54 



Ghazzalfs Alchemy of Happiness. 



gence, or the spiritual world. People in general look 

 only at the visible world, which is called also the present 

 world, the sensible world and the material world ; their 

 knowledge of it also is trivial and limited. And there 

 is also a window in the heart from whence it surveys 

 the intelligible world. There are two arguments to 

 prove that there are such windows in the heart. One of 

 the arguments is derived from dreams. When an indivi- 

 dual goes to sleep, these windows remain open and the in- 

 dividual is able to perceive events which will befall him 

 from the invisible world or from the hidden table of de- 

 crees, 1 and the result corresponds exactly with the vision. 

 Or he sees a similitude, and those who are skilled in the 

 science of interpretation of dreams understand the meaning. 

 But the explanation of this science of interpretation would 

 be too long for this treatise. The heart resembles a pure 

 mirror, you must know, in this particular, that when a man 

 falls asleep, when his senses are closed, and when the heart, 

 free and pure from blameable affections, is confronted with 

 the preserved tablet, then the tablet reflects upon the heart 

 the real states and hidden forms inscribed upon it. In that 

 state the heart sees most wonderful forms and combina- 

 tions. But when the heart is not free from impurity, or 

 when, on waking, it busies itself with things of sense, the 

 side towards the tablet will be obscured, and it can view 

 nothing. For, although in sleep the senses are blunted, 

 the imaginative faculty is not, but preserves the forms re- 

 flected upon the mirror of the heart. But as the percep- 

 tion does not take place by means of the external senses, 

 but only in the imagination, the heart does not see them 

 with absolute clearness, but sees only a phantom. But in 

 death, as the senses are completely separated and the veil 

 of the body is removed, the heart can contemplate the in- 



1 See note A. 



