stone.
Which is it, of the favours of your Lord, that ye deny, 22
and bring forth from thence ornaments which ye wear. 23
Further, comparing the houris of Paradise with the jacynth (or ruby) and
the coral-stone, He has said:
(In beauty), like the Jacynth and the coral-stone. 24
Were pearls and stones to be employed only for adornment, they would
also have been like gold and silver and unable to fulfil any want. Like
the noble metals, they can serve as currencies with regard to commodities. But pearls and stones also serve as curative agents in diseases, as
long as their lustre lasts and they appear pleasing to the eye. But compared to the jewels of the soul, they have no value. Abu Bakr Khwarizmi
praised a person saying:
He is a pearl amongst the pearls of nobility. It is not the pearl that
comes out of the oyster-shell. It is a cornelian out of the cornelians
of the nobles, not the cornelian taken from among the stones.
Pause
An object that really affords pleasure is that which, despite constant
use, still keeps its user avid for obtaining more of it. Such are the
pleasures dictated by the senses that, whenever they come across a new
object, the senses impinge upon it with delight. But (a constant habituation to pleasure) is likely to render the animating spirit dull and, once
the senses become disturbed, the animating spirit, being worn out,
cannot derive pleasure from (these objects). In dreams, the power of
imagination remains confined to the domain of thoughts. Pleasure lies
not in voices but in the significance behind them, since once the voices
are devoid of any significance, they are mere voices and cadences which
are likely to oppress the heart. And, therefore, the animating spirit seeks
peace and quiet.
The fact is that all pleasures in the end bring in their train anguish
and pain, and produce disease. Their continued practice is oppressive
and excessively harmful. Delicious foods are a case in point. Even the
best of foods, through constant eating, lose their taste so much that, in
the end, they are liable to act as an emetic. Instead of being enjoyable
they become repugnant to the body. I am stating this in order to assure
the reader that worldly pleasures are harmful and their apparent merits
are actually their demerits.
Take the case of copulation. See what the concupiscent desire from
it. What they desire is that they should couple with the partners and
enter wholesale into their bodies, although they have not the power to
do so. And, if they were not incapable of attaining this state and were
not obliged to turn back, their movements would have joined breast to
