[Footnote a: Hughes, _Dict. of Islam_, p. 618 _b_.]

And of another celebrated Sufi Sheykh (Ibnu'l Far'id) his son writes
as follows: 'When moved to ecstasy by listening [to devotional
recitations and chants] his face would increase in beauty and
radiance, while the perspiration dripped from all his body until it
ran under his feet into the ground.' [Footnote: Browne, _Literary
History of Persia_, ii. 503.]


EFFECT OF SUFISM

Sufism, however, which in the outset was a spiritual pantheism,
combined with quietism, developed in a way that was by no means so
satisfactory. The saintly mystic poet Abu Sa'id had defined it thus:
'To lay aside what thou hast in thy head (desires and ambitions), and
to give away what thou hast in thy hand, and not to flinch from
whatever befalls thee.' [Footnote: _Ibid_. ii. 208.] This is,
of course, not intended as a complete description, but shows that the
spirit of the earlier Sufism was profoundly ethical. Count Gobineau,
however, assures us that the Sufism which he knew was both
enervating and immoral. Certainly the later Sufi poets were inclined
to overpress symbolism, and the luscious sweetness of the poetry may
have been unwholesome for some--both for poets and for readers. Still
I question whether, for properly trained readers, this evil result
should follow. The doctrine of the impermanence of all that is not God
and that love between two human hearts is but a type of the love
between God and His human creatures, and that the supreme happiness is
that of identification with God, has never been more alluringly