Another bird said to the Hoopoe: ' I am effeminate, and can only hop from one branch to another. Sometimes I am wanton and dissolute, at other times I am abstinent. Sometimes my desires drag me to the taverns, sometimes my spirit draws me to prayer. Sometimes, in spite of myself, Satan leads me astray; at other times angels guide me back. Between these two I am in the pit and the prison; what can I do save lament, like Joseph?' The Hoopoe replied: 'This happens to every man, according to his nature. If we had been guiltless from the beginning God would not have had to send his messengers and prophets. Through obedience you can attain felicity. O you who loll in the sweating room of indolence and yet are full of idle wishes, while you continue to feed the dog of desire your nature is worse than that of an impotent hermaphrodite.'

Shabli once disappeared from Baghdad, no one knew where. At last he was discovered in a house of eunuchs, sitting with humid eye and dry lips among these grotesque creatures. His friends said: 'This is no place for you who are a student of divine mysteries.' He replied: 'These persons, in the way of religion, are neither men nor women. I am as they. I sink in inertia, and my virility is a reproach. If you use praise and blame to make distinctions you are creating idols. When you conceal a hundred idols under your khirka, why appear before men as a Sufi?'

Two men wearing the khirka of the Sufis were abusing each other before the tribunal. The judge stood them apart and said: 'It is not becoming for Sufis to dispute among themselves. If you have put on the mantle of resignation why quarrel? If you are men of violence then throw away your mantles. But if you are worthy of them be reconciled to each other. I who am a judge, and not a man of the spiritual way, am ashamed for the khirka; it would be better to agree to differ than, while wearing it, to quarrel.' If you wish to follow the way of love throw your prejudices to the wind and renounce attachment to the things of the body. Meanwhile, in order not to be a source of evil, do not give way to resentment and self-love!

Once upon a time in Egypt an unfortunate man fell in love with the king, who when he heard about it sent for the misguided man and said: ' Since you are in love with me you must choose one of two things - either have your head cut off or go into exile.' The man said that he preferred exile, and almost beside himself, got ready to go. But the king ordered him to be beheaded. A chamberlain said: 'He is innocent; why must he die?' 'It is,' said the king, 'because he is not a true lover and was not whole-hearted. Had he really desired me, he would rather have lost his head than leave the object of his love. It would have been all or nothing. Had he consented to execution, I would have girded up my loins and become his dervish. He who loves me, but loves his head better, is no true lover.'