Ghazzali's Alchemy of Happiness. 



133 



drink it and see ; if it do me no good, it will do me no 

 harm." And with the fancied hope of advantage from it, 

 you swallow down the bitter and unpalatable potion as if 

 it were sugar. 



Now come and be candid with yourself; you give credit 

 to a false physician, to a false writer of charms and to a 

 false astrologer, for the sake of being delivered from a day 

 or two of illness in this world, and you even undergo suf- 

 fering for the sake of it. But the learned in religion, for 

 the sake of saving you from the malady of stupidity and 

 rebellion and bringing you to everlasting health and feli- 

 city, have exerted themselves to make the verses of the 

 Koran and the holy traditions to serve as a medicine to 

 deliver you from bitter torment. Still you attach no credit 

 to their words. You treat the Koran and the traditions 

 with entire disregard, neither clinging to the command- 

 ments of God, nor avoiding forbidden things. You fol- 

 low the bent of your own inclinations, instead of follow- 

 ing the example and law of the prophet of God, and you 

 indulge in many acts of transgression. Nor do you call to 

 mind what will be your condition in the end of it all, nor 

 how long a time you have yet to live in the world, nor 

 what eternity is compared with this world. Do you not 

 know that by choosing a very little pain in the business of 

 religion during this short life and in this worthless world, 

 you may gain eternal felicity, and riches that cannot be 

 taken from you ? The pain which we may suffer in this 

 world, however severe, yet does not weigh the amount of 

 an atom in comparison with the pains and torment of the 

 other world. This world is a fading shadow, but the future 

 world is abiding and eternal. 



The following is an illustration of the duration of eter- 

 nity, so far as the human mind can comprehend it. If the 

 space from between the empyreal heaven to the regions 

 below the earth, embracing the whole universe, should be 



