Like the pearl-oyster I smile* when tormented
'Tis for the untrained to smile when successful.

When several revolutions of the heavens had occurred, the doors of dominion opened, and a new glory was given to ambition. The world's slaves exchanged the rage of envy for religious animosity and occupied themselves with evil designs. From narrowness of view and from spite they entered upon war with Almighty God, and heaped up for themselves everlasting destruction.

Those two or three slanderers demolish their own bed
They attack their own profession as well as me
May I be like the revolving moon
I decrease not, or if I do I wax again.

Inasmuch as my intentions were right, and my devotion firm, the sorry tricksters were defeated everywhere, spiritually and temporally. They were informed of the true condition of enlightenment and had to sink into the street of humiliation. At that time I, in my ignorance of the heights and hollows of the world, was seeking the companion­ship of that crew, while they took the course of showing dislike to me. Now this slumbrous-witted faction wishes to conciliate me, the once troubled and now quiescent one, and to enter into my service, whilst I reject them!

The sun of auspiciousness lighted up the darkness of the desert and by the encouragement of the world's lord I came to the pleasant abode of peace with all men. My perturbed spirit rejoiced in the clear chamber of tranquillity and as I seized the skirt of rejoicing I sang thus “If men think* you wicked, and so choose the path of enmity they are acting according to their lights and are treading the path of piety. Why are you irritated? If they know you to be good and yet follow this course it is evident that they are suffering from the disease of envy. Why look for healthy acts from a sick man?” From human frailty and mortal weakness the murmur of a wish arose from the bottom of my heart, and this desire came forth “How good it would be if my inefficient foes could understand the tranquillity of my disposition and my antipathy to revenge so that they should not use fawning bodies and supplicating tongues for making* excuses, and might make their external acts correspond with their internal feelings, and be delivered from mental troubles! Would that the good feeling which I bear to my ill-wishers, and my observance* of right—which does not know the path of hypocrisy— were known to my ignorant and childish friends so that the coin* of friendship might not bring any pain along with it.”

I threw fire into my sheaves with both hands
When I did it myself why do I plain of an enemy?
No one is my foe, I'm my own enemy
Alas for myself, my arm and my skirt!

With regard* to my panegyrists and defamers I have passed from the second* stage and arrived at the third. I hope that there will be no retrogression and that the guidance of a happy fortune will bring me to the delightful fourth station! May I repose there, and keep apart from (the doctrine of) co-partnership* with the Incomparable Deity. Most persons cultivate friendship with the first class (that of the panegyrists), and behave in an opposite fashion to the second. Dissemblers are apparently unaffected by either class: secretly they are delighted with their panegyrists, and cherish resentment against their censors. A few heaven-helped ones see the strange deceptiveness of it all, they regard both classes with an equal eye and are not perturbed by either of them. There are many who are deceived by the protean spirit which says to them “Evil speech against one such as you who are on the right path, carries with it the Divine displeasure.” They swallow the deception and rise up in abuse of their detractors, and thus turn aside from the highway of bliss. When an accurate estimate* of their actions is made, it is found that they themselves have omitted to reckon many foolish and wicked acts. The noble position is to regard the admirer who supplies food for arrogance as an enemy and the detractor who points out faults as a friend. Would that I might attain to this form of enlightenment and reach the height of my aspirations, and be delivered from the sting of a domestic foe to self-knowledge! By the help of my temperament and by firmness of soul I was soon freed from my aversion* (to society). I waged war with myself and renewed the incessant combat.

How shall I make war with myself
From whose collar shall I exsert my head?
I'll make a rent in the veil of my trappings
May it be that I strike a blow at my own skirt.

I continually smite myself and rehearse my self-disgust with a reproachful tongue. “Seeing that the Unique* Witness, whom the ancients designated by the phrase “strength of eye-testimony” has by the lamp of proof shown you to be one of the right-minded and enlightened, why are you depressed? Running away from what, do you seek the corner of despisedness? What has wearied you and made you stretch out the hand of wish? I admit that you have no inspiration, and that the light of brilliant knowledge has not been granted you. But by a happy star and a robust heart there have been given to you the search for truth and a large capacity, so that in the court of business and in the decision of cases, friend and foe, stranger and acquaintance are regarded by you with impartiality and that* neither the satisfaction nor the dissatisfaction of a world can cloud your mind. An eager* lover cannot gain his ends with you. What need then to speak of others? Why this hurrying to the realm of solitude? And what will you gain by being unknown?”

But* what does the poet say and write?

My heart grasps the sleeve and skirt of sorrow
As when Wāmiq seized the tip of Aẕrā's tress,
I feel towards the world's turmoil and to men
Such disgust as was felt by the 'Anqā.

The truth of the matter is that human effort is not successful. What can be done with regard to what has been written in destiny's antechamber? And upon what do the revolutions of the stars and the heavens depend. We cannot devise any remedy against the deceitful commixture of heavenly and earthly bodies. No shield can be framed against the archery of the skies.

The bow of heaven is drawn from the side where the cuirass is
I'm my own enemy, what use is there of donning a cuirass?

Now a wrestling-match has begun with my thousand-wiled spirit. The friends of each stand firm and from time to time the jugglery is renewed. There is wondrous rising and falling and the countenance of instruction is illuminated. I* know not what the end will be and in what station I shall repose, or with which of the three forms* of Divine knowledge I shall be eternally conjoined. Or by what enchantment will the final refreshing slumber take place. Fear has a knot on brow (thinking) that the varied glories of the universe may not enter her house of toil. Hope has an open brow (thinking) that she may with joy bear the griefs of mortals on the shoulder of her genius. The swift and prudent walker who has abandoned the dunghill of Fear, the petty garden of Hope, the fire­place of Contraction, and the recreation-ground of Expansion is not bound by joy or sorrow. Every moment an order for residence comes to the station, and ere I have made the place warm, I am summoned from another door.

With such inward struggles, I became by loyalty's command engaged in writing this weighty history. The loyalists of devotion's feast do not turn to other work. Why should this not be so? And why should it appear strange? After serving the King of enlighten­ment the world's gauds cease to weigh in the balance of the soul, and the gorgeous spectacle of the outer world has no value in vision's antechamber. Of necessity the pen moves in laud of the great gift, and praise grows fervid. To some extent a fresh lustre is bestowed on my heart for the writing of the tale of truth. I do not, like a sensualist,* measure water in a sieve or pound air in a mortar. It is far better that I do not uncover the lid of my strange soul and that I do not cast out into the open my inward secret. It is not proper to proclaim things that do not penetrate the ears of contemporaries, and which the eyes of the conventional do not comprehend.