1871 .] 
The reign of Mu'izz-uddin. 
207 
the third, entrust the duty of receiving petitions, and let him have 
the management of your personal staff; and to the fourth, give the 
office of secretary, and trust to his opinion and discernment and 
good judgment for the conduct of foreign correspondence and that 
with your judicial and revenue officers. Be always equally ac¬ 
cessible to all four officers alike. As for the counsellors of the 
state who may have a knowledge of the causes of the prosperity or 
decline of the country, adapt yourself to their views .* Do not mix 
up together the different offices of government, nor give all kinds 
of business into the hands of one, and do not let any one of your 
four ministers or any other of your courtiers get the upper hand 
over you, nor endue any one with absolute authority over the peo¬ 
ple, nor act so as to let the people conspire to resist you. 
“ The third saying of your father is this,—When you have selected 
four men duly qualified who know their work and will do it, and 
on whose gratitude and loyalty you can rely for the accomplish¬ 
ment of the counsels of your government, and when you have ad¬ 
mitted them to share your political secrets, and have confided to 
them the theories and principles of your administration, every order 
you issue, and every opinion you express, and every measure you 
adopt in those four departments, and every political secret that 
you disclose,—all should be done in the presence of all four officers. 
And though the rank of vizier may be more exalted, yet for you 
the true statecraft is, not to give to any one of these four persons 
whom you may have made the pillars of your state, any such ex¬ 
ceptional precedence as to be a source of irritation and offence to 
the minds of the other three. Be vigilant to note the good and evil 
qualities of the ministers of your will. Adhere to the settled 
usages by which your grandfather governed the country, and do 
not alter the rules of his administration, or add to, or take from, the 
practice of that far-seeing king ; and do not carry your affability 
to the people so far as to destroy the sense of fear and dread and 
awe in which you should be held. If once the dread and awe of 
kingly dominion pass away from the minds of your subjects, then 
you are reduced to their level, and your command ceases to carry 
* Such is the interpretation of this passage suggested to me by a native 
scholar, but I am far from being satisfied with it. Perhaps it means, attach 
to yourself the men who are capable of forming an opinion. 
