{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_50457/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_50457","id":"gutenberg_50457","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/50457","summary":null,"tags":["Arabic poetry -- Translations into English","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Poetry"],"text":"THE LUZUMIYAT\n                                   OF\n                               ABU'L-ALA\n\n                           Selected from his\n                  Luzum ma la Yalzam and Suct uz-Zand\n                    and first rendered into English\n\n\n                                   By\n                              AMEEN RIHANI\n                               Author of\n                           The Book of Khaled\n\n\n                            (Second Edition)\n\n                                NEW YORK\n                         JAMES T. WHITE & CO.,\n                                  1920\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                         TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS\n                              EMIR FEISAL\n                          IN WHOM ARE CENTRED\n                       THE HOPES AND ASPIRATIONS\n                          OF THE SYRIAN PEOPLE\n                           FOR A UNITED SYRIA\n                               THIS BOOK\n                              IS DEDICATED\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\"His poems generally known as the Luzumiyat arrest attention by their\nboldness and originality as well as by the sombre and earnest tone\nwhich pervades them.\"--Raynold A. Nicholson: A History of the Arabs.\n\n\n\"Abu'l-Ala is a poet many centuries ahead of his time.\"--Von Kremer.\n\n\n\n                          COPYRIGHTED 1918 BY\n                          JAMES T. WHITE & CO.\n\n\n\n\n\n        TO ABU'L-ALA\n\n\n        In thy fountained peristyles of Reason\n            Glows the light and flame of desert noons;\n        And in the cloister of thy pensive Fancy\n            Wisdom burns the spikenard of her moons.\n\n        Closed by Fate the portals of the dwelling\n            Of thy sight, the light thus inward flowed;\n        And on the shoulders of the crouching Darkness\n            Thou hast risen to the highest road.\n\n        I have seen thee walking with Canopus\n            Through the stellar spaces of the night;\n        I have heard thee asking thy Companion,\n            \"Where be now my staff, and where thy light?\"\n\n        Abu'l-Ala, in the heaving darkness,\n            Didst thou not the whisperings hear of me?\n        In thy star-lit wilderness, my Brother,\n            Didst thou not a burdened shadow see?\n\n        I have walked and I have slept beside thee,\n            I have laughed and I have wept as well;\n        I have heard the voices of thy silence\n            Melting in thy Jannat and thy hell.\n\n        I remember, too, that once the Saki\n            Filled the antique cup and gave it thee;\n        Now, filled with the treasures of thy wisdom,\n            Thou dost pass that very cup to me.\n\n        By the God of thee, my Syrian Brother,\n            Which is best, the Saki's cup or thine?\n        Which the mystery divine uncovers--\n            If the cover covers aught divine.\n\n        And if it lies hid in the soul of silence\n            Like incense in the dust of ambergris,\n        Wouldst thou burn it to perfume the terror\n            Of the caverns of the dried-up seas?\n\n        Where'er it be, Oh! let it be, my Brother.--\n            Though \"thrice-imprisoned,\"[9] thou hast forged us more\n        Solid weapons for the life-long battle\n            Than all the Heaven-taught Armorers of yore.\n\n        \"Thrice-imprisoned,\" thou wert e'en as mighty,\n            In the boundless kingdom of the mind,\n        As the whirlwind that compels the ocean,\n            As the thunder that compels the wind.\n\n        \"Thrice-imprisoned,\" thou wert freer truly\n            Than the liegeless Arab on his mare,--\n        Freer than the bearers of the sceptre,--\n            Freer than the winged lords of the air.\n\n        \"Thrice-imprisoned,\" thou hast sung of freedom\n            As but a few of all her heroes can;\n        Thou hast undermined the triple prison\n            Of the mind and heart and soul of man.\n\n        In thy fountained peristyles of Reason\n            Glows the light and flame of desert noons;\n        And in the cloister of thy pensive Fancy\n            Wisdom burns the spikenard of her moons.\n\n\n                                            Ameen Rihani.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE.\n\n\nWhen Christendom was groping amid the superstitions of the Dark Ages,\nand the Norsemen were ravaging the western part of Europe, and the\nprinces of Islam were cutting each other's throats in the name of\nAllah and his Prophet, Abu'l-Ala'l-Ma'arri was waging his bloodless war\nagainst the follies and evils of his age. He attacked the superstitions\nand false traditions of law and religion, proclaiming the supremacy\nof the mind; he hurled his trenchant invectives at the tyranny, the\nbigotry, and the quackery of his times, asserting the supremacy of\nthe soul; he held the standard of reason high above that of authority,\nfighting to the end the battle of the human intellect. An intransigeant\nwith the exquisite mind of a sage and scholar, his weapons were never\nidle. But he was, above all, a poet; for when he stood before the\neternal mystery of Life and Death, he sheathed his sword and murmured\na prayer.\n\nAbu'l-Ala'l-Ma'arri, [1] the Lucretius of Islam, the Voltaire of the\nEast, was born in the spring of the year 973 A.D., in the obscure\nvillage of Ma'arrah, [2] which is about eighteen hours' journey south\nof Halab (Aleppo). And instead of Ahmad ibn Abdallah ibn Sulaiman\nut-Tanukhi (of the tribe of Tanukh), he was called Abu'l-Ala (the\nFather of the Sublime), by which patronymic of distinction he is\npopularly known throughout the Arabic speaking world.\n\nWhen a boy, Abu'l-Ala was instructed by his father; and subsequently\nhe was sent to Halab, where he pursued his studies under the tutelage\nof the grammarian Muhammad ibn Abdallah ibn us-Sad. His literary\nproclivity was evinced in his boyhood, and he wrote verse, we are\ntold, before he was ten. Of these juvenile pieces, however, nothing\nwas preserved.\n\nHe was about five years old when he fell a victim to small-pox and\nalmost lost his sight from it. But a weakness in his eyes continued to\ntrouble him and he became, in middle age, I presume, totally blind. [3]\nSome of his biographers would have us believe he was born blind;\nothers state that he completely lost his sight when he was attacked by\nthe virulent disease; and a few intimate that he could see slightly\nat least with the right eye. As to whether or not he was blind when\nhe was sent to Halab to pursue his studies, his biographers do not\nagree. My theory, based on the careful perusal of his poems and on\na statement advanced by one of his biographers, [4] is that he lost\nhis sight gradually, and total blindness must have come upon him\neither in his youth or his middle age. [5] Were we to believe that\nhe was born blind or that he suffered the complete loss of his sight\nin his boyhood, we should be at a loss to know, not how he wrote his\nbooks, for that was done by dictation; not how he taught his pupils,\nfor that was done by lectures; but how he himself was taught in the\nabsence in those days of a regular system of instruction for the blind.\n\nIn 1010 A.D. he visited Baghdad, the centre of learning and\nintelligence and the capital of the Abbaside Khalifs, where he passed\nabout two years and became acquainted with most of the literary men of\nthe age. [6] He attended the lectures and the readings of the leading\ndoctors and grammarians, meeting with a civil reception at the hand\nof most of them.\n\nHe also journeyed to Tripoli, [7] which boasted, in those days,\nof many public libraries; and, stopping at Ladhekiyah, he lodged in\na monastery where he met and befriended a very learned monk. They\ndiscussed theology and metaphysics, digressing now and then into the\nprofane. Indeed, the skepticism which permeates Abu'l-Ala's writings\nmust have been nursed in that convent by both the monk and the poet.\n\nThese are virtually the only data extant showing the various sources\nof Abu'l-Ala's learning; but to one endowed with a keen perception,\na powerful intellect, a prodigious memory, together with strong innate\nliterary predilections, they seem sufficient. He was especially noted\nfor the extraordinary memory he possessed; and around this our Arab\nbiographers and historians weave a thick net of anecdotes, or rather\nfables. I have no doubt that one with such a prodigious memory could\nretain in a few minutes what the average person could not; but when\nwe are told that Abu'l-Ala once heard one of his pupils speaking\nwith a friend in a foreign tongue, and repeated there and then the\nlong conversation, word for word, without having the slightest idea\nof its meaning, we are disposed to be skeptical. Many such anecdotes\nare recorded and quoted by his Arab biographers without as much as\nintimating a single doubt. [8] The fact that he was blind partly\nexplains the abnormal development of his memory.\n\nHis career as poet and scholar dates from the time he returned from\nBaghdad. This, so far as is known, was the last journey he made;\nand his home became henceforth his earthly prison. He calls himself\n\"A double-fettered Captive,\" [9] his solitude being the one and his\nblindness the other. Like most of the scholars of his age, in the\nabsence of regular educational institutions, with perhaps one or two\nexceptions, he had to devote a part of his time to the large number of\npupils that flocked to Ma'arrah from all parts of Asia Minor, Arabia,\nand India. Aside from this, he dictated to his numerous amanuenses\non every possible and known subject. He is not only a poet of the\nfirst rank, but an essayist, a literary critic, and a mathematician\nas well. Everything he wrote was transcribed by many of his admirers,\nas was the fashion then, and thus circulated far and near. Nothing,\nhowever, was preserved but his Diwans, his Letters and the Epistle\nof Forgiveness, [10] of which I shall yet have occasion to speak. [11]\n\nHis reputation as poet and scholar had now, after his return from\nBaghdad, overleaped the horizons, as one writer has it. Honors were\nconferred upon him successively by the rulers and the scholars of\nhis age. His many noted admirers were in constant communication with\nhim. He was now looked upon as \"the master of the learned, the chief of\nthe wise, and the sole monarch of the bards of his century.\" Ma'arrah\n[12] became the Mecca of every literary aspirant; ambitious young\nscholars came there for enlightenment and inspiration. And Abu'l-Ala,\nalthough a pessimist, received them with his wonted kindness and\ncourtesy. He imparted to them what he knew, and told them candidly\nwhat he would not teach, since, unlike other philosophers, he was not\nable to grasp the truth, nor compass the smallest of the mysteries of\ncreation. In his latter days, youthful admirers sought his blessing,\nwhich he, as the childless father of all, graciously conferred,\nbut with no self-assumed spiritual or temporal authority.\n\nFor thirty years he remained a vegetarian, living the life of an\nascetic. [13] This mode of living led his enemies to accuse him of\nrenouncing Islam and embracing Brahminism, one of the tenets of which\nforbids the slaughter of animals. The accusation was rather sustained\nby the dispassionate attitude he held towards it, and, furthermore,\nby his vehement denunciation of the barbarous practice of killing\nanimals for food or for sport.\n\nMost of the censors of Abu'l-Ala were either spurred to their task\nby bigotry or animated by jealousy and ignorance. They held him up\nto ridicule and opprobrium, and such epithets as heretic, atheist,\nrenegade, etc., were freely applied. But he was supremely indifferent\nto them all, [14] and never would he cross swords with any particular\nindividual; he attacked the false doctrines they were teaching,\nturning a deaf ear to the virulent vituperations they hurled upon\nhim. I fail to find in the three volumes of his poems, even in the\nLetters, one acrimonious line savoring of personality.\n\nIbn-Khillikan, The Plutarch of Arabia, who is cautious and guarded\nin his statements, speaking of Abu'l-Ala, truly says:\n\n\"His asceticism, his deep sense of right and wrong, his powerful\nintellect, his prodigious memory, and his wide range of learning,\nare alike acknowledged by both friend and foe.\"\n\nHis pessimism was natural, in part hereditary. The man was nothing\nif not genuine and sincere. Ruthlessly he said what he thought and\nfelt. He had no secrets to hide from the world, no thoughts which\nhe dared not express. His soul was as open as Nature; his mind\nwas the polished mirror of his age. [15] It may be that had he not\nbeen blind-stricken and had not small-pox disfigured his features,\nhe might have found a palliative in human society. His pessimism\nmight not have been cured, but it might have been rendered at least\nenticing. Good-fellowship might have robbed it of its sting. Nor is\nhis strong aversion to marriage, in view of these facts, surprising.\n\nHe lived to know that \"his fame spread from the sequestered village of\nMa'arrah to the utmost confines of the Arabic speaking world.\" In the\nspring of 1055 A.D. he died, and was buried in a garden surrounding\nhis home. Adh-Dhahabi states that there were present at his grave\neighty poets, and that the Koran was read there two hundred times\nin a fortnight. Eighty poets in the small town of Ma'arrah sounds\nincredible. But we must bear in mind that almost every one who studies\nthe Arabic grammar has also to study prosody and versification and\nthus become at least a rhymster. Even to-day, the death of a noted\nperson among the Arabs, is always an occasion for the display of much\neloquence and tears, both in prose and verse.\n\nAbu'l-Ala, beside being a poet and scholar of the first rank, was\nalso one of the foremost thinkers of his age. Very little is said\nof his teachings, his characteristics, his many-sided intellect, in\nthe biographies I have read. The fact that he was a liberal thinker,\na trenchant writer,--free, candid, downright, independent, skeptical\nwithal,--answers for the neglect on the part of Mohammedan doctors,\nwho, when they do discuss him, try to conceal from the world what\nhis poems unquestionably reveal. I am speaking, of course, of the\nneglect after his death. For during his life-time he was much honored,\nas I have shown, and many distinguished travellers came especially\nto Ma'arrah to see him. He was also often called upon to act as\nintercessor with the Emirs for the natives of his village. [16]\n\nThe larger collection of his poems, the Luzumiyat, [17] was published\nin Cairo, in two volumes, by Azeez Zind, from an original Ms. written\nin the twelfth century, under Abu'l-Ala's own title Luzum ma la\nYalzam, or the Necessity of what is Unnecessary. This title refers to\nthe special system of rhyming which the poet adopted. And the poems,\npublished in desultory fashion, were written, it seems, at different\nperiods of his life, and are arranged according to his particular\nalphabetical system of rhyming. They bear no titles except, \"And he\nalso says, rhyming with so and so,\" whatever the consonant and vowel\nmay be. In his Preface to the Luzumiyat he says:\n\n\"It happened that I composed these poems during the past years,\nand in them I have always aimed at the truth. They are certainly\nfree from the blandishments of exaggeration. And while some of them\nare written in glorification of God, who is above such glory, others\nare, as it were, a reminder to those who forget, a pinch to those who\nsleep, and a warning to the children of the earth against the wiles\nof the great world, where human rights and human gratitude are often\nstrangled by the same hand of Fate.\"\n\nAs for the translation of these chosen quatrains, let me say at\nthe outset that it is almost impossible to adhere to the letter\nthereof and convey the meaning without being insipid, dull, and at\ntimes even ridiculous. There being no affinity between the Arabic\nand the English, their standards of art and beauty widely differ,\nand in the process of transformation the outer garment at times\nmust necessarily be doffed. I have always adhered to the spirit,\nhowever, preserving the native imagery where it was not too clannish\nor grotesque. I have added nothing that was foreign to the ruling idea,\nnor have I omitted anything that was necessary to the completion of the\ngeneral thought. One might get an idea of what is called a scholarly\ntranslation from the works of any of the Orientalists who have made\na study of Abu'l-Ala. The first English scholar to mention the poet,\nas far as I know, was J. D. Carlisle, who in his \"Specimens of Arabic\nPoetry\", published in 1810, has paraphrased in verse a quatrain on\nPride and Virtue. He also translated into Latin one of Abu'l-Ala's bold\nepigrams, fearing, I suppose, to publish it at that time in English.\n\nThe quatrains which are here published are culled from the three\nVolumes of his poems, and they are arranged, as nearly as may be,\nin the logical order of their sequence of thought. They form a kind\nof eclogue, which the poet-philosopher delivers from his prison\nin Ma'arrah.\n\nOnce, in Damascus, I visited, with some friends, a distinguished Sufi;\nand when the tea was being served, our host held forth on the subject\nof Abu'l-Ala's creed. He quoted from the Luzumiyat to show that the\npoet-philosopher of Ma'arrah was a true Sufi, and of the highest\norder. \"In his passionate hatred of the vile world and all the vile\nmaterial manifestations of life,\" quoth our host, \"he was like a\ndervish dancing in sheer bewilderment; a holy man, indeed, melting\nin tears before the distorted image of Divinity. In his aloofness,\nas in the purity of his spirit, the ecstatic negations of Abu'l-Ala\ncan only be translated in terms of the Sufi's creed. In his raptures,\nshathat, he was as distant as Ibn ul-Arabi; and in his bewilderment,\nheirat, he was as deeply intoxicated as Ibn ul-Fared. If others have\nsymbolized the Divinity in wine, he symbolized it in Reason, which is\nthe living oracle of the Soul; he has, in a word, embraced Divinity\nunder the cover of a philosophy of extinction.\"...\n\nThis, and more such from our Sufi host, to which the guests gently\nnodded understanding. One of them, a young poet and scholar,\neven added that most of the irreligious opinions that are found in\nthe Luzumiyat were forced upon the poet by the rigorous system of\nrhyming he adopted. The Rhyme, then, is responsible for the heresies\nof Abu'l-Ala! Allah be praised! But this view of the matter was not\nnew to me. I have heard it expressed by zealous Muslem scholars, who\nsee in Abu'l-Ala an adversary too strong to be allowed to enlist with\nthe enemy. They will keep him, as one of the \"Pillars of the Faith,\"\nat any cost. Coming from them, therefore, this rhyme-begotten heresy\ntheory is not surprising.\n\nBut I am surprised to find a European scholar like Professor\nMargoliouth giving countenance to such views; even repeating, to\nsupport his own argument, [18] such drivel. For if the system of\nrhyme-ending imposes upon the poet his irreligious opinions, how can\nwe account for them in his prose writings? How, for instance, explain\nhis book \"Al-fusul wal Ghayat\" (The Chapters and the Purposes), a\nwork in which he parodied the Koran itself, and which only needed,\nas he said, to bring it to the standard of the Book, \"the polishing\nof four centuries of reading in the pulpit?\" And how account for his\n\"Risalat ul-Ghufran\" (Epistle of Forgiveness), a most remarkable work\nboth in form and conception?--a Divina Comedia in its cotyledonous\nstate, as it were, only that Abu'l-Ala does not seem to have relished\nthe idea of visiting Juhannam. He must have felt that in his \"three\nearthly prisons\" he had had enough of it. So he visits the Jannat\nand there meets the pagan bards of Arabia lulling themselves in\neternal bliss under the eternal shades of the sidr tree, writing and\nreading and discussing poetry. Now, to people the Muslem's Paradise\nwith heathen poets who have been forgiven,--hence the title of the\nWork,--and received among the blest,--is not this clear enough, bold\nenough, loud enough even for the deaf and the blind? \"The idea,\"\nsays Professor Nicholson, speaking of The Epistle of Forgiveness,\n[19] \"is carried out with such ingenuity and in a spirit of audacious\nburlesque that reminds one of Lucien.\"\n\nThis does not mean, however, that the work is essentially of a\nburlesque quality. Abu'l-Ala had humor; but his earnest tone is never\nso little at an ebb as when he is in his happiest mood. I quote from\nThe Epistle of Forgiveness:\n\n\n    \"Sometimes you may find a man skilful in his trade,\" says the\n    Author, \"perfect in sagacity and in the use of arguments, but\n    when he comes to religion he is found obstinate, so does he\n    follow in the old groove. Piety is implanted in human nature;\n    it is deemed a sure refuge. To the growing child, that which\n    falls from his elders' lips is a lesson that abides with him all\n    his life. Monks in their cloisters and devotees in their mosques\n    accept their creed just as a story is handed down from him who\n    tells it, without distinguishing between a true interpreter and\n    a false. If one of these had found his kin among the Magians, or\n    among the Sabians, he would have become nearly or quite like them.\"\n\n\nIt does seem, too, that the strain of heterodoxy in Abu'l-Ala is partly\nhereditary. His father, who was also a poet of some distinction,\nand his maternal uncle, were both noted for their liberal opinions\nin religious matters. And he himself, alluding in one of his poems\nto those who reproached him for not making the pilgrimage to Mecca,\nsays that neither his father, nor his cousin, nor his uncle had\npilgrimaged at all, and that he will not be denied forgiveness, if they\nare forgiven. And if they are not, he had as lief share their fate.\n\nBut aside from his prose writings, in which, do what we may, we can not\nexplain away his supposed heresies, we find in the Luzumiyat themselves\nhis dominant ideas on religion, for instance, being a superstition;\nwine, an unmitigated evil; virtue, its own reward; the cremation of the\ndead, a virtue; the slaughter or even the torture of animals a crime;\n[20] doubt, a way to truth; reason, the only prophet and guide;--we\nfind these ideas clothed in various images and expressed in varied\nforms, but unmistakable in whatever guise we find them. Here, for\ninstance, is Professor Nicholson's almost literal translation of a\nquatrain from the Luzumiyat:\n\n\n    Hanifs [21] are stumbling, Christians gone astray,\n    Jews wildered, Magians far on error's way:--\n    We mortals are composed of two great schools,\n    Enlightened knaves or else religious fools.\n\n\nAnd here is the same idea, done in a large picture. The translation,\nliteral too, is mine:\n\n\n    'Tis strange that Kusrah and his people wash\n      Their faces in the staling of the kine;\n    And that the Christians say, Almighty God\n      Was tortured, mocked, and crucified in fine:\n    And that the Jews should picture Him as one\n      Who loves the odor of a roasting chine;\n    And stranger still that Muslems travel far\n      To kiss a black stone said to be divine:--\n    Almighty God! will all the human race\n      Stray blindly from the Truth's most sacred shrine? [22]\n\n\nThe East still remains the battle-ground of the creeds. And the\nEuropeans, though they shook off their fetters of moral and spiritual\nslavery, would keep us in ours to facilitate the conquests of European\ncommence. Thus the terrible Dragon, which is fed by the foreign\nmissionary and the native priest, by the theologians and the ulama,\nand which still preys upon the heart and mind of Orient nations, is as\nactive to-day as it was ten centuries ago. Let those consider this,\nwho think Von Kremer exaggerated when he said, \"Abu'l-Ala is a poet\nmany centuries ahead of his time.\"\n\nBefore closing, I wish to call attention to a question which, though\nunimportant in itself, is nevertheless worthy of the consideration\nof all admirers of Arabic and Persian literature. I refer to\nthe similarity of thought which exists between Omar Khayyam and\nAbu'l-Ala. The former, I have reason to believe, was an imitator or a\ndisciple of the latter. The birth of the first poet and the death of\nthe second are not very far apart: they both occurred about the middle\nof the eleventh century. The English reading public here and abroad\nhas already formed its opinion of Khayyam. Let it not, therefore,\nbe supposed that in making this claim I aim to shake or undermine\nits great faith. My desire is to confirm, not to weaken,--to expand,\nnot contract,--the Oriental influence on the Occidental mind.\n\nWhoever will take the trouble, however, to read Omar Khayyam in\nconjunction with what is here translated of Abu'l-Ala, can not fail\nto see the striking similarity in thought and image of certain phases\nof the creed or the lack of creed of both poets. [23] To be sure,\nthe skepticism and pessimism of Omar are to a great extent imported\nfrom Ma'arrah. But the Arab philosopher in his religious opinions\nis far more outspoken than the Persian tent-maker. I do not say that\nOmar was a plagiarist; but I say this: just as Voltaire, for instance,\nacquired most of his liberal and skeptical views from Hobbes, Locke and\nBayle, so did Omar acquire his from Abu'l-Ala. In my notes to these\nquatrains I have quoted in comparison from both the Fitzgerald and\nthe Herron-Allen versions of the Persian poet; and with so much or so\nlittle said, I leave the matter in the hands of the reader, who, upon\na careful examination, will doubtless bear me out as to this point.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                       THE LUZUMIYAT OF ABU'L-ALA\n\n\n\nI\n\nThe sable wings of Night pursuing day\nAcross the opalescent hills, display\n    The wondrous star-gems which the fiery suns\nAre scattering upon their fiery way.\n\n\n\nII\n\nO my Companion, Night is passing fair,\nFairer than aught the dawn and sundown wear;\n    And fairer, too, than all the gilded days\nOf blond Illusion and its golden snare.\n\n\n\nIII\n\nHark, in the minarets muazzens call\nThe evening hour that in the interval\n    Of darkness Ahmad might remembered be,--\nRemembered of the Darkness be they all.\n\n\n\nIV\n\nAnd hear the others who with cymbals try\nTo stay the feet of every passer-by:\n    The market-men along the darkling lane\nAre crying up their wares.--Oh! let them cry.\n\n\n\nV\n\nMohammed or Messiah! Hear thou me,\nThe truth entire nor here nor there can be;\n    How should our God who made the sun and moon\nGive all his light to One, I cannot see.\n\n\n\nVI\n\nCome, let us with the naked Night now rest\nAnd read in Allah's Book the sonnet best:\n    The Pleiads--ah, the Moon from them departs,--\nShe draws her veil and hastens toward the west.\n\n\n\nVII\n\nThe Pleiads follow; and our Ethiop Queen,\nEmerging from behind her starry screen,\n    Will steep her tresses in the saffron dye\nOf dawn, and vanish in the morning sheen.\n\n\n\nVIII\n\nThe secret of the day and night is in\nThe constellations, which forever spin\n    Around each other in the comet-dust;--\nThe comet-dust and humankind are kin.\n\n\n\nIX\n\nBut whether of dust or fire or foam, the glaive\nOf Allah cleaves the planet and the wave\n    Of this mysterious Heaven-Sea of life,\nAnd lo! we have the Cradle of the Grave.\n\n\n\nX\n\nThe Grave and Cradle, the untiring twain,\nWho in the markets of this narrow lane\n    Bordered of darkness, ever give and take\nIn equal measure--what's the loss or gain?\n\n\n\nXI\n\nAy, like the circles which the sun doth spin\nOf gossamer, we end as we begin;\n    Our feet are on the heads of those that pass,\nBut ever their Graves around our Cradles grin.\n\n\n\nXII\n\nAnd what avails it then that Man be born\nTo joy or sorrow?--why rejoice or mourn?\n    The doling doves are calling to the rose;\nThe dying rose is bleeding o'er the thorn.\n\n\n\nXIII\n\nAnd he the Messenger, who takes away\nThe faded garments, purple, white, and gray\n    Of all our dreams unto the Dyer, will\nBring back new robes to-morrow--so they say.\n\n\n\nXIV\n\nBut now the funeral is passing by,\nAnd in its trail, beneath this moaning sky,\n    The howdaj comes,--both vanish into night;\nTo me are one, the sob, the joyous cry.\n\n\n\nXV\n\nWith tombs and ruined temples groans the land\nIn which our forbears in the drifting sand\n    Arise as dunes upon the track of Time\nTo mark the cycles of the moving hand\n\n\n\nXVI\n\nOf Fate. Alas! and we shall follow soon\nInto the night eternal or the noon;\n    The wayward daughters of the spheres return\nUnto the bosom of their sun or moon.\n\n\n\nXVII\n\nAnd from the last days of Thamud and 'Ad\nUp to the first of Hashem's fearless lad,\n    Who smashed the idols of his mighty tribe,\nWhat idols and what heroes Death has had!\n\n\n\nXVIII\n\nTread lightly, for the mighty that have been\nMight now be breathing in the dust unseen;\n    Lightly, the violets beneath thy feet\nSpring from the mole of some Arabian queen.\n\n\n\nXIX\n\nMany a grave embraces friend and foe\nBehind the curtain of this sorry show\n    Of love and hate inscrutable; alas!\nThe Fates will always reap the while they sow.\n\n\n\nXX\n\nThe silken fibre of the fell Zakkum,\nAs warp and woof, is woven on the loom\n    Of life into a tapestry of dreams\nTo decorate the chariot-seat of Doom.\n\n\n\nXXI\n\nAnd still we weave, and still we are content\nIn slaving for the sovereigns who have spent\n    The savings of the toiling of the mind\nUpon the glory of Dismemberment.\n\n\n\nXXII\n\nNor king nor slave the hungry Days will spare;\nBetween their fang\u00e9d Hours alike we fare:\n    Anon they bound upon us while we play\nUnheeding at the threshold of their Lair.\n\n\n\nXXIII\n\nThen Jannat or Juhannam? From the height\nOf reason I can see nor fire nor light\n    That feeds not on the darknesses; we pass\nFrom world to world, like shadows through the night.\n\n\n\nXXIV\n\nOr sleep--and shall it be eternal sleep\nSomewhither in the bosom of the deep\n    Infinities of cosmic dust, or here\nWhere gracile cypresses the vigil keep!\n\n\n\nXXV\n\nUpon the threshing-floor of life I burn\nBeside the Winnower a word to learn;\n    And only this: Man's of the soil and sun,\nAnd to the soil and sun he shall return.\n\n\n\nXXVI\n\nAnd like a spider's house or sparrow's nest,\nThe Sultan's palace, though upon the crest\n    Of glory's mountain, soon or late must go:\nAy, all abodes to ruin are addrest.\n\n\n\nXXVII\n\nSo, too, the creeds of Man: the one prevails\nUntil the other comes; and this one fails\n    When that one triumphs; ay, the lonesome world\nWill always want the latest fairy-tales.\n\n\n\nXXVIII\n\nSeek not the Tavern of Belief, my friend,\nUntil the Sakis there their morals mend;\n    A lie imbibed a thousand lies will breed,\nAnd thou'lt become a Saki in the end.\n\n\n\nXXIX\n\nBy fearing whom I trust I find my way\nTo truth; by trusting wholly I betray\n    The trust of wisdom; better far is doubt\nWhich brings the false into the light of day.\n\n\n\nXXX\n\nOr wilt thou commerce have with those who make\nRugs of the rainbow, rainbows of the snake,\n    Snakes of a staff, and other wondrous things?--\nThe burning thirst a mirage can not slake.\n\n\n\nXXXI\n\nReligion is a maiden veiled in prayer,\nWhose bridal gifts and dowry those who care\n    Can buy in Mutakallem's shop of words\nBut I for such, a dirham can not spare.\n\n\n\nXXXII\n\nWhy linger here, why turn another page?\nOh! seal with doubt the whole book of the age;\n    Doubt every one, even him, the seeming slave\nOf righteousness, and doubt the canting sage.\n\n\n\nXXXIII\n\nSome day the weeping daughters of Hadil\nWill say unto the bulbuls: \"Let's appeal\n    To Allah in behalf of Brother Man\nWho's at the mercy now of Ababil.\"\n\n\n\nXXXIV\n\nOf Ababil! I would the tale were true,--\nWould all the birds were such winged furies too;\n    The scourging and the purging were a boon\nFor me, O my dear Brothers, and for you.\n\n\n\nXXXV\n\nMethinks Allah divides me to complete\nHis problem, which with Xs is replete;\n    For I am free and I am too in chains\nGroping along the labyrinthine street.\n\n\n\nXXXVI\n\nAnd round the Well how oft my Soul doth grope\nAthirst; but lo! my Bucket hath no Rope:\n    I cry for water, and the deep, dark Well\nEchoes my wailing cry, but not my hope.\n\n\n\nXXXVII\n\nAh, many have I seen of those who fell\nWhile drawing, with a swagger, from the Well;\n    They came with Rope and Bucket, and they went\nEmpty of hand another tale to tell.\n\n\n\nXXXVIII\n\nThe I in me standing upon the brink\nWould leap into the Well to get a drink;\n    But how to rise once in the depth, I cry,\nAnd cowardly behind my logic slink.\n\n\n\nXXXIX\n\nAnd she: \"How long must I the burden bear?\nHow long this tattered garment must I wear?\"\n    And I: \"Why wear it? Leave it here, and go\nAway without it--little do I care.\"\n\n\n\nXL\n\nBut once when we were quarreling, the door\nWas opened by a Visitor who bore\n    Both Rope and Pail; he offered them and said:\n\"Drink, if you will, but once, and nevermore.\"\n\n\n\nXLI\n\nOne draught, more bitter than the Zakkum tree,\nBrought us unto the land of mystery\n    Where rising Sand and Dust and Flame conceal\nThe door of every Caravanseri.\n\n\n\nXLII\n\nWe reach a door and there the legend find.\n\"To all the Pilgrims of the Human Mind:\n    Knock and pass on!\" We knock and knock and knock;\nBut no one answers save the moaning wind.\n\n\n\nXLIII\n\nHow like a door the knowledge we attain,\nWhich door is on the bourne of the Inane;\n    It opens and our nothingness is closed,--\nIt closes and in darkness we remain.\n\n\n\nXLIV\n\nHither we come unknowing, hence we go;\nUnknowing we are messaged to and fro;\n    And yet we think we know all things of earth\nAnd sky--the suns and stars we think we know.\n\n\n\nXLV\n\nApply thy wit, O Brother, here and there\nUpon this and upon that; but beware\n    Lest in the end--ah, better at the start\nGo to the Tinker for a slight repair.\n\n\n\nXLVI\n\nAnd why so much ado, and wherefore lay\nThe burden of the years upon the day\n    Of thy vain dreams? Who polishes his sword\nMorning and eve will polish it away.\n\n\n\nXLVII\n\nI heard it whispered in the cryptic streets\nWhere every sage the same dumb shadow meets:\n    \"We are but words fallen from the lipe of Time\nWhich God, that we might understand, repeats.\"\n\n\n\nXLVIII\n\nAnother said: \"The creeping worm hath shown,\nIn her discourse on human flesh and bone,\n    That Man was once the bed on which she slept--\nThe walking dust was once a thing of stone.\"\n\n\n\nXLIX\n\nAnd still another: \"We are coins which fade\nIn circulation, coins which Allah made\n    To cheat Iblis: the good and bad alike\nAre spent by Fate upon a passing shade.\"\n\n\n\nL\n\nAnd in the pottery the potter cried,\nAs on his work shone all the master's pride--\n    \"How is it, Rabbi, I, thy slave, can make\nSuch vessels as nobody dare deride?\"\n\n\n\nLI\n\nThe Earth then spake: \"My children silent be;\nSame are to God the camel and the flea:\n    He makes a mess of me to nourish you,\nThen makes a mess of you to nourish me.\"\n\n\n\nLII\n\nNow, I believe the Potter will essay\nOnce more the Wheel, and from a better clay\n    Will make a better Vessel, and perchance\nA masterpiece which will endure for aye.\n\n\n\nLIII\n\nWith better skill he even will remould\nThe scattered potsherds of the New and Old;\n    Then you and I will not disdain to buy,\nThough in the mart of Iblis they be sold.\n\n\n\nLIV\n\nSooth I have told the masters of the mart\nOf rusty creeds and Babylonian art\n    Of magic. Now the truth about myself--\nHere is the secret of my wincing heart.\n\n\n\nLV\n\nI muse, but in my musings I recall\nThe days of my iniquity; we're all--\n    An arrow shot across the wilderness,\nSomewhither, in the wilderness must fall.\n\n\n\nLVI\n\nI laugh, but in my laughter-cup I pour\nThe tears of scorn and melancholy sore;\n    I who am shattered by the hand of Doubt,\nLike glass to be remoulded nevermore.\n\n\n\nLVII\n\nI wheedle, too, even like my slave Zeidun,\nWho robs at dawn his brother, and at noon\n    Prostrates himself in prayer--ah, let us pray\nThat Night might blot us and our sins, and soon.\n\n\n\nLVIII\n\nBut in the fatal coils, without intent,\nWe sin; wherefore a future punishment?\n    They say the metal dead a deadly steel\nBecomes with Allah's knowledge and consent.\n\n\n\nLIX\n\nAnd even the repentant sinner's tear\nFalling into Juhannam's very ear,\n    Goes to its heart, extinguishes its fire\nFor ever and forever,--so I hear.\n\n\n\nLX\n\nBetween the white and purple Words of Time\nIn motley garb with Destiny I rhyme:\n    The colored glasses to the water give\nThe colors of a symbolry sublime.\n\n\n\nLXI\n\nHow oft, when young, my brothers I would shun\nIf their religious feelings were not spun\n    Of my own cobweb, which I find was but\nA spider's revelation of the sun.\n\n\n\nLXII\n\nNow, mosques and churches--even a Kaaba Stone,\nKorans and Bibles--even a martyr's bone,--\n    All these and more my heart can tolerate,\nFor my religion's love, and love alone.\n\n\n\nLXIII\n\nTo humankind, O Brother, consecrate\nThy heart, and shun the hundred Sects that prate\n    About the things they little know about--\nLet all receive thy pity, none thy hate.\n\n\n\nLXIV\n\nThe tavern and the temple also shun,\nFor sheikh and libertine in sooth are one;\n    And when the pious knave begins to pule,\nThe knave in purple breaks his vow anon.\n\n\n\nLXV\n\n\"The wine's forbidden,\" say these honest folk,\nBut for themselves the law they will revoke;\n    The snivelling sheikh says he's without a garb,\nWhen in the tap-house he had pawned his cloak.\n\n\n\nLXVI\n\nOr in the house of lust. The priestly name\nAnd priestly turban once were those of Shame--\n    And Shame is preaching in the pulpit now--\nIf pulpits tumble down, I'm not to blame.\n\n\n\nLXVII\n\nFor after she declaims upon the vows\nOf Faith, she pusillanimously bows\n    Before the Sultan's wine-empurpled throne,\nWhile he and all his courtezans carouse.\n\n\n\nLXVIII\n\nCarouse, ye sovereign lords! The wheel will roll\nForever to confound and to console:\n    Who sips to-day the golden cup will drink\nMayhap to-morrow in a wooden bowl--\n\n\n\nLXIX\n\nAnd silent drink. The tumult of our mirth\nIs worse than our mad welcoming of birth:--\n    The thunder hath a grandeur, but the rains,\nWithout the thunder, quench the thirst of Earth.\n\n\n\nLXX\n\nThe Prophets, too, among us come to teach,\nAre one with those who from the pulpit preach;\n    They pray, and slay, and pass away, and yet\nOur ills are as the pebbles on the beach.\n\n\n\nLXXI\n\nAnd though around the temple they should run\nFor seventy times and seven, and in the sun\n    Of mad devotion drool, their prayers are still\nLike their desires of feasting-fancies spun.\n\n\n\nLXXII\n\nOh! let them in the marshes grope, or ride\nTheir jaded Myths along the mountain-side;\n    Come up with me, O Brother, to the heights\nWhere Reason is the prophet and the guide.\n\n\n\nLXXIII\n\n\"What is thy faith and creed,\" they ask of me,\n\"And who art thou? Unseal thy pedigree.\"--\n    I am the child of Time, my tribe, mankind,\nAnd now this world's my caravanseri.\n\n\n\nLXXIV\n\nSwathe thee in wool, my Sufi friend, and go\nThy way; in cotton I the wiser grow;\n    But we ourselves are shreds of earth, and soon\nThe Tailor of the Universe will sew.\n\n\n\nLXXV\n\nAy! suddenly the mystic Hand will seal\nThe saint's devotion and the sinner's weal;\n    They worship Saturn, but I worship One\nBefore whom Saturn and the Heavens kneel.\n\n\n\nLXXVI\n\nAmong the crumbling ruins of the creeds\nThe Scout upon his camel played his reeds\n    And called out to his people,--\"Let us hence!\nThe pasture here is full of noxious weeds.\"\n\n\n\nLXXVII\n\nAmong us falsehood is proclaimed aloud,\nBut truth is whispered to the phantom bowed\n    Of conscience; ay! and Wrong is ever crowned,\nWhile Right and Reason are denied a shroud.\n\n\n\nLXXVIII\n\nAnd why in this dark Kingdom tribute pay?\nWith clamant multitudes why stop to pray?\n    Oh! hear the inner Voice:--\"If thou'lt be right,\nDo what they deem is wrong, and go thy way.\"\n\n\n\nLXXIX\n\nThy way unto the Sun the spaces through\nWhere king Orion's black-eyed huris slew\n    The Mother of Night to guide the Wings that bear\nThe flame divine hid in a drop of dew.\n\n\n\nLXXX\n\nHear ye who in the dust of ages creep,\nAnd in the halls of wicked masters sleep:--\n    Arise! and out of this wan weariness\nWhere Allah's laughter makes the Devil weep.\n\n\n\nLXXXI\n\nArise! for lo! the Laughter and the Weeping\nReveal the Weapon which the Master's keeping\n    Above your heads; Oh! take it up and strike!\nThe lion of tyranny is only sleeping.\n\n\n\nLXXXII\n\nEvil and Virtue? Shadows on the street\nOf Fate and Vanity,--but shadows meet\n    When in the gloaming they are hast'ning forth\nTo drink with Night annihilation sweet.\n\n\n\nLXXXIII\n\nAnd thus the Sun will write and will efface\nThe mystic symbols which the sages trace\n    In vain, for all the worlds of God are stored\nIn his enduring vessels Time and Space.\n\n\n\nLXXXIV\n\nFor all my learning's but a veil, I guess,\nVeiling the phantom of my nothingness;\n    Howbeit, there are those who think me wise,\nAnd those who think me--even these I bless.\n\n\n\nLXXXV\n\nAnd all my years, as vapid as my lay,\nAre bitter morsels of a mystic day,--\n    The day of Fate, who carries in his lap\nDecember snows and snow-white flowers of May.\n\n\n\nLXXXVI\n\nAllah, my sleep is woven through, it seems,\nWith burning threads of night and golden beams;\n    But when my dreams are evil they come true;\nWhen they are not, they are, alas! but dreams.\n\n\n\nLXXXVII\n\nThe subtle ways of Destiny I know;\nIn me she plays her game of \"Give and Go.\"\n    Misfortune I receive in cash, but joy,\nIn drafts on Heaven or on the winds that blow.\n\n\n\nLXXXVIII\n\nI give and go, grim Destiny,--I play\nUpon this checker-board of Night and Day\n    The dark game with thee, but the day will come\nWhen one will turn the Board the other way.\n\n\n\nLXXXIX\n\nIf my house-swallow, laboring with zest,\nFelt like myself the burden of unrest,\n    Unlightened by inscrutable designs,\nShe would not build her young that cozy nest.\n\n\n\nXC\n\nThy life with guiltless life-blood do not stain--\nHunt not the children of the woods; in vain\n    Thou'lt try one day to wash thy bloody hand:\nNor hunter here nor hunted long remain.\n\n\n\nXCI\n\nOh! cast my dust away from thee, and doff\nThy cloak of sycophancy and like stuff:\n    I'm but a shadow on the sandy waste,--\nEnough of thy duplicity, enough!\n\n\n\nXCII\n\nBehold! the Veil that hid thy soul is torn\nAnd all thy secrets on the winds are borne:\n    The hand of Sin has written on thy face\n\"Awake, for these untimely furrows warn!\"\n\n\n\nXCIII\n\nA prince of souls, 'tis sung in ancient lay,\nOne morning sought a vesture of the clay;\n    He came into the Pottery, the fool--\nThe lucky fool was warned to stay away.\n\n\n\nXCIV\n\nBut I was not. Oh! that the Fates decree\nThat I now cast aside this clay of me;\n    My soul and body wedded for a while\nAre sick and would that separation be.\n\n\n\nXCV\n\n\"Thou shalt not kill!\"--Thy words, O God, we heed,\nThough thy two Soul-devouring Angels feed\n    Thy Promise of another life on this,--\nTo have spared us both, it were a boon indeed.\n\n\n\nXCVI\n\nOh! that some one would but return to tell\nIf old Nubakht is burning now in hell,\n    Or if the workers for the Prophet's prize\nAre laughing at his Paradisal sell.\n\n\n\nXCVII\n\nOnce I have tried to string a few Pearl-seeds\nUpon my Rosary of wooden beads;\n    But I have searched, and I have searched in vain\nFor pearls in all the caverns of the creeds\n\n\n\nXCVIII\n\nAnd in the palaces of wealth I found\nSome beads of wisdom scattered on the ground,\n    Around the throne of Power, beneath the feet\nOf fair-faced slaves with flowers of folly crowned.\n\n\n\nXCIX\n\nThy wealth can shed no tears around thy bier,\nNor can it wash thy hands of shame and fear;\n    Ere thou departest with it freely part,--\nLet others plead for thee and God will hear.\n\n\n\nC\n\nFor me thy silks and feathers have no charm\nThe pillow I like best is my right arm;\n    The comforts of this passing show I spurn,\nFor Poverty can do the soul no harm.\n\n\n\nCI\n\nThe guiding hand of Allah I can see\nUpon my staff: of what use then is he\n    Who'd be the blind man's guide? Thou silent oak,\nNo son of Eve shall walk with me and thee.\n\n\n\nCII\n\nMy life's the road on which I blindly speed:\nMy goal's the grave on which I plant a reed\n    To shape my Hope, but soon the Hand unseen\nWill strike, and lo! I'm but a sapless weed.\n\n\n\nCIII\n\nO Rabbi, curse us not if we have been\nNursed in the shadow of the Gate of Sin\n    Built by thy hand--yea, ev'n thine angels blink\nWhen we are coming out and going in.\n\n\n\nCIV\n\nAnd like the dead of Ind I do not fear\nTo go to thee in flames; the most austere\n    Angel of fire a softer tooth and tongue\nHath he than dreadful Munker and Nakir.\n\n\n\nCV\n\nNow, at this end of Adam's line I stand\nHolding my father's life-curse in my hand,\n    Doing no one the wrong that he did me:--\nAh, would that he were barren as the sand!\n\n\n\nCVI\n\nAy, thus thy children, though they sovereigns be,\nWhen truth upon them dawns, will turn on thee,\n    Who cast them into life's dark labyrinth\nWhere even old Izrail can not see.\n\n\n\nCVII\n\nAnd in the labyrinth both son and sire\nAwhile will fan and fuel hatred's fire;\n    Sparks of the log of evil are all men\nAllwhere--extinguished be the race entire!\n\n\n\nCVIII\n\nIf miracles were wrought in ancient years,\nWhy not to-day, O Heaven-cradled seers?\n    The highway's strewn with dead, the lepers weep,\nIf ye but knew,--if ye but saw their tears!\n\n\n\nCIX\n\nFan thou a lisping fire and it will leap\nIn flames, but dost thou fan an ashy heap?\n    They would respond, indeed, whom thou dost call,\nWere they not dead, alas! or dead asleep.\n\n\n\nCX\n\nThe way of vice is open as the sky,\nThe way of virtue's like the needle's eye;\n    But whether here or there, the eager Soul\nHas only two Companions--Whence and Why.\n\n\n\nCXI\n\nWhence come, O firmament, thy myriad lights?\nWhence comes thy sap, O vineyard of the heights?\n    Whence comes the perfume of the rose, and whence\nThe spirit-larva which the body blights?\n\n\n\nCXII\n\nWhence does the nettle get its bitter sting?\nWhence do the honey bees their honey bring?\n    Whence our Companions, too--our Whence and Why?\nO Soul, I do not know a single thing!\n\n\n\nCXIII\n\nHow many like us in the ages past\nHave blindly soared, though like a pebble cast,\n    Seeking the veil of mystery to tear,\nBut fell accurst beneath the burning blast?\n\n\n\nCXIV\n\nWhy try to con the book of earth and sky,\nWhy seek the truth which neither you nor I\n    Can grasp? But Death methinks the secret keeps,\nAnd will impart it to us by and by.\n\n\n\nCXV\n\nThe Sultan, too, relinquishing his throne\nMust wayfare through the darkening dust alone\n    Where neither crown nor kingdom be, and he,\nPart of the Secret, here and there is blown.\n\n\n\nCXVI\n\nTo clay the mighty Sultan must return\nAnd, chancing, help a praying slave to burn\n    His midnight oil before the face of Him,\nWho of the Sultan makes an incense urn.\n\n\n\nCXVII\n\nTurned to a cup, who once the sword of state\nHeld o'er the head of slave and potentate,\n    Is now held in the tippler's trembling hand,\nOr smashed upon the tavern-floor of Fate.\n\n\n\nCXVIII\n\nFor this I say, Be watchful of the Cage\nOf chance; it opes alike to fool and sage;\n    Spy on the moment, for to-morrow'll be,\nLike yesterday, an obliterated page.\n\n\n\nCXIX\n\nYea, kiss the rosy cheeks of new-born Day,\nAnd hail eternity in every ray\n    Forming a halo round its infant head,\nIllumining thy labyrinthine way.\n\n\n\nCXX\n\nBut I, the thrice-imprisoned, try to troll\nStrains of the song of night, which fill with dole\n    My blindness, my confinement, and my flesh--\nThe sordid habitation of my soul.\n\n\n\nCXXI\n\nHowbeit, my inner vision heir shall be\nTo the increasing flames of mystery\n    Which may illumine yet my prisons all,\nAnd crown the ever living hope of me.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOTES TO THE QUATRAINS\n\n\nI\n\nTo open a poem with a few amatory lines, is a literary tradition among\nArab poets. But Abu'l-Ala, having had no occasion to evince such\ntender emotions, whether real or merely academic, succeeded, as in\neverything else he did, in deviating from the trodden path. I find,\nhowever, in his minor Diwan, Suct uz-Zand, a slight manifestation\nof his youthful ardor, of which this and the succeeding quatrains,\ndescriptive of the charms of Night, are fairly representative.\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\"Ahmad,\" Mohammed the Prophet.\n\n\n\nIV\n\n\"And hear the others who with cymbals try,\" etc., meaning the\nChristians; in the preceding quatrain he referred to the Mohammedans.\n\n\n\nVII\n\nMilton, in Il Penseroso, also speaks of night as \"the starred Ethiop\nqueen\"; and Shakespeare, in Romeo and Juliet, has these lines:\n\n\n    \"Her beauty hangs upon the cheek of night\n    As a rich jewel in an Ethiop ear.\"\n\n\nThe source of inspiration is the same to all world-poets, who only\ndiffer sometimes in the jars they bring to the source.\n\n\n\nXIII\n\nThe purple, white, and gray garments, symbolizing Man's dreams of\npower, of love, and of bliss.\n\n\n\nXIV\n\nThe same idea is expressed by Omar Khayyam. Here are the first three\nlines of the 122nd quatrain of Heron-Allen's literal translation:\n\n\n    \"To him who understands the mysteries of the world\n    The joy and sorrow of the world is all the same,\n    Since the good and the bad of the world all come to an end.\"\n\n\n\"Howdaj,\" a sort of palanquin borne by camels; hence, a wedding or\na triumphal procession.\n\n\n\nXVII\n\n\"Thamud\" and \"'Ad,\" two of the primitive tribes which figure\nprominently in the legendary history of Arabia. They flouted and stoned\nthe prophets that were sent to them, and are constantly held up in the\nKoran as terrible examples of the pride that goeth before destruction.\n\n\"Hashem's fearless lad,\" Mohammed the Prophet.\n\n\n\nXVIII\n\nI quote again from Omar, Fitzgerald's translation:\n\n\n    \"And this reviving Herb, whose Tender Green\n    Fledges the River-Lip, on which we lean--\n        Ah, lean upon it lightly! for who knows\n    From what once lovely Lip it springs unseen.\"\n\n\nIn justice to both the Persian and the Arab poet, however, I give\nthe 43d quatrain of Heron-Allen's, which I think contains two lines\nof that of Fitzgerald, together with Abu'l-Ala's own poetic-fancy.\n\n    \"Everywhere that there has been a rose or tulip bed\n    There has been spilled the crimson blood of a king;\n    Every violet shoot that grows from the earth\n    Is a mole that was once upon the cheek of beauty.\"\n\n\n\nXX\n\n\"Zakkum,\" a tree which, in Mohammedan mythology, is said to have its\nroots in hell, and from which are fed the dwellers of hell-fire. In\none of the Chapters of the Koran, The Saffat, I find this upon it:\n\"And is that a pure bounty, or the Zakkum tree? It is a tree which\ngroweth in hell; its fruits are like unto the heads of the devils,\nwho eat from it, and from it fill their stomachs.\"\n\nZakkum is also one of the bitter-fruited trees of Arabia. And the\npeople there speak of \"a mouthful of zakkum\" when they want to describe\nan unhappy experience. It is also the name of one of the plants of\nthe desert, whose flower is like the jasmine; and of one of the trees\nof Jericho, whose fruit is like the date, but somewhat bitter.\n\n\n\nXXIII\n\n\"Jannat,\" Paradise. \"Juhannam,\" Hell.\n\n\n\nXXIX\n\nAnd Tennyson also says:\n\n\n    \"There is more truth in honest doubt,\n    Believe me, than in all the creeds.\"\n\n\n\nXXXI\n\n\"Mutakallem,\" disputant. The mutakallemin are the logicians and\ntheologians of Islam.\n\n\n\nXXXIII\n\nHadil is a poetic term for dove. And in Arabic mythology it is the\nname of a particular dove, which died of thirst in the days of Noah,\nand is bemoaned until this day.\n\n\"Ababil,\" a flock of birds, who scourged with flint-stones which\nthey carried in their beaks, one of the ancient Arab tribes, noted\nfor its idolatry and evil practices.\n\n\n\nXXXVIII, XCIII and XCIV\n\nI quote again from Omar, Fitzgerald's version, quatrain 44:\n\n\n    \"Why, if the Soul can fling the dust aside,\n    And naked on the air of Heaven ride,\n        Were't not a shame--were't not a shame for him\n    In this clay carcass crippled to abide?\"\n\n\nAnd from Heron-Allen's, quatrain 145:\n\n\n    \"O Soul, if thou canst purify thyself from the dust of the clay,\n    Thou, naked spirit, canst soar in the heav'ns,\n    The Empyrian is thy sphere--let it be thy shame\n    That thou comest and art a dweller within the confines of earth.\"\n\n\n\nXLVIII\n\n\"The walking dust was once a thing of stone,\" is my rendering of\nthe line,\n\n\n    \"And he concerning whom the world is puzzled\n    Is an animal evolved of inorganic matter.\"\n\n\nThis line of Abu'l-Ala is much quoted by his enthusiastic admirers\nof the present day to prove that he anticipated Darwin's theory of\nevolution. And it is remarkable how the fancy of the poet sometimes\ncoincides with the logical conclusions of the scientist.\n\n\n\nXLIX\n\n\"Iblis,\" the devil.\n\n\n\nL\n\n\"Rabbi,\" my lord God.\n\n\n\nLVI\n\nThis quatrain is quoted by many of the Biographers of Abu'l-Ala to\nprove that he is a materialist. Which argument is easily refuted,\nhowever, with others quatrains taken at random from the Luzumiyat.\n\n\n\nLVII, LVIII and LIX\n\nOmar was also a confessed cynical-hypocrite. Thus runs the first line\nof the 114th quatrain of Heron-Allen's:\n\n\n    \"The world being fleeting I practise naught but artifice.\"\n\n\nAnd he also chafes in the chains of his sins. Following is the 23d\nquatrain of the same translation:\n\n\n    \"Khayyam, why mourn for thy sins?\n    From grieving thus what advantage more or less dost thou gain?\n    Mercy was never for him who sins not,\n    Mercy is granted for sins; why then grieve?\"\n\n\nAbu'l-Ala, in a quatrain which I did not translate, goes even farther\nin his questioning perplexity. \"Why do good since thou art to be\nforgiven for thy sins?\" he asks.\n\n\n\nLXII\n\n\"Kaaba Stone,\" the sacred black stone in the Kaaba at Meccah.\n\n\n\nLXXVII\n\nThe American poet, Lowell, in \"The Crisis,\" utters the same cry:\n\n\n    \"Truth forever on the scaffold,\n    Wrong forever on the throne.\"\n\n\n\nXC\n\n\n    \"And the poor beetle that we tread upon\n    In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great\n    As when a giant dies.\"\n\n                    --Shakespeare: Measure for Measure.\n\n\n\"To let go a flea is a more virtuous act than to give a dirham to\na beggar.\"--Abu'l-Ala.\n\n\n\nXCIII and XCIV\n\nOmar too, in the 157th quatrain of Heron-Allen's--\n\n\n    \"Had I charge of the matter I would not have come,\n    And likewise could I control my going, where could I go?\"\n\n\n\nXCV\n\n\"Thy two soul-devouring angels,\" the angels of death and resurrection.\n\n\n\nXCVI\n\n\"Nubakht,\" one of the opponents of the Prophet Mohammed.\n\n\n\nCIII\n\n\"Rabbi,\" my lord God.\n\n\n\nCIV\n\n\"And like the dead of Ind,\" referring to the practice of the Hindus\nwho burn their dead.\n\n\"Munker\" and \"Nakir,\" the two angels who on the Day of Judgment open\nthe graves of the dead and cross-examine them--the process is said to\nbe very cruel--as to their faith. Whosoever is found wanting in this\nis pushed back into the grave and thence thrown into Juhannam. No\nwonder Abu'l-Ala prefers cremation.\n\n\n\nCV\n\nHe wrote his own epitaph, which is:\n\n\n    \"This wrong to me was by my father done,\n        But never by me to any one.\"\n\n\n\nCVI\n\n\"Izrail,\" the angel of death.\n\n\n\nCXV, CXVI and CXVII\n\nThese will suggest to the reader Shakespeare's lines:\n\n\n    \"Imperial Caesar, dead and turned to clay,\n    Might stop a hole to keep the wind away;\n    O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe,\n    Should stop a wall t'expel the winter's flaw.\"\n\n\n\nCXVIII\n\nCompare this with Omar's:\n\n\n    \"Thou hast no power over the morrow,\n    And anxiety about the morrow is useless to thee:\n        Waste not thou the moment, if thy heart is not mad,\n    For the value of the remainder of thy life is not certain.\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPRESS AND PERSONAL NOTICES\n\n\nMr. Rihani's book is soundly workmanlike, with adequate scholarship,\nand is often very felicitous. He has done a real service to modern\nunderstanding of an important though slightly known literature in\npresenting these selections with sufficient annotation.--New York\nEvening Sun.\n\n\nThe Luzumiyat. By Abu'l-Ala. Born in Syria, in the tenth century A. D.,\nthis poet, scholar, teacher, philosopher and pessimist became known as\n\"the Voltaire of the East,\" and may well be read for the beauty of\nhis work, even if there is little agreement with his general ideas\nof life.--The Christian Century.\n\n\nAbu'l-Ala is a true poet, with a philosophy much nobler than Omar's,\nand Mr. Rihani's translation has rare poetic qualities.--Edwin Markham.\n\n\n            If I had but a garden for a bower\n            Wherein the roses of Damascus flower,\n            How happy, with the Luzumiyat in hand,\n            To pass the afternoon and sunset hour!\n\n                                      Clinton Scollard.\n\n\n\"The Luzumiyat\" of Abu'l-Ala, as rendered into English by Mr. Ameen\nRihani, is more than a mere translation--it is excellent poetry. Aside\nfrom its interest as a literary curiosity, it possesses intrinsic value\nas literature of a high quality. The historical matter contained in\nthe preface of the book, as well as the notes following the preface,\nwill appeal to the scholar who makes a study of the best expressions\nof Oriental thought.--James B. Kenyon.\n\n\nThe first English rendition of the Luzumiyat of Abu'l-Ala, comes from\nAmeen Rihani, the author of the Book of Khaled, who has selected the\nquatrains from three volumes of the works of the Syrian poet. For\nthose who cling to a childish haze concerning Assyrians and Syrians,\nwe would add that while the Assyrian comes down like a wolf on the\nfold, the Syrian, at least this particular one, has a tread like Omar\nKhayyam. Therein lies the chief interest of the Luzumiyat, unfair\nas it may be, in view of the fact that Abu'l-Ala died at about the\ntime Omar was born. So marked and far-reaching is the resemblance,\nthat we might almost bring ourselves to the belief that in Omar\nKhayyam was recreated the soul of Abu'l-Ala, with subtle changes,\nnotable among them the casting off of the tenets of prohibition,\nand a substitution of fatalism for stoicism.--The Sun (New York).\n\n\nWhat Fitzgerald did for the Man of Neishapur in his wonderful version\nof the Rubaiyat, Mr. Rihani has done, in scarcely inferior measure,\nfor his own remote ancestor Abu'l-Ala. Mr. Rihani, who is a poet and\nessayist in English as well as in Arabic, has made a permanent addition\nto Literature. The Luzumiyat can not be displaced.--Michael Monahan.\n\n\nMr. Rihani has rendered valuable service to Literature in making\nthe career of \"The Lucretius of Islam,\" as he happily calls him,\nknown to the general reader in the English-speaking world.... The\nsimilarity of the Luzumiyat to Omar Khayyam under certain aspects,\nshould win for Rihani's brilliant rendering a generous measure of\nrecognition. As it is, the rare merits of the book, the critical power\nof the preface, the skill and sincere feeling exhibited in the verse,\nand the wide knowledge of English Literature shown in the notes,\nmake it, to my mind, a little masterpiece.--Percy White.\n\n\nThe similarity in some parts of the Luzumiyat to Omar Khayyam is\nstriking. But Abu'l-Ala, to my mind, is a greater poet, and he is\nat times so remarkably modern. I am glad to make his acquaintance\nthrough your excellent translation.--R. B. Cunninghame Graham.\n\n\nThere is a compelling power in his attack on hypocrisy and quackery,\nin his recognition of the supremacy of reason and the human soul. Those\nwho still fondly turn to the \"Rubaiyat\" for enjoyment will surely\nfind stimulus, too, and pleasure in these ruthless rhymes.--Asia.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOTES\n\n\n[1] My learned friend, Count E. de Mulinen, called my attention to\nthe work of Von Kremer on Abu'l-Ala. And I have seen copies of a\ncertain German Asiatic Review in which were published translations,\nmade by that eminent Orientalist, of many poems from the Luzumiyat. He\nspeaks of Abu'l-Ala as one of the greatest moralists of all times,\nwhose profound genius anticipated much that is commonly attributed\nto the so-called modern spirit of enlightenment.\n\nProfessor D. S. Margoliouth has also translated into English the\nLetters of Abu'l-Ala, which were published with the Arabic Text at the\nClarendon Press, Oxford, 1898. Also Professor Raynold A. Nicholson,\nin his work, \"A Literary History of the Arabs,\" discusses the poet at\nlength and renders into English some poems from the Luzumiyat. A work\nwas published by Charles Carrington, Paris, 1904, under the title,\n\"Un Pr\u00e9curseur d'Omar Khayyam, Le Po\u00e9te Aveugle: Extraits de Po\u00e9mes\net de Lettres d'Abu'l-Ala al-Ma'arri.\" And another, \"The Diwan of\nAbu'l-Ala,\" done into English by Henry Baerlein, who must have helped\nhimself freely to the Quatrains of Von Kremer.\n\n[2] For a picturesque description of the squalidness and sordidness of\nMa'arrah and its people, see Letter XX of \"The Letters of Abu'l-Ala,\"\nOxford Edition.\n\n[3] When he visited Baghdad he was about thirty-seven years of age. And\nwhen he went to attend a lecture there by one of the leading scholars,\nhe was called by the lecturer, istabl, which is Syrian slang for blind.\n\n[4] \"He was four years of age when he had the attack of small-pox. The\nsight of his left eye was entirely lost and the eyeball of his right\nhad turned white. Al-Hafiz us-Silafi relates: 'Abu Muhammad Abdallah\ntold me that he visited him (Abu'l-Ala) once with his uncle and\nfound him sitting on an old hair matting. He was very old, and the\ndisease that attacked him in his boyhood had left its deep traces\non his emaciated face. He bade me come near him and blessed me as\nhe placed his hand on my head. I was a boy then, and I can picture\nhim before me now. I looked into his eyes and remarked how the one\nwas horribly protruding, and the other, buried in its socket, could\nbarely be seen.'\"--Ibn Khillikan.\n\n[5] \"How long he retained any sort of vision is not certain. His\nfrequent references in his writings to stars, flowers, and the forms of\nthe Arabic letters imply that he could see a little at least some years\nafter this calamity.\"--D. S. Margoliouth: The Letters of Abu'l-Ala.\n\n\"He used to play chess and nard.\"--Safadi.\n\n[6] For an interesting account of Literary Society in Baghdad see\nRenan's \"Islam and Science\"; also the Biography to the Letters of\nAbu'l-Ala. Prof. Margoliouth, though not unfair in his judgment of the\npoet, is unnecessarily captious at times. He would seem partial to the\nsuffrage of orthodox Mohammedans with regard to Abu'l-Ala's unorthodox\nreligious views. But they have a reason, these ulama, for endeavoring\nto keep a genius like Abu'l-Ala within the pale of belief. Which\nreason, let us hope, has no claim on Prof. Margoliouth. And in his\nattempt to depreciate Abu'l-Ala as a disinterested and independent\nscholar and poet, he does not escape the inconsistency which often\nfollows in the wake of cavil. Read this, for instance:\n\n\n    \"Like many of those who have failed to secure material prosperity,\n    he found comfort in a system which flatters the vanity of those\n    who have not succeeded by teaching that success is not worth\n    attaining.\"\n\n\nAnd this, not on the same page perhaps, but close to it:\n\n\n    \"For though other roads towards obtaining the means of supporting\n    himself at Baghdad have been open to him, that which he refused\n    to follow (the profession of an encomiast, i. e. a sycophant,\n    a toady) was the most certain.\"\n\n\n[7] Biography of Abu'l-Ala by Adh-Dhahabi.\n\n[8] \"The Letters, which abound in quotations, enable us to\ngauge the power of his memory better than these wonder-loving\nnarrators.\"--D. S. Margoliouth.\n\n[9] In one of his poems he speaks of three prisons, his body being\nthe third. Here is Professor Nicholson's translation:\n\n\n    Methink I am thrice-imprisoned--ask not me\n    Of news that need no telling--\n    By loss of sight, confinement in my house,\n    And this vile body for my spirit's dwelling.\n\n\n[10] Also his Commentary on the works of the poet Al-Mutanabbi.\n\n[11] Adh-Dhahabi gives the titles of forty-eight of his works, to\nwhich Safadi adds fourteen. A literary baggage of considerable bulk,\nhad not most of it perished when the Crusaders took Ma'arrah in\n1098. Now, the Luzumiyat, the Letters, Suct uz-Zand and the Epistle\nof Forgiveness can be obtained in printed form.\n\n[12] \"What he says of Al-Maghribi in the First Letter became literally\ntrue of himself: 'As Sinai derives its fame from Moses and the Stone\nfrom Abraham, so Ma'arrah is from this time (after his return from\nBaghdad) known by him.'\"--D. S. Margoliouth.\n\n[13] Even before he visited Baghdad he had a pension of thirty dinars\n(about $100), half of which he paid to his servant, and the other half\nwas sufficient to secure for him the necessaries of life. \"He lived\non lentils and figs,\" says Adh-Dhahabi; \"he slept on a felt mattress;\nhe wore nothing but cotton garments; and his dwelling was furnished\nwith a straw matting.\"\n\n[14] We have the following from Adh-Dhahabi:\n\n\"One of these critics came one day to Abu'l-Ala and relating the\nconversation himself said, 'What is it that is quoted and said about\nyou?' I asked.\n\n'It is false; they are jealous of me,' he replied.\n\n'And what have you to incite their jealousy? You have left for them\nboth this world and the other.'\n\n'And the other?' murmured the poet, questioning, ruminating. 'And\nthe other, too?'\"\n\n[15] \"His poems, generally known as the Luzumiyat, arrest attention by\ntheir boldness and originality as well as by the sombre and earnest\ntone which pervades them.\"--Raynold A. Nicholson: A Literary History\nof the Arabs.\n\n[16] The Governor of Halab, Salih ibn Mirdas, passed once by Ma'arrah,\nwhen thirty of its distinguished citizens were imprisoned on account\nof a riot in the town the previous year. Abu'l-Ala being asked to\nintercede for them, was led to Salih, who received him most politely\nand asked him what he desired. The poet, in eloquent but unflattering\nspeech, asked Salih 'to take and give forgiveness.' And the Governor,\nnot displeased, replied: 'I grant it you.' Whereupon the prisoners\nwere released.\n\n[17] \"His poems leave no aspect of the age (in which he lived)\nuntouched, and present a vivid picture of degeneracy and corruption,\nin which tyrannous rulers, venal judges, hypocritical and unscrupulous\ntheologians, swindling astrologers, roving swarms of dervishes and\ngodless Carmathians, occupy a prominent place.\"--Raynold A. Nicholson:\nA Literary History of the Arabs.\n\n[18] \"The Mohammedan critics who thought he let his opinions be guided\nby his pen probably came near the truth. And any man who writes in such\nfetters as the meter (he means the rhyme-ending; for Abu'l-Ala made\nuse of every known meter of Arabic prosody) of the Luzumiyat imposes,\ncan exercise but slight control over his thoughts.\"--D. S. Margoliouth:\nLetters of Abu'l-Ala.\n\n[19] This work, of which Professor Nicholson says there are but\ntwo copies extant, one in Constantinople and the other in his own\nCollection, was published in Cairo, in 1907, edited by Sheikh Ibrahim\nul-Yazeji.\n\n[20] \"To let go a flea is a more virtuous act than to give a dirham\nto a beggar.\"--Abu'l-Ala.\n\n[21] The Orthodox, i. e. the Mohammedans.\n\n[22] I do not find these verses in the printed copies of either the\nLuzumiyat or Suct uz-Zand. But they are quoted, from some Ms. copy\nI suppose, by the historian Abu'l-Fida.\n\n[23] Omar wrote poetry in Arabic too. My learned friend, Isa Iskandar\nMaluf of Zehleh, Mt. Lebanon, showed me some quatrains of \"Omar the\nTent-maker and Astronomer,\" in an old Arabic Ms. which bear a striking\nresemblance to some of Abu'l-Ala's both in thought and style.","title":"The Luzumiyat of Abu'l-Ala: Selected from his Luzum ma la Yalzam and Suct us-Zand","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":11359}