(14) We have seen above that one kind of spiritual hell is the forcible separation from worldly things to which the heart cleaves too fondly. Many carry about within them the germs of such a hell without being aware of it; hereafter they will feel like some king who, after living in luxury, has been dethroned and made a laughing stock. The second kind of spiritual hell is that of shame, when a man wakes up to see the nature of the actions he committed in their naked reality. Thus he who slandered will see himself in the guise of a cannibal eating his dead brother's flesh, and he who envied as one who cast stones against a wall, which stones, rebounding, put out the eyes of his own children.

(75) If one, by nature evil, evil does, Let him redeem the time; for such as he Shall by and by due punishment receive."

(2) ’Twixt Heaven and Earth, upon the waves of Cosmos, is it dragged in contrary directions, for ever racked with ceaseless pains ; so that in this its deathless nature doth afflict the soul, in that because of its unceasing sense, it hath the yoke of ceaseless torture set upon its neck. Know, then, that we should dread, and be afraid, and [ever] be upon our guard, lest we should be entangled in these [toils]. For those who do not now believe, will after their misdeeds be driven to believe, by facts not words, by actual sufferings of punishment and not by threats.

(12) The burden of bondage to sorrow has its root in these hindrances. It will be felt in this life, or in a life not yet manifested.

(9) Those who have indulged without limit in the pleasures of the world, at the time of death will be like a man who has gorged himself to repletion on delicious viands and then vomits them up. The deliciousness has gone, but the disgrace remains. The greater the abundance of the possessions which they have enjoyed in the shape of gardens, male and female slaves, gold, silver, etc., the more keenly they will feel the bitterness of parting from them. This is a bitterness which will outlast death, for the soul which has contracted covetousness as a fixed habit will necessarily in the next world suffer from the pangs of unsatisfied desire.

(23) This may be illustrated by the following anecdote: A certain scavenger went into the perfume sellers' bazaar, and, smelling the sweet scents, fell down unconscious. People came round him and sprinkled rose-water upon him and held musk to his nose, but he only became worse. At last one came who had been a scavenger himself; he held a little filth under the man's nose and he revived instantly, exclaiming, with a sigh of satisfaction, "Ah! this is perfume indeed!" Thus in the next life a worlding will no longer find the filthy lucre and the filthy pleasures of the world; the spiritual joys of that world will be altogether alien to him and but increase his wretchedness. For the next world is a world of Spirit and of the manifestation of the Beauty of God; happy is that man who has aimed at and acquired affinity with it. All austerities, devotions, studies have the acquirement of that affinity for their aim, and that affinity is love. This is the meaning of that saying of the Koran, "He who has purified his soul is happy." Sins and lusts directly oppose the attainment of this affinity; therefore the Koran goes on to say, "and he who has corrupted his soul is miserable." Those who are gifted with spiritual insight have really grasped this truth as a fact of experience, and not a merely traditional maxim. Their clear perception of it leads them to the conviction that he by whom it was spoken was a prophet indeed, just as a man who has studied medicine knows when he is listening to a physician. This is a kind of certainty which requires no support from miracles such as the conversion of a rod into a snake, the credit of which may be shaken by apparently equally extraordinary miracles performed by magicians.

(12) Thus one of the Wicked curses the other, who has caused him to commit such Wickedness; the Inferior his Superior that has given him Offence, [and been a Stumbling-block to him;] the Laity curse the Clergy or Priests, who have given them evil Examples, and seduced them with false Doctrine; the wicked Curser, Swearer, and Blasphemer, bites and gnaws his Tongue, which has so murdered him; the Mind beats the Head against the Stones; and the Ungodly hide themselves in the Caves and Holes of the Earth, before the Terror of the LORD; for there is great Quaking and Stirring in the Essences of the Anger and fierce Wrath of the LORD; and the Anguish breaks the Heart, and yet there is no Dying; for the Anger is stirring, and the Life of the Ungodly flows up in the Anger. There the Ungodly curses the Heaven and the Earth that bore him, as also the Constellation [or Stars] that led him, and the Hour of his Birth; all his Uncleanness stands before his Eyes, and he sees the Cause of his Horror, and condemns himself; he cannot look upon the Righteous for very Shame; all his Works stand in his Mind, and in the Essences cry, Woe to him that did them, they accuse him; the Tears of those he has afflicted and oppressed are like a fiery stinging Serpent; he desires Rest or Ease, but there is no Comfort, Despair rises up in him, for Hell terrifies him.

(3) The man who does not follow the cycle thus set revolving is a sinner rejoicing in sense-pleasures and he lives in vain.

(15) This species of hell (i.e., of shame) may be symbolised by the following short parable: Suppose a certain king has been celebrating his son's marriage. In the evening the young man goes off with some companions and presently returns to the palace (as he thinks) intoxicated. He enters a chamber where a light is burning and lies down, as he supposes, by his bride. In the morning, when soberness returns, he is aghast to find himself in a mortuary of fire worshippers, his couch a bier, and the form which he mistook for that of his bride the corpse of an old woman beginning to decay. On emerging from the mortuary with his garments all soiled, what is his shame to see his father, the king, approaching with a retinue of soldiers! Such is a feeble picture of the shame those will feel in the next world who in this have greedily abandoned themselves to what they thought were delights.

(15) Then he that will not take heed and beware of his lies, while he may very well do it, there is no remedy for him neither here nor hereafter: he that soweth and will sow with the devil, must reap with the devil also.

(47) On the contrary, many a one is in great Anguish, and longs after it, and generates very painfully, he would fain have uit; but then the Devil rushes upon him, and stirs up Irksomeness [Vexation] and Discontent, and also overwhelms him with great Sins, so that he knows not himself, and then dejects him with Impatience and Doubting; and his Heart stands continually in Anguish, it would fain get out of Evil, and endeavours continually for Abstinence or Forbearance, many Times with Groans, Sighing, and Longing, but then the Devil holds his Sins before him, and bars up the Door of the Grace of God, that he might despair.

(4) Verily, this person, by being born and obtaining a body, is joined with evils. When he departs, on dying, he leaves evils behind.

(20) His face becomes grimed by the smoke fumes; Then he quickly perceives the impression of his fault, So that he wails and cries 'O Allah!' When he is stubborn and follows his evil practices, He recks not of repentance, and, moreover, that sin Becomes dear to his heart, so that he becomes without faith, Old shame for sin and calling on God quit him, Rust five layers deep settles on his mirror, Rust spots begin to gnaw his iron,

(4) Now to know is more than to believe, as to be dignified with the highest honour after being saved is a greater thing than being saved. Accordingly the believer, through great discipline, divesting himself of the passions, passes to the mansion which is better than the former one, viz., to the greatest torment, taking with him the characteristic of repentance from the sins he has committed after baptism. He is tortured then still more - not yet or not quite attaining what he sees others to have acquired. Besides, he is also ashamed of his transgressions. The greatest torments, indeed, are assigned to the believer. For God's righteousness is good, and His goodness is righteous. And though the punishments cease in the course of the completion of the expiation and purification of each one, yet those have very great and permanent grief who are found worthy of the other fold, on account of not being along with those that have been glorified through righteousness.

(4) But the ignorant man, the faithless man, the doubting man goes to destruction. For the doubting self, there is no happiness either in this world or the next.

(37) O nobly-born, although one liketh it not, nevertheless, being pursued from behind by karmic tormenting furies, one feeleth compelled involuntarily to go on; [and with] tormenting furies in the front, and life-cutters as a vanguard leading one, and darkness and karmic tornadoes, and noises and snow and rain and terrifying hail-storms and whirlwinds of icy blasts occurring, there will arise the thought of fleeing from them.

(23) Has it wrought Good here? then it shall eat that Good; for all Sins stand before it in its Tincture: If it thinks inwardly in itself of the Kingdom of Heaven, which yet it neither sees nor knows, then it sees the Causes why it is in such a Source [or Misery;] for itself has made that. And there all the Tears of the Oppressed and Afflicted are in its Tincture, and they are fiery, stinging and burning in a hostile Manner, fretting and gnawing in themselves, and make an eternal Despair in the Essences, and an hostile Will against God; the more it thinks of

(8) On the other hand, the pains which souls suffer after death all have their source in excessive love of the world. The Prophet said that every unbeliever, after death, will be tormented by ninety-nine snakes, each having nine heads. Some simple-minded people have examined the unbelievers' graves and wondered at failing to see these snakes. They do not understand that these snakes have their abode within the unbeliever's spirit, and