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5
2352-2361

  • Cunning and enchantment is my business: it is my business to beguile and lead astray.”
  • Hastening from the mountain-top towards the river, he found that miserable emaciated ass.
  • Then he saluted him cordially and advanced: he advanced to meet that poor simpleton,
  • And said (to him), “How are you in this arid desert (where you live) amidst stones and on sterile ground?” 2355
  • The ass replied, “Whether I am in pain or in Iram, God has made it my portion, and I am grateful for it.
  • I give thanks to the Friend (God) in good and evil estate, because in (the Divine) destiny there is worse than (the present) ill.
  • Since He is the Dispenser of portions, complaint is (an act of) infidelity. Patience is needful: patience is the key to the gift (bounteous reward).
  • All except God are enemies: He (alone) is the Friend: how is it good (seemly) to complain of a friend to an enemy?
  • So long as He gives me buttermilk I will not desire honey, for every pleasure has a pain joined with it.” 2360
  • Story of an ass belonging to a seller of firewood, which saw some well-fed Arab horses in the royal stable and wished for the same fortune. (This story is intended) to convey the lesson that one ought not to wish for anything but (God's) forgiveness and favour; for though you are in a hundred kinds of pain, they all become sweet (to you) when you feel the delight of being forgiven; and for the rest, every fortune that you wish for before you have experienced it is accompanied by a pain which you do not perceive (at the moment); as (for example) in every trap the bait is visible while the snare is concealed. You (who) have been caught in this one trap are (still) wishing (and saying to yourself), “Would that I had gone after those (other) baits!” You fancy that those baits are without a trap.
  • There was a water-carrier who owned an ass that had been bent double like a