(83) But what do these in the east? Thou art a lofty proud bride from the beginning; the crown was always offered to thee from the beginning, but thou thoughtest thyself too fair already; thou livest as the rest do. Of the Operation and Property of the Divine and Heavenly Nature.

(18) (And, having gained Thine audience and Thine Order's sacred chieftainship), then I ask of Thee, O Ahura! and tell me aright, how shall I acquire that Thy Righteous Order's prize, ten (costly) mares male-mated, and with them the camel (those signs of honour and blessing for Thy chief. I ask Thee for these gifts for sacrifice). For it was told me for the sake of our Welfare (in our salvation), and of our Immortality, in what manner Thou shalt give to these (Thy conquering hosts) both of these Thy (gifts of grace).

(13) And it was not at small cost, that they conquered the fields and the towns; the small towns and the large towns paid high ransoms; they brought precious stones and metals, they brought honey of the bees, bracelets, bracelets of emeralds and other stones, and brought garlands made of blue feathers, the tribute of all the towns. They came into the presence of the marvelous kings Gucumatz and Cotuhá, and before Quicab and Cavizimah, the Ahpop, the Ahpop-Camhá, the Galel and the Ahtzic-Vinac.

(2) A king, whose empire stretched to the far horizons, had a daughter as beautiful as the moon. Before her loveliness even the fairies were abashed. Her dimpled chin resembled the well of Joseph, and the locks of her hair wounded a hundred hearts. Her eyebrows were twin bows, and when she loosed their arrows the space between sang her praise. Her eyes, languorous as the narcissus, threw thorns of her eyelashes in the path of the wise. Her face was as the sun when he took the moon's virginity. The Angel Gabriel could not tear his eyes from the pearls and rubies of her mouth. A smile of her

lips dried up the water of life in the beholder, who yet begged alms from these same lips. Whoever glanced at her chin fell headlong into a spring of bubbling water.

The king also had a slave, a youth, so handsome that the sun grew pale and the light of the moon diminished. When he walked in the streets and market-place crowds stopped to gaze at him.

By chance one day the princess saw this slave, and in a moment her heart slipped from her hand. Reason forsook her and love took possession. Her soul, sweet as Shirin, turned bitter. Withdrawing from her companions she mused, and musing and reflecting, began to burn. Then she called her ten young maids of honour. They were excellent musicians and played on the shawms and pipes; their voices wxre those of nightingales, and their singing, which tore the soul, was worthy of David. Gathering them around her she told them about her state, saying that she was ready to sacrifice her name, her honour, and her life for the love of this youth; for when one is deep in love one is good for nothing else. 'But,' she said, 'if I tell him of my love no doubt he will do something rash. If it becomes known that I have been intimate with a slave both he and I will suffer. On the other hand, if he does not possess me, I shall die lamenting behind the curtain of the harem. I have read a hundred books on patience and still I am without it. What can I do! I must find a way to enjoy the love of this slender cypress, so that the desire of my body shall accord with the longing of my soul - and this must be done without his knowing.'

Then the sweet-voiced maids said: 'Do not grieve. Tonight we will bring him here unknown to anyone, and even he will know nothing about it.'

Soon, one of the young girls went in secret to the slave and asked him, as if to play with him, to bring two cups of wine. Into one cup she threw a drug, contriving that he should drink it. He at once fell asleep, so that she was able

to carry out her plan, and the youth of the silver breast remained without news of the two worlds.

When night came the maids of honour went softly to where he lay and put him on a litter and carried him to the princess. Then they sat him on a golden throne and placed a coronet of pearls on his head. At midnight, still a little drugged, he opened his eyes and saw a palace as fair as paradise, and around him were golden seats. The place was lighted by ten great candles perfumed with amber, and sweet aloe wood burned in pans. The maidens began to sing, but in such sweet strains that reason bade farewell to the spirit, and the soul to the body. Then the sun of wine went round to the light of the candles. Bewildered with the joy of his surroundings and dazzled by the beauty of the princess, the youth lost his wits. He was no longer really in this world nor was he in the other. With a heart full of love, and a body possessed with desire, amid these delights he fell into a state of ecstasy. His eyes were fastened on her beauty and his ears to the sound of the reed pipes. His nostrils took in the perfume of amber and the wine in his mouth became like liquid fire. The princess kissed him, and he shed tears of joy while she mingled hers with his. Sometimes she pressed sweet kisses on his mouth, sometimes they were tinged with salt; sometimes she ruffled his long hair, sometimes she lost herself in his eyes. He possessed her; and so they passed the time until the dawn appeared in the East. When morning Zephyr breathed the young slave became sad; but they sent him to sleep again and took him back to his quarters.

When he of the silver breast came to himself, without knowing why, he began to weep. One might say the thing was finished, so what was the good of crying out. He tore his clothes, pulled his hair and put earth on his head. Those about him asked why he was doing this, and what had happened. He said: Ht is impossible to describe what I have

I

seen, no one else can ever see it except in a dream, for what has happened to me can never have happened to anyone before. Never was there a more astonishing mystery.'

Another said: 'Wake up, and tell us at least one of the hundred things that happened.' He replied: 'lam in a tumult because what I have seen has happened to me in another body. While hearing nothing I have heard everything, while seeing nothing I have seen everything.'

Another said: 'Have you lost your wits or have you just been dreaming?' 'Ah,' he said, 'I don't know if I was drunk or sober. What can be more puzzling than something which is neither revealed nor hidden. What I have seen I can never forget, yet I have no idea where it happened. For one whole night I revelled with a beauty who is without equal. Who and what she is I do not know. Only love remains, and that is all. But God knows the truth.'

(1) Now the Humay stood before the assembly, the Giver of Shade, whose shadow bestows pomp on kings. For this he has received the name of 'Humayun', the fortunate, since of all creatures he has the most ambition. He said: 'Birds of land and sea, I am not a bird as you are. A high ambition moves me and to satisfy it I am separated from other creatures. I have subdued the dog of desire, therefore are Feridoon and Jamshid dignified. Kings are lifted up by the influence of my shadow, but beggarly-natured men do not please me. I give a bone to my dog of desire and put my spirit in surety against it. How can men turn their head away from him whose shadow creates kings? Beneath my wings everyone seeks shelter. Do I need the friendship of the lordly Simurgh when I have royalty at my disposition?'

The Hoopoe replied: 'O slave of pride! Spread no more your shadow and boast no more of yourself. At this moment, far from conferring power upon kings you are like a dog busy with a bone. God forbid that you put a Chosroes on the throne. But supposing that your shadow sets rulers on their thrones, tomorrow they will meet misfortune and be forever deprived of their royalty, while, if they had never seen your shadow, they would not have to face so terrible a reckoning on the last day.'

(98) I ask of you no recompense for my prophesying; I am a guide; God buyeth my guidance for you, True, a guide deserves his wages; But what are my wages? The vision of The Friend. Abu Bakr indeed offered me forty thousand pieces of gold, How could I take brass beads for pearls of Aden?" I will tell you a tale; hearken attentively, Can eyes of hearts clouded with greed see clearly? The illusion of rank and riches blinds his sight,

(22) Report to Bilqis what marvels ye have seen, And what plains of gold belong to Solomon; How ye beheld forty mansions faced with gold, And how ye were ashamed of your presents; That she may know Solomon is not covetous of gold; The moment he wills it, every grain of earth's dust For this cause, O thou that lovest gold, Quit thy wealth, even if it be the realm of Saba; What thou callest a throne is only a prison; Thou thinkest thyself enthroned, but art outside the door.

(3) The parents of Laila refused to let Majnun go near their tents. But Majnun, intoxicated with love, borrowed the skin of a sheep from a shepherd in the desert, where Laila's tribe pitched their tents. He bent his head down and put on the sheep-skin, and said to the shepherd: 'In the name of God, let me crawl along in the middle of your sheep, then lead the flock past Laila's tent, so that I may perhaps discover her sweet perfume, and being concealed in this skin may contrive something.' The shepherd did as Majnun wished, and as they passed her tent he saw her, and swooned away. The shepherd then carried him from the tents into the desert and threw water on his face to cool his burning love.

Another day, Majnun was with some companions in the desert, and one of them asked him: 'How can you, a nobleman, go about naked? I wdll get some clothes for you if you wish.' Majnun said: 'No garments that I can wear are worthy of my friend, so for me there is nothing better than my bare body or a sheepskin. She, for me, is as ispand to avert the evil eye. Majnun would willingly wear garments of silk and cloth of gold, but he prefers this sheepskin by means of which he caught sight of Laila.'

Love should tear aside your prudence. Love changes your attitude. To love is to give up your ordinary life and forsake your tawdry pleasures.

(3) "Do not show us before the tribes when we are angered by the words of their mouths, or because of their conduct. Neither shall you permit us to fall into a snare. Give us, instead, the creatures of the woods and of the fields, and also the female deer, and the female birds. Come and give us a little of your blood, have pity upon us. You may have the skins of the deer and guard us from those whose eyes have deceived us.

(6) "Oh, Thou, beauty of the day! Thou, Huracán; Thou, Heart of Heaven and of Earth! Thou, giver of richness, and giver of the daughters and the sons! Turn toward us your power and your riches; grant life and growth unto my sons and vassals; let those who must maintain and nourish Thee multiply and increase; those who invoke Thee on the roads, in the fields, on the banks of the rivers, in the ravines, under the trees, under the vines.

(2) "Since neither your great power nor your race any longer exist, and since neither do you deserve mercy, your rank shall be lowered. Not for you shall be the ball game. You shall spend your time making earthen pots and tubs and stones to grind corn. Only the children of the thickets and desert shall speak with you. The noble sons, the civilized vassals shall not consort with you, and they will foresake your presence. The sinners, the evil ones, the sad ones, the unfortunate ones, those who give themselves up to vice, these are the ones who will welcome you. No longer will you seize men suddenly [for sacrifice]; remember your rank has been lowered." Thus they spoke to all the people of Xibalba.

(11) All the lands praise thy beauties like Rā when he rises every morning; thou art crowned like him who is high on his pedestal, thy beauties are exalted, thy strides are lengthened; thou hast received the royal power of Seb, thy father who creates thy beauties; thy mother gave existence to thy limbs, Nut who bare the gods bare thee to be the chief of the five gods. The white crown of the South is placed on thy head; thou seizest the hook and the flail. When thou wast still in the womb, before thou didst appear on earth, thou wast crowned to be lord of the two earths, the atef crown of Rā was on thy head

(3) I come to you, O Circle of gods in Restau, and I bring to you N . Grant to him Bread, Water, Air and an allotment in the Sechit-hotepu like Horus

(27) " Do not take thee a wife of any of the daughters of Canaan ; arise and go to Mesopotamia, to the house of Bethuel, thy mother's father, and take thee a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban, thy mother's brother.

(13) Let me seize that Thigh which is under the place of Osiris, with which I may open the mouth of the gods and sit by him, like Thoth the Scribe, sound of heart, with thousands of loaves, beer, beef, and fowl upon the table of my father, and the flesh of oxen and birds of various kinds, which I offer to Horus, which I present to Thoth, and which I sacrifice to the Lord of Heaven

(8) When this torch of kings left Gazna to make war on the Hindus and encountered their mighty army, he was cast down, and he made a vow to the King of Justice that if he were victorious he would give all the booty that fell into his hands to the dervdshes. He gained the victory, and his army collected an enormous amount of treasure. When the black-faces had retreated leaving the plunder, Mahmud said:

' Send this to the dervishes, for I have promised God to do so, and I must keep my vow.' Then his officers protested and said: 'Why give so much silver and gold to a handful of men who do not fight! Why not give it to the army which has borne the brunt of the battle, or, at least, put it in the treasury?'

The Sultan hesitated between his vow and the protests of his army. Meanwhile, Bu Hassein, an idiot of God, who was intelligent but uneducated, passed along that way. Mahmud seeing him in the distance said: 'Call that idiot; tell him to come here and say what ought to be done, and I will act accordingly; since he fears neither the Sultan nor the army he will give an impartial opinion.' When the Sultan had put the case to Bu Hassein, the latter said: 'Sire, it is a question of two obols, but if you wish to act becomingly towards God, think no more, O my dear, about these two obols; and if you win another victory by his grace, be ashamed to hold back two obols. Since God has given you the victory, can that which belongs to God belong to you?'

Mahmud thereupon gave the treasure to the dervishes, and became a great monarch.

(3) Again, he sent forth other servants, saying, Tell them which are bidden, Behold, I have prepared my dinner: my oxen and my fatlings are killed, and all things are ready: come unto the marriage. But they made light of it, and went their ways, one to his farm, another to his merchandise: and the remnant took his servants, and entreated them spitefully, and slew them. But when the king heard thereof, he was wroth: and sent forth his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city.

(466) shall seek to appropriate the whole state to himself, then he will have to learn how wisely Hesiod spoke, when he said, ‘half is more than the whole.’ If he were to consult me, I should say to him: Stay where you are, when you have the offer of such a life. You agree then, I said, that men and women are to have a common way of life such as we have described—common education, common children; and they are to watch over the citizens in common whether abiding in the city or going out to war; they are to keep watch together, and to hunt together like dogs; and always and in all things, as far as they are able, women are to share with the men? And in so doing they will do what is best, and will not violate, but preserve the natural relation of the sexes. I agree with you, he replied. The enquiry, I said, has yet to be made, whether such a community be found possible—as among other animals, so also among men—and if possible, in what way possible? You have anticipated the question which I was about to suggest. There is no difficulty, I said, in seeing how war will be carried on by them. How? Why, of course they will go on expeditions together; and will take with them any of their children who are strong enough, that, after the manner of the artisan’s child, they may look on at the work which they will have to do when they are grown up;

(8) Meanwhile the hearts of the priests and the sacrificers on the summit of the mountain were calm. And Balam-Quitzé, Balam-Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui-Balam having talked together, they built a wall at the edge of the town and enclosed it with boards and thorns. Then they made figures in the form of men, and put them in rows on the wall, armed them with shields and arrows and adorned them, putting metal crowns on their heads. These they put on the simple wooden figures, they adorned them with the metal which they had taken from the tribes on the road and with them they decorated the figures. They made a moat around the town, and then they asked advice of Tohil: "Shall they kill us? Shall they overcome us?" their hearts said to Tohil.

A certain king dreamed that his dearly beloved son, a youth of great promise, had come to an untimely end. On awaking he was rejoiced to find that his son was still alive; but he reflected that an accident might carry him off at any moment, and therefore decided to marry him without delay, in order that the succession might be secured. Accordingly he chose the daughter of a pious Darvesh as a bride for his son, and made preparations for the wedding. But his wife and the other ladies of his harem did not approve of the match, considering it below the dignity of the prince to marry the daughter of a beggar. The king rebuked them, saying that a Darvesh who had renounced worldly wealth for the sake of God was not to be confounded with an ordinary beggar, and insisted on the consummation of the marriage. After the marriage the prince refused to have anything to do with his bride, though she was very fair to look on, and he carried on an intrigue with an ugly old woman who had bewitched him by sorcery. After a year, however, the king found some physicians who succeeded in breaking the spell, and the prince returned to his senses, and his eyes were opened to the superior attractions of his wife, and he renounced his ugly paramour and fell in love with his wife. This is a parable, the true wife being the Deity, the old paramour the world, and the physicians the prophets and saints. Another illustration is a child who played at besieging a mimic fort with his fellows, and succeeded in capturing it and keeping the others out. At this moment God "bestowed on him wisdom, though a child," and it became to him a day "when a man flees from his brethren," and he recognized the emptiness of this idle sport, and engaged in the pursuit of holiness and piety. This is followed by an anecdote of a devotee who had so concentrated his thoughts on things above that he was utterly careless of all earthly troubles, and was cheerful and rejoicing even in the midst of a severe famine. The world is the outward form of "Universal Reason" (Muhammad), and he who grieves him must expect trouble in the world.