Said the Excellent, the Incomparable, Abû Moḥammed al Ḳâsim ibn ‘Alî ibn Moḥammed ibn ‘Othmân Al Ḥarîri of Baṣrah (God cool his resting-place).

O God, we praise thee for what perspicuity thou hast taught, and what enunciation thou hast inspired; as we praise thee for what bounty thou hast enlarged, what mercy thou hast diffused:—And we take refuge with thee from the vehemence of fluency and the immodera­tion of talkativeness, as we take refuge with thee from the vice of inarticulateness and the shame of hesitation.— And by thee we seek to be kept from temptation through the flattery of the praiser and the connivance of the favourer, as we seek to be kept from exposure to the defaming of the slanderer and the betrayal of the in­former.—And we ask pardon of thee if our desires carry us into the region of ambiguities, as we ask pardon if our steps advance to the domain of errors.—And we ask of thee succour which shall lead us aright, and a heart turning with justice, and a tongue adorned with truth, and a speech strengthened with demonstration, and accuracy that shall keep us from mistake, and reso­lution that shall conquer caprice, and perception by which we may estimate duly:—And that thou wilt help us by thy guidance to conceive, and enable us by thy as­sistance to express;—That thou wilt guard us from error in narration, and turn us from unseemliness in jesting;— That we may be secure from slanders of the tongue; that we may be free from the ill of tinselled speech;— That we walk not in the road of sin, nor stand in the place of repentance:—That we be not pursued by suit or censure, nor need to flee from hastiness to excuse.—O God, fulfil to us this wish; give us to attain to this desire: put us not forth of thy large shadow, make us not a morsel for the devourer.—For now we stretch forth to thee the hand of entreaty; we are thorough in humiliation to thee and abasement.—And we call down thy abundant grace and thy bounty that is over all, with humbleness of seeking and with the venture of hope.—Also approaching thee through the merits of Moḥammed, Lord of men, the Intercessor whose inter­cession shall be received at the congregation of judg­ment.—By whom thou hast set the seal to the prophets, and whose degree thou hast exalted to the highest heaven:—Whom thou hast described in thy clear-speak­ing Book, and hast said (and thou art the most truthful of sayers): “It is the word of a noble envoy, of him who is mighty in the presence of the Lord of the throne, having authority, obeyed, yea, faithful.”—O God, send thy blessing on him and his House who guide aright, and his companions who built up the faith; and make us followers of his guidance and theirs, and profit us all by the loving of him and them: for thou art Almighty, and one meet to answer prayer.

And now: In a meeting devoted to that learning whose breeze has stilled in this age, whose lights are nigh gone out—There ran a mention of the Assemblies which had been invented by Badî‘ az Zemân, the sage of Hamadân (God shew him mercy);—In which he had referred the composition to Abû’l Fatḥ of Alexandria and the relation to ‘Îsa, son of Hishâm.—And both these are persons obscure, not known; vague, not to be re­cognized.—Then suggested to me one whose suggestion is as a decree, and obedience to whom is as a prize,—That I should compose Assemblies, following in them the method of Badî‘ (although the lame steed attains not to outrun like the stout one).—Then I reminded him of what is said concerning him who joins even two words, or strings together one or two verses:—And deprecated this position in which the understanding is bewildered, and the fancy misses aim, and the depth of the intelli­gence is probed, and a man’s real value is made mani­fest:—And in which one is forced to be as a wood-gatherer by night, or as he who musters footmen and horsemen together:—Considering, too, that the voluble man is seldom secure or pardoned if he trips.—But when he consented not to forbearance, and freed me not from his demand, I assented to his invitation with the assenting of the obedient, and displayed in according with him all my endeavour;—And composed, in spite of what I suffered from frozen genius, and dimmed intelligence, and failing judgment, and afflicting cares,—Fifty Assem­blies, comprising what is serious in language and lively, what is delicate in expression and dignified; the bril­liancies of eloquence and its pearls, the beauties of scholarship and its rarities:—Besides what I have adorned them with of verses of the Koran and goodly metonymies, and studded them with of Arab proverbs, and scholarly elegancies, and grammatical riddles, and decisions dependent on the meaning of words, and original addresses, and ornate orations, and tear-moving exhorta­tions, and amusing jests:—All of which I have indited as by the tongue of Abû Zayd of Serûj, while I have attributed the relating of them to Al Ḥârith son of Hammâm, of Basra.—And whenever I change the pasture I have no purpose but to inspirit the reader, and to increase the number of those who shall seek my book.— And of the poetry of others I have introduced nothing but two single verses, on which I have based the fabric of the Assembly of Ḥolwân; and two others, in a couplet, which I have inserted at the conclusion of the Assembly of Kerej.—And, as for the rest, my own mind is the father of its virginity, the author of its sweet and its bitter.—Yet I acknowledge withal that Badî‘ (God shew him mercy) is a mighty passer of goals, a worker of wonders;—And that he who assays after him to the composition of an Assembly, even though he be gifted with the eloquence of Ḳodâmeh,—Does but scoop up of his overflow, and travels that path only by his guidance.—And excellently said one:—

If before it mourned, I had mourned my love for Su‘da, then should I have healed my soul, nor had afterwards to repent.

But it mourned before me, and its mourning excited mine, and I said, “The superiority is to the one that is first.”

Now I hope I shall not be, in respect of the playful style that I display, and the source that I repair to, like the beast that scratched up its death with its hoof, or he who cut off his nose with his own hand;—So as to be joined to those who are “most of all losers in their works, whose course on earth has been in vain, while they count that they have done fair deeds.”—Since I know that although he who is intelligent and liberal will connive at me, and he who is friendly and partial may defend me,—I can hardly escape from the simpleton who is ignorant, or the spiteful man who feigns ignor­ance;—Who will detract from me on account of this com­position, and will give out that it is among the things forbidden of the law.—But yet, whoever scans matters with the eye of intelligence, and makes good his insight into principles—Will rank these Assemblies in the order of useful writings, and class them with the fables that relate to brutes and lifeless objects.—Now none was ever heard of whose hearing shrank from such tales, or who held as sinful those who related them at ordinary times.— Moreover, since deeds depend on intentions, and in these lies the effectiveness of religious obligations,—What fault is there in one who composes stories for instruction not for display, and whose purpose in them is the educa­tion and not the fablings?—Nay, is he not in the posi­tion of one who assents to doctrine, and “guides to the right path?”

Yet am I content if I may carry my caprice, and then be quit of it, without any debt against me or to me.

And of God I seek to be helped in what I purpose, and to be kept from that which makes defective, and to be led to that which leads aright.—For there is no refuge but to Him, and no seeking of succour but in Him, and no prospering but from Him, and no sanctuary but He.—On Him I rely, and to Him I have recourse.