Hâjî Abdû has been known to me for more years than I care to record. A native, it is believed, of Dârabghird in the Yezd Province, he always preferred to style himself El-Hichmakani, a facetious "lackab" or surname, meaning "Of No-hall, Nowhere." He had travelled far and wide with his eyes open; as appears by his "couplets."
The Pilgrim holds with St. Augustine Absolute Evil is impossible because it is always rising up into good. He considers the theory of a beneficent or maleficent deity a purely sentimental fancy, contradicted by human reason and the aspect of the world.
With Hâjî Abdû the soul is not material, for that would be a contradiction of terms. He regards it, with many moderns, as a state of things, not a thing; a convenient word denoting the sense of personality, of individual identity.
Is not man born with a love of change — an Englishman to be discontented — an Anglo-Indian to grumble?
Travellers like poets are mostly an angry race.
How melancholy a thing is success. Whilst failure inspirits a man, attainment reads the sad prosy lesson that all our glories "Are shadows, not substantial things." Truly said the sayer, "disappointment is the salt of life" a salutary bitter which strengthens the mind for fresh exertion, and gives a double value to the prize.
Of the gladest moments in human life, methinks is the departure upon a distant journey to unknown lands. Shaking off with one mighty effort the fetters of habit, the leaden weight of Routine, the cloak of many Cares and the Slavery of Home, man feels once more happy. The blood flows with the fast circulation of childhood....afresh dawns the morn of life...
Support a compatriot against a native, however the former may blunder or plunder.
They walked the water's vasty breadth of blue,parting the restless billows on their way.
Ah! where shall weary man take sanctuary,that launch their thunders at us earthen worms?
The dearest ambition of a slave is not liberty but to have a slave of his own.
The more I study religions the more I am convinced that man never worshipped anything but himself.
The England of our day would fain bring up both sexes and keep all ages in profound ignorance of sexual and intersexual relations; and the consequences of that imbecility are particularly cruel and afflicting. … Shall we ever understand that ignorance is not innocence?
I have struggled for forty-seven years, distinguishing myself honourably in every way that I possibly could. I never had a compliment, nor a "thank you," nor a single farthing. I translate a doubtful book in my old age, and I immediately make sixteen thousand guineas. Now that I know the tastes of England, we need never be without money.
Conquer thyself, till thou hast done this, thou art but a slave; for it is almost as well to be subjected to another's appetite as to thine own.
Starting in a hollowed log of wood — some thousand miles up a river, with an infinitesimal prospect of returning! I ask myself 'Why?' and the only echo is 'damned fool!... the Devil drives'.
Friends of my youth, a last adieu! haply some day we meet again; Yet ne'er the self-same men shall meet; the years shall make us other men.
Hardly we find the path of love, to sink the self, forget the "I," When sad suspicion grips the heart, when Man, the Man begins to die:
How Thought is imp'otent to divine the secret which the gods defend, Weaving th' unpattern'd dark design, so dark we doubt it owns a plan.
Cease, Man, to mourn, to weep, to wail; enjoy thy shining hour of sun; We dance along Death's icy brink, but is the dance less full of fun?
There is no God, no man-made God; a bigger, stronger, crueller man; Black phantom of our baby-fears, ere Thought, the life of Life, began.
Grant an Idea, Primal Cause, the Causing Cause, why crave for more? But leave it vague as airy space, dark in its darkness mystical.
Your childish fears would seek a Sire, by the non-human God defined, That begs a boon already giv'en, or craves a change of law to see?
Man worships self: his God is Man; the struggling of the mortal mind To form its model as 'twould be, the perfect of itself to find.
What call ye them or Goods or Ills, ill-goods, good-ills, a loss, a gain, When realms arise and falls a roof; a world is won, a man is slain?
All Faith is false, all Faith is true: Truth is the shattered mirror strown In myriad bits; while each believes his little bit the whole to own.
What is the Truth? was askt of yore. Reply all object Truth is oneAs twain of halves aye makes a whole; the moral Truth for all is none.
As palace mirror'd in the stream, as vapour mingled with the skies,So weaves the brain of mortal man the tangled web of Truth and Lies.
What see we here? Forms, nothing more! Forms fill the brightest, strongest eye,We know not substance; 'mid the shades shadows ourselves we live and die.
"Faith mountains move" I hear: I see the practice of the world unheedAnd will remain till wiser man the day-dreams of his youth disdain.
With God's foreknowledge man's free will! what monster-growth of human brain,What powers of light shall ever pierce this puzzle dense with words inane?
"Be ye Good Boys, go seek for Heav'en, come pay the priest that holds the key;"So spake, and speaks, and aye shall speak the last to enter Heaven, — he.
Yes Truth may be, but 'tis not Here; mankind must seek and find it There,Indeed he knows not how to know who knows not also how to 'unknow.
"Th' immortal mind of mortal man!" we hear yon loud-lunged Zealot cry;In sickness sick, in sleep asleep, and dead when Death lets drop the scene.
"Tush!" quoth the Zahid, "well we ken the teaching of the school abhorr'dWhy waste on this your hate and fear, why waste on that your love and awe?
Is not the highest honour his who from the worst hath drawn the best;Cease, then, your own Almighty Power to bind, to bound, to understand.
"Reason and Instinct!" How we love to play with words that please our pride;From Instinct diff'ering in degree as golden mine from leaden vein.
Reason is Life's sole arbiter, the magic Laby'rinth's single clue:Worlds lie above, beyond its ken; what crosses it can ne'er be true.
"Fools rush where Angels fear to tread!" Angels and Fools have equal claimTo do what Nature bids them do, sans hope of praise, sans fear of blame!
There is no Heav'en, there is no Hell; these be the dreams of baby minds,In Life to find thy hell and heav'en as thou abuse or use it well.
"Who drinks one bowl hath scant delight; to poorest passion he was born;Who scales the brow of frowning Alp must face full many a slip and fall.
Do what thy manhood bids thee do, from none but self expect applause; A breath, a wind, a sound, a voice, a tinkling of the camel-bell.
From self-approval seek applause: What ken not men thou kennest, thou! Thy Thought to thee an Empire be; break every prison'ing lock and bar.
Haply the Law that rules the world allows to man the widest range; Where change shall ne'er surcharge the thought; nor hope defer'd shall hurt the heart.