Almighty God!* What a profound thought and glorious idea it is that the subtle apprehenders of truth, whose bright minds are like the breath of morning, and who are keen-sighted students of the schedules* of Creation and drawers* of diagrams on the tablet of wisdom and perception, have not, with the exception of Speech which is but a vagrant breeze and fluctuating gale, found in the combinations* of the elements or in material* forms, anything so sublime, or a jewel so rare that it come not within the mould of price, that Reason's balance cannot weigh it, that Language's measure cannot contain it, and that it be beyond the scale of Thought;—and yet, how should it be otherwise? Without help of Speech, the inner world's capital could not be built, nor this evil outer world's civilization be conceived.
VERSE.*What a Word* was that whose utterance
Unveiled the eighteen thousand!*
No feast equals it in intoxicating power;
No rival comes nigh it in supremacy.
It is the initiator in the workshop;
It sits enthroned in the palace.
Whatever reaches the heart of the wise,
The heart utters to the tongue and the tongue rehearses to the ear.
Its path is from the adit to the exit of hearts;
Expression and audition are its arena.
In reason's observatory* the tongue and the ear
Are the rising* and setting of speech's moon.
We cannot reach its sublime foundation by the ladder* of the skies nor can the swift foot of reason plant a step in its nature's mysterious wilderness. Its disposition* is fiery, its constitution aerial, its nature earthy but resembling water.* Its fount is the fire-temple of the heart; its culmination, the blissful abode of the atmosphere; it is as water in the flow of its traffic; earth's surface is its place of repose.
Judges of precedence in the ranks of glory, have in consonance with their knowledge and insight, recognized Speech as Commander-in-Chief* of Truth's army,—nay, as the true son and heir of the mind. They have felt it to be the Archimage* of knowledge, the fire-temple of the heart,—nay, to be the mind's first birth.* Especially preëminent is that Speech* which is the ornamented argument of the splendid volume; adorned preface of the sublime code, that is, is the praise of the Lord of heaven and earth; panegyric of the Distributor of life and Creator of the body; which is at once a stage of exaltation for the beginning and a heart-entrancing ornament for the close; at once caravan-conductor* of the eloquent and prince of eloquence; chamber-lamp of the sitters in darkness; solitude-adorning companion of the recluse; pain-increaser of the lovers of the path of God-seeking; ulcer-plaster of the wounded dwellers in the recess of impatience; cordial for the drinkers of sorrow's bitter tears; embalmer* of the broken-hearted denizens of the hermitage of silence; marshaller of the brave in the contests of divine love; banquet-lamp of the beloved* ones in the palace of peace; thirst-increaser* of thirsty-lipped inquirers; hunger-increaser of hungry-hearted ones in the wilderness of search. Hence it is that wakeful-hearted sages,—with all their tumult of love and restless longing,—have stayed the hand of contemplation at the hem of the divine canopy* and with thirsty lips, and blistered feet, and the gulping down of thousands of agitations and cries, have set the seal of silence on their lips and—wisely wrapping the foot of respect in the skirt of humility,—have not attempted what has not been vouchsafed to them from the almonry of destiny.
VERSE.Letters* and dots are the desert sand in Thy perfect path.
In the universe of Thy wisdom, the city of speech is but some market-booths.*
The warders of jealousy* at Thy door, smite the understanding,
With blows of astonishment in front, and strokes of ignorance* from behind.
In other words, praise of the incomparable Deity lies outside the field of possibility, and the panegyric of the unequalled God is beyond the field of existence.*
VERSE.Wherever discourse* deals with the knowledge of God,
Our thoughts' praise becomes dispraise.
Behold rashness, how it boils over with daring!
Can a drop embrace the ocean?
Think not that it is even a single letter of the Book,* For the Letter is muslin* and the Book moonlight.
How long wilt thou be an embroiderer* of speech?
Stay thy foot here, with the acknowledgment* of humility.
So long as there is no link between terrestrials and celestials, and the path of speech between the earthly and the heavenly is closed, what intercourse can there be between the limited and the unlimited, so that an atom of the dust can have any lot in the pure, world-warming Sun? What goal in the boundless plains of necessity and eternity is possible for a prisoner in the subterraneous vault of accident and modernity; and what strength can he have to traverse them? What portion can a bewildered, headless and footless mote* have in the beams of the world-lighting Sun? It can only be tossed about in the wind. What is a dewdrop to the swelling ocean or to the cloud surcharged with rain? 'Tis but the vaunt of a parched lip. Pity it were that a mote should discourse about the Illuminator of the assemblage of existences and, though it know him not, and cannot address him, yet should speak of him and search for him!
What connection is there between the dark defile and the courts of light; between non-entity and absolute being? The creature may never attain such knowledge of the Creator, as to be able to draw even a few breaths in the rare atmosphere of the praise of His mysteries (maknūnāt) or to plant some steps in the field of the comprehension of the wonders* of His store-houses (makhzūnāt). How then can he be fit to enter the courts of the Creator's praise? For him who has no right of approach, to speak of the Sultan's privy chamber, is only to be exposed to ridicule and to make himself a public laughingstock.
VERSE.*Though the foot of Speech be long of stride,
Thy curtain-stone* hath shattered it.
Though Speech be fat and lusty,
It is lean* when it reaches Thy table.
O Thou! Higher than our imaginary* heavens and more exalted than the plane of the elements and than the stars, inasmuch as Thou hast not bestowed on us knowledge of Thy essence and attributes, it is manifest that Thou regardest not thanksgiving as within our powers, and seeing that Thou hast conferred on us mercies which are infinite, it follows that Thou hast not laid upon us the obligation of adequate gratitude!
When I saw that the door of utterance was closed, I perceived that of action open and said to myself in ecstacy;—
“If thou hast not the power of utterance and canst not chaunt panegyrics, be not cast down, for it is the smooth-tongued and empty-handed who, by a fraudulent barter, traffic words at the rate of realities. The praise which is laid upon mankind* as a duty, by the commands of the Understanding,—that world-obeyed sovereign,—is that they make the night-illuminating jewel of reason,—one of the bountiful Divine Ruler's greatest gifts,—into a bright lamp, and employ it for sweeping and cleansing the courts of their outer and inner man. Should the taskmasters* of fate's workshop have attired a son of Adam in the garb of want and solitude, let him first of all gird up his loins for self-culture and afterward let him endeavour the improvement of others. Should they have brought him into a crowd of associations and contacts— as may be inevitable in the arrangements of this evil world,—let him, if a ruler, prefer the betterment of others to his own; for the duty of the shepherd is watching the flock, and the design of sovereignty is universal guardianship. If he be a subject, let him, first of all, show alacrity in obeying the orders of his legitimate ruler,* and then let him cleanse the secret chambers of his heart from the dust of heavy-pacing sensuality and nimble-footed wrath, so that, by his life and conversation, he be a teacher and a testimony of the incomparable Giver and Cherisher of his outer and inner man.”
When the communing with my heart had proceeded thus far, a resting-stage showed itself afar off to my bewildered mind, and my thoughts were pleasant for a while. My astonied heart was, it is true, saddened by the length and difficulty of the journey, but was cheered by the sound of the machinery of movement,* and by the good tidings of eventual arrival. Suddenly the thoughtful foot of my boding spirit came upon a stone; for the praise of God does not consist in comprehending His perfect attributes and assigning* them to His Essence; nor is it the reckoning up of His benefits which are without beginning or end, and by dint* of these wares of new-fangled* praise, thrusting oneself forward; nor* should we regard praise as beyond human comprehension and so, stop short of the porch of thanksgiving; nor should we style self-culture* the recital of the Divine praise, and growing weary-hearted* at the darkness of the road and the distance of the goal, regard such self-deception as a gain, and with abandonment of thanksgiving, set about whatever the cheatery of the hour represent as our true aim.