four dirhems I shall offer four prayers." The slave gave the four dirhems to Mansur, who asked him what prayers he should offer for him. He answered: I have a master, and should like to be freed from him. Mansur prayed that he might be, and called for the next request. He said: Pray that God may restore me my dirhems. Mansur did so. The third request was that God might accept his master's repentance; and the fourth, that God might forgive him, his master, Mansur and his audience. Mansur offered up these prayers, and the slave went home. Questioned by his master why he had delayed, he told him the story. The master asked, And for what did Mansur pray? He said, For my liberty. The master manumitted him at once, and asked what was the second prayer? He said, That God might restore me the four dirhems. The master said: Here, take four thousand dirhems; and what was the third prayer? He said, That God might accept your repentance. The master said, I repent this day; and the fourth? The slave replied: That God might forgive me, you, the preacher and the audience. That, replied the master, is is not mine to give. But in the night he dreamed that some one said to him: Thou hast done thy part; thinkest thou that I shall not do mine? Verily I have forgiven thee, thy slave, Mansur ben Ammar, and all that were present.

IX.

THE INSIGNIFICANCE OF THIS WORLD'S GOOD.

Among the sages, whose hearts are disciplined by revelations and manifestations, he who abandons this world for the next is said to be like a man who being hindered from entering the King's door by a dog, throws him a morsel of bread, and while the dog is intent thereon, enters at the door, and gaining access to the King, becomes ruler of all his Kingdom. Think you that such a man will count the morsel of bread he has thrown the king's dog as a great favour that he has done the King?

Now Satan is a dog lying at God's door, and keeping men from entering, albeit the door is open, and the curtain raised. And the world is like a morsel of bread, of which the pleasure, if it be eaten, lasts but for the moment of mastication, and ceases with the act of swallowing. And how can he who abandons it in order to obtain royal honours, look longingly back to it, when the portion of the world that falls to the lot of any individual, though he live a

hundred years, bears to the delight of the next world a less proportion than a crust of bread to the whole world?

For the finite bears no proportion to the infinite.

X.

THE CONTEMPLATION OF GOD ALL-SUFFICING.

Among the legends of King David it is recorded that God revealed himself to him, saying: How long wilt thou make mention of Paradise, and not ask of me the desire after Me? He said: O LORD, who are they that desire Thee? He answered: They that desire me are those whose hearts I have purified from every stain, whom I have roused to vigilance, and from whose hearts I have torn portions for Myself. They gaze upon me while I hold their hearts in my hand, and set them in my heaven. Then I summon the captains of my angels, who, when they come together, prostrate themselves before me. But I say unto them: I have not called you to prostrate yourselves before me, but to set before you the hearts of those that desire me, and to glory in you, O ye that desire me; for their hearts shine in the heaven before my angels as the sun shines before the people of the earth. O David, verily I have created the hearts of them that desire me out of my favour, and have endowed them with the light of my countenance, and I have taken them for my councillors, and have made their bodies the resting-place for my gaze on earth.

Out of their hearts I have cut a path where through gazing towards me, they grow in desire each day.-David said: O LORD, show me the people of Thy love.-He said: Go to Mount Lebanon, for there are fourteen souls, lads, old men, and men in the prime of life; and when thou comest to them, greet them from me, and say: Your LORD greets you, saying; Will you not ask a favour of me? For ye are my beloved, my dear ones and my friends. I rejoice with your joy and hasten to your love.-David went thither and found them by a well of water, meditating on the majesty of God. When they beheld David, they ran, to separate themselves from him. But he said: I am the messenger of God unto you, and am come to bring you a message from your LORD. Then they ran towards him, and turned their ears to his words, casting their eyes down to the ground. He said: I am God's messenger, greeting you from Him and saying to you: Will ye not ask a favour? Will ye not speak to me that I may hear the sound of your words? Ye are my

beloved, my dear ones and my friends. I rejoice with your joy and hasten to your love. I gaze on you each hour with a fond mother's loving gaze. The tears ran down their cheeks: then the eldest of them said: Praise be unto Thee! We are Thy servants and Thy servants' sons, forgive us for any moment of our lives wherein our hearts thought not of Thee!-Another said: Praise be unto Thee! And grant us a fair vision of each other!-Another said: Praise be unto Thee! And how could we dare to pray, when Thou knowest that we need nothing for ourselves? Grant only that we may abide in the path that leads to Thee, and fulfil thereby Thy favour towards us. Another said: We come short in seeking for Thy favour; aid us therein by Thy bounty!-Another said: Thou hast created us of flesh, and vouchsafed to us to contemplate Thy majesty; how should he dare to speak whose mind is filled with Thy majesty and his thoughts with Thy glory? Our desire is only to approach Thy light. -Another said: Our tongues are too feeble to pray to Thee, so mighty art Thou and so near to Thy saints, and so copious are Thy favours to the people of Thy love!--Another said: Thou hast guided our hearts to think of Thee, and hast emptied them that they might be filled with Thee; so forgive us our unworthy gratitude!-Another said: Thou knowest our need; it is to look upon Thy countenance! -Another said: How can the slave venture before his Master? Since thou hast commanded us to ask of Thy bounty, give us light to guide us in the darkness of the storeyed heaven.-Another said: We pray Thee to come to us and to let Thy light abide with us. -Another said: We beseech Thee to fulfil the message which Thou hast vouchsafed us.-Another said: We need nothing of Thy creation; only vouchsafe to us to look on the beauty of Thy countenance. -Another said: I pray Thee that Thou wilt blind my eyes to this world and its inhabitants and my heart from thinking of the next world. Another said: I know, blessed LORD, that Thou lovest Thy saints; so grant that our hearts be occupied with Thee to the exclusion of all else.

Then God revealed himself to David, saying: Say unto them: I have heard your words and what ye have answered. Let each one of you leave his friend and take for himself a hole in the earth; and then I shall uplift the veil between us that ye may behold my light and my glory.

And whereby, said David, have they obtained this of Thee, O God?-He said: By good thoughts, and abstinence from the world, and secret converse with me! For this is a stage reached only by him who abandons this world and its folk, and thinks not about

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it at all, but keeps his heart free for me, and prefers me above all my creatures. Then I turn to him, and purify his soul, and uplift the veil between us, till he beholds me face to face, and I show him my glory every hour and cause him to approach the light of my countenance. If he be sick, I tend him as a mother tends her child. If he thirst, I give him drink, and make him taste my recollection. And when I do this to him, O David, I blind his soul to the world and its folk, and make him careless of them; and he ceases not to think of me and beg me speed his flight; but I will not let him die, because he is the resting place of my eyes among my creatures. He sees nought but me, and I see nought but him. Couldst thou but see him, O David, his soul wasted and his body pining, and his members shattered, and his heart withdrawn, when he hears my name! Of him I boast before my angels and the dwellers in my heaven. And by my might and my glory, I shall cause him to sit in Paradise, and shall soothe his heart with the vision of me till he be satisfied, yea, more than satisfied!

SÚ FIISM.

I.

CREATION.

In solitude, where Being signless dwelt, and all the Universe still
dormant lay

Concealed in selflessness, One Being was unstained by thought of
"I" or "Thou" and free
From all Duality: Beauty supreme, unmanifest, except unto Itself,
By Its own light, with latent power to charm the souls of all; con-
cealed in the Unseen
An Essence pure, unstained by aught of ill. No mirror to reflect
Its loveliness,

Nor comb to touch Its locks: the morning breeze ne'er stirred Its
tresses, nor collyrium.
Lent lustre to Its eyes: no rosy cheeks o'ershadowed by dark curls,
like hyacinth,

Nor peach-like down were there: no dusky mole adorned Its face,
no eye had yet beheld

Its image to Itself It sang of Love in wordless measures: by Itself
It cast

The die of Love. But Beauty cannot brook concealment and the

veil, nor patient rest

Unseen and unadmired, but bursts all bonds, and from Its prisoncasement to the world

Reveals Itself. See where the tulip grows in upland meadows: how in balmy spring

It decks itself, and how amidst its thorns the wild rose rends its garments, and displays

Its loveliness. And thou, when some rare thought, or beauteous

image, or deep mystery,