Page:A Moslem seeker after God - showing Islam at its best in the life and teaching of al-Ghazali, mystic and theologian of the eleventh century (IA moslemseekeraft00zwem).pdf/100



myrtle twigs, and bouquets of roses, broached wine vats and the sound of the flute and the lute. We approached them and they advanced to receive us. Then we clave to a table whose vessels were rilled, whose gardens were in flower, and whose dishes were arranged in rows with viands of various hues; opposite a dish of something intensely black was something exceedingly white, and against some thing very red was arranged something. very yel low." And in another place: " I was in Bagdad in a famine year, and so I approached a company, united like the Pleiades, in order to ask something of them. Now there was among them a youth with a lisp in his tongue and a space between his front teeth. He asked: What is thy affair? I replied: Two conditions in which a man pros pers not: that of a beggar harassed by hunger, and that of an exile to whom return is impossible. The boy then said: Which of the two breaches dost thou wish stopped first? I answered: Hunger, for it has become extreme with me. He said: What sayest thou to a white cake on a clean table, picked herbs with very sour vinegar, fine date wine with pungent mustard, roast meat ranged on a skewer with a little salt, placed now before thee by one who will not put thee off with a promise nor torture thee with delay, and who will afterwards follow it up with golden goblets of the juice of grape? Is that preferable to thee, or a large company, full cups, variety of dessert, spread