Mansur* was wise, but wiser they
who smote him with the hurled stones;
And, though his blood a witness bore,
no wisdom-might could mend his bones.

* A famous Mystic stoned for blasphemy.

"Eat, drink, and sport; the rest of life's
not worth a fillip," quoth the King;
Methinks the saying saith too much:
the swine would say the selfsame thing!

Two-footed beasts that browse through life,
by Death to serve as soil design'd,
Bow prone to Earth whereof they be,
and there the proper pleasures find:

But you of finer, nobler, stuff,
ye, whom to Higher leads the High,
What binds your hearts in common bond
with creatures of the stall and sty?

"In certain hope of Life-to-come
I journey through this shifting scene"
The Zahid* snarls and saunters down
his Vale of Tears with confi'dent mien.

* The "Philister" of "respectable" belief.

Wiser than Amran's Son* art thou,