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2
714-763

  • Little by little they take away that beauty: little by little the sapling withers.
  • Go, recite (the text) to whom so We grant length of days, him We cause to decline. Seek the heart (spirit), set not thy heart on bones; 715
  • For that beauty of the heart is the lasting beauty: its fortune gives to drink of the Water of Life.
  • Truly it is both the water and the giver of drink and the drunken: all three become one when your talisman is shattered.
  • That oneness you cannot know by reasoning. Do service (to God) and refrain from foolish gabble, O undiscerning man!
  • Your reality is the form and that which is borrowed: you rejoice in what is relative and (secondary like) rhyme.
  • Reality is that which seizes (enraptures) you and makes you independent of form. 720
  • Reality is not that which makes blind and deaf and causes a man to be more in love with form.
  • The portion of the blind is the fancy that increases pain; the share of the (spiritual) eye is these fancies (ideas) of dying to self (faná).
  • The blind are a mine (full) of the letter of the Qur’án: they do not see the ass, and (only) cling to the pack-saddle.
  • Since you have sight, go after the ass which has jumped (away from you): how long (will you persist in) stitching the saddle, O saddle-worshipper?
  • When the ass is there, the saddle will certainly be yours: bread does not fail when you have the (vital) spirit. 725
  • (On) the back of the ass is shop and wealth and gain; the pearl of your heart is the stock (which provides wealth) for a hundred bodies.
  • Mount the ass bare-backed, O busybody: did not the Prophet ride the ass bare-backed?
  • The Prophet rode (his beast) bare-backed; and the Prophet, it is said, journeyed on foot.
  • The ass, your fleshly soul, has gone off; tie it to a peg. How long will it run away from work and burden, how long?
  • It must bear the burden of patience and thanksgiving, whether for a hundred years or for thirty or twenty. 730
  • None that is laden supported another's load; none reaped until he sowed something.
  • ’Tis a raw (absurd) hope; eat not what is raw, O son: eating raw brings illness to men.
  • (Do not say to yourself), “So-and-so suddenly found a treasure; I would like the same: neither work nor shop (for me)!”
  • That (discovery of treasure) is Fortune's doing (a piece of luck), and moreover it is rare: one must earn a living so long as the body is able.
  • How does earning a livelihood prevent the (discovery of) treasure? Do not retire from work: that (treasure), indeed, is (following) behind (the work). 735
  • See that you are not made captive by “if,” saying, “If I had done this or the other (thing),”
  • For the sincere Prophet forbade (people) to say “if,” and said, “That is from hypocrisy”;
  • For the hypocrite died in saying “if,” and from saying “if” he won nothing but remorse.
  • Parable.
  • A certain stranger was hastily seeking a house: a friend took him to a house in ruins.
  • He said (to the stranger), “If this (house) had a roof, it would be a home for you beside me. 740
  • Your family too would be comfortable, if it had another room in it.”
  • “Yes,” said he, “it is nice (to be) beside friends, but my dear soul, one cannot lodge in ‘if’.”
  • All the world are seekers of happiness, and on account of a false happiness they are in the fire.
  • Old and young have become gold-seekers, but the common eye does not distinguish alloy from gold.
  • The pure (gold) shot a beam on the alloy: see that you choose not the gold on the ground of (mere) opinion, without a touchstone. 745
  • If you have a touchstone, choose; otherwise, go, devote yourself to him that knows (the difference).
  • Either you must have a touchstone within your own soul, or if you know not the Way, do not go forward alone.
  • The cry of the ghouls is the cry of an acquaintance—an acquaintance who would lure you to perdition.
  • She (the ghoul) keeps on crying, “Hark, O caravan people! Come towards me, here is the track and the landmarks.”
  • The ghoul mentions the name of each, saying “O so-and-so,” in order that she may make that personage one of those who sink. 750
  • When he reaches the spot, he sees wolves and lions, his life lost, the road far off, and the day late.
  • Prithee say, what is the ghoul's cry like? (It is) “I desire riches, I desire position and renown.”
  • Prevent these voices from (entering) your heart, so that (spiritual) mysteries may be revealed.
  • Repeat (in prayer) the name of God, drown the cry of the ghouls, close your narcissus eye to this vulture.
  • Know the difference between the false dawn and the true, distinguish the colour of the wine from the colour of the cup, 755
  • That, perchance, from the eyes which see the seven colours patience and waiting may produce a (spiritual) eye,
  • (With which) you may behold colours other than these, and may behold pearls instead of stones.
  • What pearl? Nay, you will become an ocean, you will become a sun traversing the sky.
  • The Worker is hidden in the workshop: go you and in the workshop see Him plain.
  • Inasmuch as the work has woven a veil over the Worker, you cannot see Him outside of that work. 760
  • Since the workshop is the dwelling-place of the Worker, he that is outside is unaware of Him.
  • Come, then, into the workshop, that is to say, non-existence, that you may see the work and the Worker together.
  • As the workshop is the place of clairvoyance, then outside of the workshop there is (only) blindfold ness.