thing\n No honour is left either to the low or the high.\n Seest thou not how one ox of the pasturage\n Defiles all oxen of the village?\n\n I replied: 'Thanks be to the God of majesty and glory, I have not\nbeen excluded from the advantages enjoyed by dervishes, although I\nhave separated myself from their society. I have profited by what thou\nhast narrated to me and this admonition will be of use through life to\npersons like me.'\n\n For one rude fellow in the assembly\n The heart of intelligent men is much grieved.\n If a tank be filled with rose-water\n A dog falling into it pollutes the whole.\n\n Story 6\n\n A hermit, being the guest of a padshah, ate less than he wished when\nsitting at dinner and when he rose for prayers he prolonged them\nmore than was his wont in order to enhance the opinion entertained\nby the padshah of his piety.\n\n O Arab of the desert, I fear thou wilt not reach the Ka'bah\n Because the road on which thou travellest leads to Turkestan.\n\n When he returned to his own house, he desired the table to be laid\nout for eating. He had an intelligent son who said: 'Father, hast thou\nnot eaten anything at the repast of the sultan?' He replied: 'I have\nnot eaten anything to serve a purpose.' The boy said: 'Then likewise\nsay thy prayers again as thou hast not done anything to serve that\npurpose.'\n\n O thou who showest virtues on the palms of the hand\n But concealest thy errors under the armpit\n What wilt thou purchase, O vain-glorious fool,\n On the day of distress with counterfeit silver?\n\n Story 7\n\n I remember, being in my childhood pious, rising in the night,\naddicted to devotion and abstinence. One night I was sitting with my\nfather, remaining awake and holding the beloved Quran in my lap,\nwhilst the people around us were asleep. I said: 'Not one of these\npersons lifts up his head or makes a genuflection. They are as fast\nasleep as if they were dead.' He replied: 'Darling of thy father,\nwould that thou wert also asleep rather than disparaging people.'\n\n The pretender sees no one but himself\n Because he has the veil of conceit in front.\n If he were endowed with a God-discerning eye\n He would see that no one is weaker than himself.\n\n Story 8\n\n A great man was praised in an assembly and, his good qualities being\nextolled, he raised his head and said: 'I am such as I know myself\nto be.'\n\n O thou who reckonest my virtues, refrainest from giving me pain,\n These are my open, and thou knowest not my hidden, qualities.\n\n My person is, to the eyes of the world, of good aspect\n But my internal wickedness makes me droop my head with shame.\n The peacock is for his beauteous colours by the people\n Praised whilst he is ashamed of his ugly feet.\n\n Story 9\n\n One of the devotees of Mount Lebanon, whose piety was famed in the\nArab country and his miracles well known, entered the cathedral mosque\nof Damascus and was performing his purificatory ablution on the edge\nof a tank when his feet slipped and he fell into the reservoir but\nsaved himself with great trouble. After the congregation had\nfinished their prayers, one of his companions said: 'I have a\ndifficulty.' He asked: 'What is it?' He continued: 'I remember that\nthe sheikh walked on the surface of the African sea without his feet\ngetting wetted and today he nearly perished in this paltry water which\nis not deeper than a man's stature. What reason is there in this?' The\nsheikh drooped his head into the bosom of meditation and said after\na long pause: 'Hast thou not heard that the prince of the world,\nMuhammad the chosen, upon whom be the benediction of Allah and\npeace, has said: I have time with Allah during which no cherubim nor\ninspired prophet is equal to me?' But he did not say that such was\nalways the case. The time alluded to was when Gabriel or Michael\ninspired him whilst on other occasions he was satisfied with the\nsociety of Hafsah and Zainab. The visions of the righteous one are\nbetween brilliancy and obscurity.\n\n Thou showest thy countenance and then hidest it\n Enhancing thy value and augmenting our desire.\n\n I behold whom I love without an intervention.\n Then a trance befalls me; I lose the road;\n It kindles fire, then quenches it with a sprinkling shower.\n Wherefore thou seest me burning and drowning.\n\n Story 10\n\n One asked the man who had lost his son:\n\n 'O noble and intelligent old man!\n As thou hast smelt the odour of his garment from Egypt\n Why hast thou not seen him in the well of Canaan?'\n\n He replied:\n\n 'My state is that of leaping lightning.\n One moment it appears and at another vanishes.\n I am sometimes sitting in high heaven.\n Sometimes I cannot see the back of my foot.\n Were a dervish always to remain in that state\n He would not care for the two worlds.'\n\n Story 11\n\n I spoke in the cathedral mosque of Damascus a few words by way of\na sermon but to a congregation whose hearts were withered and dead,\nnot having travelled from the road of the world of form, the physical,\nto the world of meaning, the moral world. I perceived that my words\ntook no effect and that burning fire does not kindle moist wood. I was\nsorry for instructing brutes and holding forth a mirror in a\nlocality of blind people. I had, however, opened the door of meaning\nand was giving a long explanation of the verse We are nearer unto\nHim than the jugular vein till I said:\n\n 'The Friend is nearer to me than my self,\n But it is more strange that I am far from him.\n What am I to do? To whom can it be said that he\n Is in my arms, but I am exiled from him.'\n\n I had intoxicated myself with the wine of these sentiments,\nholding the remnant of the cup of the sermon in my hand when a\ntraveller happened to pass near the edge of the assembly, and the last\nturn of the circulating cup made such an impression upon him that he\nshouted and the others joined him who began to roar, whilst the raw\nportion of the congregation became turbulent. Whereon I said:\n'Praise be to Allah! Those who are far away but intelligent are in the\npresence of Allah, and those who are near but blind are distant.'\n\n When the hearer understands not the meaning of words\n Do not look for the effect of the orator's force\n But raise an extensive field of desire\n That the eloquent man may strike the ball of effect.\n\n Story 12\n\n One night I had in the desert of Mekkah become so weak from want\nof sleep that I was unable to walk and, laying myself down, told the\ncamel driver to let me alone.\n\n How far can the foot of a wretched pedestrian go\n When a dromedary gets distressed by its load?\n Whilst the body of a fat man becomes lean\n A weak man will be dead of exhaustion.\n\n He replied: 'O brother, the sanctuary is in front of us and brigands\nin the rear. If thou goest thou wilt prosper. If thou sleepest thou\nwilt die.'\n\n It is pleasant to sleep under an acacia on the desert road\n But alas! thou must bid farewell to life on the night of departure.\n\n Story 13\n\n I saw a holy man on the seashore who had been wounded by a tiger. No\nmedicine could relieve his pain; he suffered much but he\nnevertheless constantly thanked God the most high, saying: 'Praise\nbe to Allah that I have fallen into a calamity and not into sin.'\n\n If that beloved Friend decrees me to be slain\n I shall not say that moment that I grieve for life\n Or say: What fault has thy slave committed?\n My grief will be for having offended thee.\n\n Story 14\n\n A dervish who had fallen into want stole a blanket from the house of\na friend. The judge ordered his hand to be amputated but the owner\nof the blanket interceded, saying that he had condoned the fault.\nThe judge rejoined: 'Thy intercession cannot persuade me to neglect\nthe provision of the law.' The man continued: 'Thou hast spoken the\ntruth but amputation is not applicable to a person who steals some\nproperty dedicated to pious uses. More over a beggar possesses nothing\nand whatever belongs to a dervish is dedicated to the use of the\nneedy.' Thereon the judge released the culprit, saying: 'The world\nmust indeed have become too narrow for thee that thou hast committed\nno theft except from the house of such a friend.' He replied: 'Hast\nthou not heard the saying: Sweep out the house of friends and do not\nknock at the door of foes.'\n\n If thou sinkest in a calamity be not helpless.\n Strip thy foes of their skins and thy friends of their fur-coats.\n\n Story 15\n\n A padshah, meeting a holy man, asked him whether he did not\nsometimes remember him for the purpose of getting presents. He\nreplied: 'Yes, I do, whenever I forget God.'\n\n Whom He drives from his door, runs everywhere.\n Whom He calls, runs to no one's door.\n\n Story 16\n\n A pious man saw in a dream a padshah in paradise and a devotee in\nhell whereon he asked for the reason of the former's exaltation and\nthe latter's degradation, saying that he had imagined the contrary\nought to be the case. He received the following answer: 'The padshah\nhad, for the love he bore to dervishes, been rewarded with paradise\nand the devotee had, for associating with padshahs, been punished in\nhell.'\n\n Of what use is thy frock, rosary and patched dress?\n Keep thyself free from despicable practices.\n Then thou wilt have no need of a cap of leaves.\n Have the qualities of a dervish and wear a Tatar cap.\n\n Story 17\n\n A bareheaded and barefooted pedestrian who had arrived from Kufah\nwith the Hejaz-caravan of pilgrims joined us, strutted about and\nrecited:\n\n 'I am neither riding a camel nor under a load like a camel.\n I am neither a lord of subjects nor the slave of a potentate.\n Grief for the present, or distress for the past, does not\n trouble me.\n I draw my breath in comfort and thus spend my life.'\n\n A camel-rider shouted to him: 'O dervish, where art thou going?\nReturn, for thou wilt expire from hardships.' He paid no attention but\nentered the desert and marched. When we reached the station at the\npalm-grove of Mahmud, the rich man was on the point of death and the\ndervish, approaching his pillow, said: 'We have not expired from\nhardship but thou hast died on a dromedary.'\n\n A man wept all night near the head of a patient.\n When the day dawned he died and the patient revived.\n\n Many a fleet charger had fallen dead\n While a lame ass reached the station alive.\n Often healthy persons were in the soil\n Buried and the wounded did not die.\n\n Story 18\n\n A hermit, having been invited by a padshah, concluded that if he\nwere to take some medicine to make himself weak he might perhaps\nenhance the opinion of the padshah regarding his merits. But it is\nrelated that the medicine was lethal so that when he partook of it\nhe died.\n\n Who appeared to thee all marrow like a pistachio\n Was but skin upon skin like an onion.\n Devotees with their face towards the world\n Say their prayers with their back to the Qiblah.\n When a worshipper calls upon his God,\n He must know no one besides God.\n\n Story 19\n\n A caravan having been plundered in the Yunan country and deprived of\nboundless wealth, the merchants wept and lamented, beseeching God\nand the prophet to intercede for them with the robbers, but\nineffectually.\n\n When a dark-minded robber is victorious\n What cares he for the weeping of the caravan?\n\n Loqman the philosopher being among the people of the caravan, one of\nthem asked him to speak a few words of wisdom and advice to the\nrobbers so that they might perhaps return some of the property they\nhad plundered because the loss of so much wealth would be\nlamentable. Loqman replied: 'It would be lamentable to utter one\nword of wisdom to them.'\n\n The rust which has eaten into iron\n Cannot be removed by polishing.\n Of what use is preaching to a black heart?\n An iron nail cannot be driven into a rock.\n\n Help the distressed in the day of prosperity\n Because comforting the poor averts evil from thyself.\n When a mendicant implores thee for a thing,\n Give it or else an oppressor may take it by force.\n\n Story 20\n\n Despite the abundant admonitions of the most illustrious Sheikh\nAbulfaraj Ben Juzi to shun musical entertainments and to prefer\nsolitude and retirement, the budding of my youth overcame me, my\nsensual desires were excited so that, unable to resist them, I\nwalked some steps contrary to the opinion of my tutor, enjoying myself\nin musical amusements and convivial meetings. When the advice of my\nsheikh occurred to my mind, I said:\n\n 'If the qazi were sitting with us, he would clap his hands.\n If the muhtasib were bibbing wine, he would excuse a drunkard.'\n\n Thus I lived till I paid one night a visit to an assembly of\npeople in which I saw a musician.\n\n Thou wouldst have said he is tearing up the vital artery\n with his fiddle-bow.\n His voice was more unpleasant than the wailing of one who\n lost his father.\n\n The audience now stopped their ears with their fingers, and now\nput them on their lips to silence him. We became ecstatic by the\nsounds of pleasing songs but thou art such a singer that when thou art\nsilent we are pleased.\n\n No one feels pleased by thy performance\n Except at the time of departure when thou pleasest.\n\n When that harper began to sing\n I said to the host: 'For God's sake\n Put mercury in my ear that I may not hear\n Or open the door that I may go away.'\n\n In short, I tried to please my friends and succeeded after a\nconsiderable struggle in spending the whole night there.\n\n The muezzin shouted the call to prayers out of time,\n Not knowing how much of the night had elapsed.\n Ask the length of the night from my eyelids\n For sleep did not enter my eyes one moment.\n\n In the morning I took my turban from my head, with one dinar from my\nbelt by way of gratification, and placed them before the musician whom\nI embraced and thanked. My friends who saw that my appreciation of his\nmerits was unusual attributed it to the levity of my intellect and\nlaughed secretly. One of them, however, lengthened out his tongue of\nobjection and began to reproach me, saying that I had committed an act\nrepugnant to intelligent men by bestowing a portion of my professional\ndress upon a musician who had all his life not a dirhem laid upon\nthe palm of his hand nor filings of silver or of gold placed on his\ndrum.\n\n A musician! Far be he from this happy abode.\n No one ever saw him twice in the same place.\n As soon as the shout rose from his mouth\n The hair on the bodies of the people stood on end.\n The fowls of the house, terrified by him, flew away\n Whilst he distracted our senses and tore his throat.\n\n I said: 'It will be proper to shorten the tongue of objection\nbecause his talent has become evident to me.' He then asked me to\nexplain the quality of it in order to inform the company so that all\nmight apologize for the jokes they had cracked about me. I replied:\n'Although my sheikh had often told me to abandon musical\nentertainments and had given me abundant advice, I did not mind it.\nThis night my propitious horoscope and my august luck have guided me\nto this place where I have, on hearing the performance of this\nmusician, repented and vowed never again to attend at singing and\nconvivial parties.'\n\n A pleasant voice, from a sweet palate, mouth and lips,\n Whether employed in singing or not, enchants the heart\n But the melodies of lovers of Isfahan or of the Hejaz\n From the windpipe of a bad singer are not nice.\n\n Story 21\n\n Loqman, being asked from whom he had learnt civility, replied: 'From\nthose who had no civility because what appeared to me unbecoming in\nthem I refrained from doing.'\n\n Not a word is said even in sport\n Without an intelligent man taking advice thereby.\n But if a hundred chapters of wisdom are read to a fool\n All strike his ear merely as sport.\n\n Story 22\n\n It is related that a hermit consumed during one night ten mann of\nfood and perused the whole Quran till morning. A pious fellow who\nhad heard of this said: 'It would have been more excellent if he had\neaten half a loaf and slept till the morning.'\n\n Keep thy interior empty of food\n That thou mayest behold therein the light of marifet.\n Thou art empty of wisdom for the reason\n That thou art replete with food up to the nose.\n\n Story 23\n\n A man had by his sins forfeited the divine favour but the lamp of\ngrace nevertheless so shone upon his path that it guided him into\nthe circle of religious men and, by the blessing of his association\nwith dervishes, as well as by the example of their righteousness,\nthe depravities of his character were transmuted into virtues and he\nrefrained from lust and passion. But the tongues of the malevolent\nwere lengthened with reference to his character, alleging that it\nwas the same as it had ever been and that his abstinence and piety\nwere spurious.\n\n By apology and penitence one may be saved from the wrath of God\n But cannot be saved from the tongues of men.\n\n He could no longer bear the reviling tongues and complained to the\npir of the Tariqat. The sheikh wept and said: 'How wilt thou be able\nto be sufficiently grateful for this divine favour that thou art\nbetter than the people imagine?'\n\n How long wilt thou say: 'The malevolent and envious\n Are searching out the defects of my humble self.\n Sometimes they arise to shed my blood.\n Sometimes they sit down to curse me.'\n To be good and to be in spoken of by the people\n Is better than to be bad and considered good by them.\n\n Look at me whom the good opinion of our contemporaries deems to be\nperfect whereas I am imperfection itself.\n\n If I were doing what I speak\n I would be of good conduct and a devotee.\n\n Verily I am veiled from the eyes of my neighbours\n But Allah knows my secret and my overt concerns.\n\n The door is locked to the access of people\n That they may not spread out my faults.\n What profiteth a closed door? The Omniscient\n Knows what I conceal or reveal.\n\n Story 24\n\n I complained to one of the sheikhs that a certain man had falsely\naccused me of lasciviousness. He replied: 'Put him to shame by thy\ngood conduct.'\n\n Be thou well behaved that a maligner\n May not find occasion to speak of thy faults.\n When the harp is in proper tune\n How can the hand of the musician correct it?\n\n Story 25\n\n One of the sheikhs of Syria, being asked on the true state of the\nSufis, replied: 'In former times they were a tribe in the world,\napparently distressed, but in reality contented whereas today they are\npeople outwardly satisfied but inwardly discontented.'\n\n If my heart roams away from thee every hour,\n Thou wilt find no tranquillity in solitude\n But if thou possessest property, dignity, fields and wares,\n If thy heart be with God, thou wilt be a recluse.\n\n Story 26\n\n I remember having once walked all night with a caravan and then\nslept on the edge of the desert. A distracted man who had\naccompanied us on that journey raised a shout, ran towards the\ndesert and took not a moment's rest. When it was daylight, I asked him\nwhat state of his that was. He replied: 'I saw bulbuls commencing to\nlament on the trees, the partridges on the mountains, the frogs in the\nwater and the beasts in the desert so I bethought myself that it would\nnot be becoming for me to sleep in carelessness while they all were\npraising God.'\n\n Yesterday at dawn a bird lamented,\n Depriving me of sense, patience, strength and consciousness.\n One of my intimate friends who\n Had perhaps heard my distressed voice\n Said: 'I could not believe that thou\n Wouldst be so dazed by a bird's cry.'\n I replied: 'It is not becoming to humanity\n That I should be silent when birds chant praises.'\n\n Story 27\n\n It once happened that on a journey to the Hejaz a company of young\nand pious men, whose sentiments harmonized with mine, were my\nfellow-travellers. They occasionally sung and recited spiritual verses\nbut we had with us also an a'bid, who entertained a bad opinion of the\nbehaviour of the dervishes and was ignorant of their sufferings.\nWhen we reached the palm-grove of the Beni Hallal, a black boy of\nthe encampment, falling into a state of excitement, broke out in a\nstrain which brought down the birds from the sky. I saw, however,\nthe camel of the a'bid, which began to prance, throwing him and\nrunning into the desert.\n\n Knowest thou what that matutinal bulbul said to me?\n What man art thou to be ignorant of love?\n The Arabic verses threw a camel into ecstasy and joy.\n If thou hast no taste thou art an ill-natured brute.\n\n When a camel's head is turned by the frenzy of joy\n And a man does not feel it, he must be an ass.\n\n When the winds blow over the plain\n The branches of the ban-tree bend, not hard rocks.\n\n Whatever thou beholdest chants his praises.\n He knows this who has the true perception.\n Not only the bulbul on the rosebush sings praises\n But every bramble is a tongue, extolling him.\n\n Story 28\n\n The life of a king was drawing to a close and he had no successor.\nHe ordered in his last testament that the next morning after his death\nthe first person entering the gate of the city be presented with the\nroyal crown and be entrusted with the government of the realm. It so\nhappened that the first person who entered was a mendicant who had all\nhis life subsisted on the morsels he collected and had sewn patch\nafter patch upon his clothes. The pillars of the state and grandees of\nthe court executed the injunction of the king and bestowed upon him\nthe government and the treasures; whereon the dervish reigned for a\nwhile until some amirs of the monarchy withdrew their necks from his\nobedience and kings from every side began to rise for hostilities\nand to prepare their armies for war. At last his own troops and\nsubjects also rebelled and deprived him of a portion of his dominions.\nThis event afflicted the mind of the dervish until one of his old\nfriends, who had been his companion when he was yet himself a dervish,\nreturned from a journey and, seeing him in such an exalted position,\nsaid: 'Thanks be to God the most high and glorious that thy rose has\nthus come forth from the thorn and thy thorn was extracted from thy\nfoot. Thy high luck has aided thee and prosperity with fortune has\nguided thee till thou hast attained this position. Verily hardship\nis followed by comfort.'\n\n A flower is sometimes blooming and sometimes withering.\n A tree is at times nude and at times clothed.\n\n He replied: 'Brother, condole with me because there is no occasion\nfor congratulation. When thou sawest me last, I was distressed for\nbread and now a world of distress has overwhelmed me.'\n\n If I have no wealth I grieve.\n If I have some the love of it captivates me.\n There is no greater calamity than worldly goods.\n Both their possession and their want are griefs.\n\n If thou wishest for power, covet nothing\n Except contentment which is sufficient happiness.\n If a rich man pours gold into thy lap\n Care not a moment for thanking him.\n Because often I heard great men say\n The patience of a dervish is better than the gift of a rich man.\n\n Story 29\n\n A man had a friend, who held the office of devan to the padshah, but\nwhom he had not seen for a long time; and, a man having asked him\nfor the reason, he replied: 'I do not want to see him.' A dependent\nhowever of the devan, who also happened to be present, queried:\n'What fault has he committed that thou art unwilling to meet him?'\nHe replied: 'There is no fault in the matter but a friend who is a\ndevan may be seen when he is removed from office.'\n\n Whilst in greatness and in the turmoil of busines\n They do not like to be troubled by neighbours\n But when they are depressed and removed from office\n They will lay open their heart's grief to friends.\n\n Story 30\n\n Abu Harirah, may the approbation of Allah be upon him, was in the\nhabit of daily waiting upon the Mustafa, peace on him, who said:\n'Abu Harira, visit me on alternate days that our love may increase.' A\nman said to a devotee: 'Beautiful as the sun is, I never heard that\nanybody took it for a friend or fell in love with it', and he replied:\n'This is because it may be seen daily, except in winter when it is\nveiled and beloved.'\n\n There is no harm in visiting people\n But not till they say: 'It is enough!'\n If thou findest fault with thyself\n Thou wilt not hear others reproaching thee.\n\n Story 31\n\n A man, being tormented story by a contrary wind in his belly and not\nhaving the power to retain it, unwittingly allowed it to escape. He\nsaid: 'Friends, I had no option in what I did, the fault of it is\nnot to be ascribed to me and peace has resulted to my internal\nparts. Kindly excuse me.'\n\n The belly is a prison of wind, O wise man.\n No sage retains wind in captivity.\n If wind twists thy belly let it out\n Because wind in the belly is a burden to the heart.\n\n Story 32\n\n Having become tired of my friends in Damascus, I went into the\ndesert of Jerusalem and associated with animals till the time when I\nbecame a prisoner of the Franks, who put me to work with infidels in\ndigging the earth of a moat in Tarapolis, when one of the chiefs of\nAleppo, with whom I had formerly been acquainted, recognized me and\nsaid: 'What state is this?' I recited:\n\n 'I fled from men to mountain and desert\n Wishing to attend upon no one but God.\n Imagine what my state at present is\n When I must be satisfied in a stable of wretches.\n\n The feet in chains with friends\n Is better than to be with strangers in a garden.'\n\n He took pity on my state and ransomed me for ten dinars from the\ncaptivity of the Franks, taking me to Aleppo where he had a daughter\nand married me to her with a dowry of one hundred dinars. After some\ntime had elapsed, she turned out to be ill-humoured, quarrelsome,\ndisobedient, abusive in her tongue and embittering my life:\n\n A bad wife in a good man's house\n Is his hell in this world already.\n Alas for a bad consort, alas!\n Preserve us, O Lord from the punishment of fire.\n\n Once she lengthened her tongue of reproach and said: 'Art thou not\nthe man whom my father purchased from the Franks for ten dinars?' I\nreplied: 'Yes, he bought me for ten dinars and sold me into thy\nhands for one hundred dinars.'\n\n I heard that a sheep had by a great man\n Been rescued from the jaws and the power of a wolf.\n In the evening he stroked her throat with a knife\n Whereon the soul of the sheep complained thus:\n Thou hast snatched me away from the claws of a wolf,\n But at last I see thou art thyself a wolf.'\n\n Story 33\n\n A padshah asked a hermit: 'How spendest thou thy precious time?'\nHe replied: 'I am all night engaged in prayer, during the morning in\nsupplications and the rest of the day in restricting my expenses.'\nThen the king ordered a sufficient allowance to be allotted to him\nso as to relieve him of the cares of his family.\n\n O thou who art encumbered with a family,\n Think no more of ever enjoying freedom.\n Cares for children, raiment and food\n Restrain thee from the heavenly kingdom.\n Every day I renew my determination\n To wait upon God until the night.\n In the night, while tying the knot of prayer,\n I think what my children will eat on the morrow.\n\n Story 34\n\n A man, professing to be a hermit in the desert of Syria, attended\nfor years to his devotions and subsisted on the leaves of trees. A\npadshah, who had gone in that direction by way of pilgrimage,\napproached him and said: 'If thou thinkest proper, we shall prepare\na place for thee in the town where thou wilt enjoy leisure for thy\ndevotions and others may profit by thy spiritual advice as well as\nimitate thy good works.' The hermit refused compliance but the pillars\nof the State were of opinion that, in order to please the king, he\nought to spend a few days in town to ascertain the state of the place;\nso that if he feared that the purity of his precious time might become\nturbid by association with strangers, he would still have the option\nto refuse compliance. It is related that the hermit entered the town\nwhere a private garden-house of the king, which was a\nheart-expanding and soul refreshing locality, had been prepared to\nreceive him.\n\n Its red roses were like the cheeks of belles,\n Its hyacinths like the ringlets of mistresses\n Protected from the inclemency of mid-winter\n Like sucklings who have not yet tasted the nurse's milk.\n\n And branches with pomegranates upon them:\n Fire suspended from the green-trees.\n\n The king immediately sent him a beautiful slave-girl:\n\n After beholding this hermit-deceiving crescent-moon\n Of the form of an angel and the beauty of a peacock,\n After seeing her it would be impossible\n To an anchorite's nature to remain patient.\n\n After her he sent likewise a slave-boy of wonderful beauty and\ngraceful placidity:\n\n People around him are dying with thirst\n And he, who looks like a cupbearer, gives no drink.\n\n The sight cannot be satisfied by seeing him\n Like the dropsical man near the Euphrates.\n\n The hermit began to eat delicious food, to wear nice clothes, to\nenjoy fruit and perfumed confectionery as well as to contemplate the\nbeauty of the slave-boy and girl in conformity with the maxim of\nwise men, who have said that the curls of belles are fetters to the\nfeet of the intellect and a snare to a sagacious bird.\n\n In thy service I lost my heart and religion with all my learning,\n I am indeed the sagacious bird and thou the snare.\n\n In short, the happiness of his former time of contentedness had come\nto an end, as the saying is:\n\n Any faqih, pir and murid\n Or pure minded orator,\n Descending into the base world,\n Sticks in the honey like a fly.\n\n Once the king desired to visit him but saw the hermit changed from\nhis former state, as he had become red, white and corpulent. When\nthe king entered, he beheld him reclining on a couch of gold brocade\nwhilst the boy and the fairy stood near his head with a fan of\npeacocks' feathers. He expressed pleasure to behold the hermit in so\ncomfortable a position, conversed with him on many topics and said\nat the conclusion of the visit: 'I am afraid of these two classes of\nmen in the world: scholars and hermits.' The vezier, who was a\nphilosopher and experienced in the affairs of the world, being\npresent, said: 'O king, the conditions of friendship require thee to\ndo good to both classes. Bestow gold upon scholars that they may\nread more but give nothing to hermits that they may remain hermits.'\n\n A hermit requires neither dirhems nor dinars.\n If lie takes any, find another hermit.\n\n Who has a good behaviour and a secret with God\n Is an anchorite without the waqfbread or begged morsel.\n\n With a handsome figure and heart-ravishing ear-tip\n A girl is a belle without turquoise-ring or pendants.\n\n A dervish of good behaviour and of happy disposition\n Requires not the bread of the rebat nor the begged morsel.\n A lady endowed with a beauteous form and chaste face\n Requires no paint, adornment or turquoise-ring.\n\n When I have and covet more\n It will not be proper to call me an anchorite.\n\n Story 35\n\n In conformity with the above sentiments an affair of importance\nemerged to a padshah, who thereon vowed that, if it terminated\naccording to his wishes, he would present devotees with a certain\nsum of money. His wish having been fulfilled, it became necessary to\nkeep his promise. Accordingly he gave a purse of dirhems to one of his\nconfidential servants to distribute it among recluses. It is related\nthat the slave was intelligent and shrewd. He walked about all day and\nreturning at nightfall, kissed the dirhems and deposited them before\nthe king with the remark that he had not found any devotees. The\nking rejoined: 'What nonsense is this? As far as I know there are four\nhundred devotees in this town. He said: 'Lord of the world, who is a\ndevotee does not accept money and who accepts it is not a devotee.'\nThe king smiled and said to his courtiers: 'Despite of my wishing to\ndo good to this class of worshippers of God, this rogue bears them\nemnity and thwarts my wish but truth is on his side.'\n\n If a devotee has taken dirhems and dinars\n Find another who is more a devotee than he.\n\n Story 36\n\n One of the ulemma of solid learning, having been asked for his\nopinion about waqfbread, answered: 'If it be accepted to insure\ntranquillity of mind from cares for food and to obtain leisure for\ndevotion, it is lawful but if it be taken for maintenance it is\nforbidden.'\n\n Bread is taken for the corner of devotion\n By pious men and not the corner of devotion for bread.\n\n Story 37\n\n A dervish arrived in a place, the owner of which was of a noble\ndisposition, and had surrounded himself with a company of\ndistinguished and eloquent men, each of whom uttered something elegant\nor jocular, according to the fashion of wits. The dervish who had\ntravelled through the desert and was fatigued had eaten nothing. One\nof the company asked him by way of encouragement likewise to say\nsomething. The dervish replied: 'I do not possess distinction and\neloquence like you and have read nothing so you must be satisfied with\none distich of mine.' The company having agreed with pleasure he\nrecited:\n\n 'I am hungry and opposite to a table of food\n Like a bachelor at the door of a bath of females.'\n\n The company, having thus been apprised of his famished condition,\nproduced a table with bread but as he began to eat greedily the host\nsaid: 'Friend, at any rate stop a while till my servants roast some\nminced meat'; whereon the dervish lifted his head and recited:\n\n 'Do not order pounded meat for my table.\n To a pounded man simple bread is pounded meat.'\n\n Story 38\n\n A murid said to his pir: 'What am I to do? I am troubled by the\npeople, many of whom pay me visits. By their coming and going they\nencroach upon my precious time.' He replied: 'Lend something to\nevery one of them who is poor and ask something from every one who\nis rich and they will come round thee no more.'\n\n If a mendicant were the leader of the army of Islam,\n The infidels would for fear of his importunity run as far as China.\n\n Story 39\n\n The son of a faqih said to his father: 'These heart-ravishing\nwords of moralists make no impression upon me because I do not see\nthat their actions are in conformity with their speeches.'\n\n They teach people to abandon the world\n But themselves accumulate silver and corn.\n A scholar who only preaches and nothing more\n Will not impress anyone when he speaks.\n He is a scholar who commits no evil,\n Not he who speaks to men but acts not himself.\n\n Will you enjoin virtue to mankind and forget your own souls?\n\n A scholar who follows his lusts and panders to his body\n Is himself lost although he may show the way.\n\n The father replied: 'My son, it is not proper merely on account of\nthis vain fancy to turn away the face from the instruction of\nadvisers, to travel on the road of vanity, to accuse the ullemma of\naberration, and whilst searching for an immaculate scholar, to\nremain excluded from the benefits of knowledge, like a blind man who\none night fell into the mud and shouted: \"O Musalmans, hold a lamp\non my path.\" Whereon a courtesan who heard him asked: \"As thou canst\nnot see the lamp, what wilt thou see with the lamp?\" In the same way\nthe preaching assembly is like the shop of a dealer in linen because\nif thou bringest no money thou canst obtain no wares and if thou\nbringest no inclination to the assembly thou wilt not get any\nfelicity.'\n\n He said: 'Listen with thy soul's ear to a scholar\n Although his actions may not be like his doctrines.'\n In vain does the gainsayer ask:\n 'How can a sleeper awaken a sleeper?\n A man must receive into his ears\n The advice although it be written on a wall.'\n\n A pious man came to the door of a college from a monastery.\n He broke the covenant of the company of those of the Tariq.\n I asked him what the difference between a scholar and a monk\n amounts to?\n He replied: 'The former saves his blanket from the waves\n Whilst the latter strives to save the drowning man.'\n\n Story 40\n\n A man was sleeping dead-drunk on the highway and the bridle of\nspontaneity had slipped from his hands. A hermit passed near him and\nconsidered the disgraceful condition he was in. The youth raised his\nhead and recited: When they passed near something contemptible, they\npassed it kindly. When thou beholdest a sinner be concealing and meek.\n\n Turn not thy face from a sinner, O anchorite.\n Look upon him with benignity.\n If I am ignoble in my actions\n Pass me by like a noble fellow.\n\n Story 41\n\n A company of vagabonds met a dervish, spoke insulting words to\nhim, struck him and otherwise molested him; whereon he complained to\nhis superior and explained the case. The pir replied: 'My son, the\npatched frock of dervishes is the garment of resignation and who,\nwearing it, cannot bear injuries is a pretender not entitled to the\nfrock.'\n\n A large river will not become turbid from stones.\n The Arif who feels aggrieved is shallow water yet.\n\n If he injures thee, bear it\n Because pardon will purify thee from sin.\n O brother, as the end is dust, be dust before thou art\n turned into dust.\n\n Story 42\n\n Listen to this story how in Baghdad\n A flag and a curtain fell into dispute.\n Travel stained, dusty and fatigued, the flag\n Said to the curtain by way of reproach:\n 'I and thou, we are both fellow servants,\n Slaves of the sultan's palace.\n Not a moment had I rest from service\n In season and out of season I travelled about.\n Thou hast suffered neither toil nor siege,\n Not from the desert, wind, nor dust and dirt.\n My step in the march is more advancing.\n Then why is thy honour exceeding mine?\n Thou art upon moon-faced servants\n Or jessamine scented slave girls.\n I have fallen into prentice hands.\n I travel with foot in fetters and head fluttering.'\n The curtain said: 'My head is on the threshold\n Not like thine in the heavens.\n Who carelessly lifts up his neck\n Throws himself upon his neck.'\n\n Story 43\n\n A pious man saw an acrobat in great dudgeon, full of wrath and\nfoaming at the mouth. He asked: 'What is the matter with this fellow?'\nA bystander said: 'Someone has insulted him.' He remarked: 'This\nbase wretch is able to lift a thousand mann of stones and has not\nthe power to bear one word.'\n\n Abandon thy claim to strength and manliness.\n Thou art weak-minded and base, whether thou be a man or woman.\n If thou art able, make a sweet mouth.\n It is not manliness to strike the fist on a mouth.\n\n Although able to tear up an elephant's front\n He is not a man who possessed no humanity.\n A man's nature is of earth.\n If he is not humble he is not a man.\n\n Story 44\n\n I asked a good man concerning the qualities of the brethren of\npurity. He replied: 'The least of them is that they prefer to please\ntheir friends rather than themselves; and philosophers have said\nthat a brother who is fettered by affairs relating to himself is\nneither a brother nor a relative.'\n\n If thy fellow traveller hastens, he is not thy fellow.\n Tie not thy heart to one whose heart is not tied to thine.\n When a kinsman possesses no virtue and piety\n Then severing connection is better than love of kinship.\n\n I remember that an opponent objected to the last two lines,\nsaying: 'God the most high and glorious has in his noble book\nprohibited the severing of connection with relatives and has commanded\nus to love them. What thou hast alleged is contrary to it.' I replied:\n'Thou art mistaken because according to the Quran, Allah the most high\nhas said: If they both father and mother, strive to induce thee to\nassociate with me that concerning which thou hast no knowledge, obey\nthem not.\n\n A thousand kinsmen who are strangers to God\n Are the sacrifice for one stranger who knows him.\n\n Story 45\n\n A kind old man in Baghdad\n Gave his daughter to a cobbler.\n The cruel little man so bit her\n That blood flowed from the daughter's lips.\n Next morning the father saw her thus\n And going to the bridegroom asked him:\n 'O mean wretch, what teeth are these?\n Chewest thou thus her lips? They are not leather.\n I do not say these words in jest,\n Leave joking off and enjoy her seriously.\n If ill humour becomes fixed in a nature\n It will not leave it till the time of death.'\n\n Story 46\n\n A faqih had a very ugly daughter and when she attained puberty no\none was inclined to marry her in spite of her dowry and wealth.\n\n Bad is the brocade and damask cloth\n Which is upon an ugly bride.\n\n At last it became necessary to marry her to a blind man and it is\nrelated that on the said occasion a physician arrived from Serandip\nwho was able to restore sight to the blind. The faqih, being asked why\nhe had not put his son-in-law under treatment, replied: 'I fear that\nif he is able to see he will divorce my daughter.'\n\n It is better if the husband of an ugly woman is blind.\n\n Story 47\n\n A padshah was casting a glanced of contempt upon a company of\ndervishes and one of them, understanding by his sagacity the meaning\nof it, said: 'O king, in this world we are inferior to thee in dignity\nbut more happy in life. In death we are equal and in the\nresurrection superior to thee.'\n\n Though the master of a country may have enjoyment\n And the dervish may be in need of bread\n In that hour when both of them will die\n They will take from the world not more than a shroud.\n When thou takest thy departure from the realm\n It will be better to be a mendicant than a padshah.\n\n Externally the dervish shows a patched robe and a shaved head but in\nreality his heart is living and his lust dead.\n\n He does not sit at the door of pretence away from people\n To fight against them if they oppose him\n Because when a millstone rolls from a mountain\n He is not an A'rif who gets out of the way of the stone.\n\n The way of dervishes is praying, gratitude, service, obedience,\nalmsgiving, contentment, professing the unity of God, trust,\nsubmission and patience. Whoever possesses these qualities is really a\ndervish, although he may wear an elegant robe, whereas a prattler\nwho neglects his orisons, is luxurious, sensual, turns day into\nnight in the bondage of lust, and night into day in the sleep of\ncarelessness, eats whatever he gets, and speaks whatever comes upon\nhis tongue, is a profligate, although he may wear the habit of a\ndervish.\n\n O thou whose interior is denuded of piety\n But wearest outwardly the garb of hypocrisy\n Do not display a curtain of seven colours.\n Thou hast reed mats inside thy house.\n\n Story 48\n\n I saw bouquets of fresh roses\n Tied upon a cupola of grass.\n I asked: 'What is despicable grass\n To sit also in the line of the roses?'\n The grass wept and said: 'Hush!\n Companionship does not obliterate nobility.\n Although I have no beauty, colour and perfume,\n Am I not after all the grass of his garden?\n I am the slave of a bountiful lord,\n Cherished from old by his liberality.\n Whether I possess virtue or not\n I hope for grace from the Lord\n Although I possess no property\n No capital to offer as obedience.\n He knows the remedy for the slave\n To whom no support remains.\n It is customary that the owner gives a writ\n Of emancipation to an old slave.\n O God, who hast adorned the universe,\n Be bountiful to thy old slave.'\n Sa'di, take the road to the Ka'bah of submission.\n O man of God, follow the way of God.\n Unlucky is he who turns his head\n Away from this door for he will find no other door.\n\n Story 49\n\n A sage having been asked whether liberality or bravery is better\nreplied: 'He who possesses liberality needs no bravery.'\n\n It is written on the tomb of Behram Gur:\n 'A liberal hand is better than a strong arm.'\n\n Hatim Tai has passed away but for ever\n His high name will remain celebrated for beneficence.\n Set aside the zekat from thy property because the exuberant vines\n When pruned by the vintner will yield more grapes.",
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