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Page 1 of 11910 · PDF PAGE 131
…uran. To recite it 1,000 times nightly causes one to become a great Sheikh. 4. Surely Oriental exaggeration. A. L. (Not at all. I do not think that El Haji necessarily means separate and distinct emissions ; he may mean thrusts. Now even the uneducated Briton, with a little practice, can learn to retain his semen for 3 to 6 hours without withdrawal or prolonged rest. Allowing only four thrusts on an average per minute, it would require but four hours and ten minutes to fulfil these conditions. Ed.) Ingenious, but absurd. The Persian does not ad…
1910 · PDF PAGE 79
…cord- ing to Mahbub that El Qahar will not use a leather dildo, but his own stalwart member, upon the po- dex of Habib ; but I prefer to think that he simply means “ I will not beat thee ” i.e. with leather thongs. In all countries beating is jestingly spoken of as “ payment.” Besides, the whole ode concerns active punishment, not mere deprivation of plea- sure. (See note to XII. Ed.)
1910 · PDF PAGE 41
33 bring home these things, don’t you know ? But we think what we think, don’t you know ? While your admiring friends openly boast of you as a dam clever bugger, by God ! He had half the boys in London, and when they started to black- mail him, he turned right round like that (gesture) before you could say “ knife ”, by God ! and didn’t they get beans, by God ! But could I fight an English election ? How would my chiefs in the army look at it, when it came to the actual point of choosing one of two men for promotion ? What price that fat tutor-…
1910 · PDF PAGE 58
… Deep as I plunge, I do not break Within the velvet of thy skin. Do what I will, thy Self is hid From me by envy of the Jinn. So, when I think, I cannot pierce The truth of things ; I cannot win Unto the real ; life’s wheel is kept From turning by its axle-pin.1 But swing thine hips and smile upon The hideous world’s malicious grin ! Then when we end, the task is light : Bid El Qahar once more begin2 ! 1. The very cause of life — desire — is that which hinders its attaining to higher planes. A
1910 · PDF PAGE 119
… have left any mark on history, save by the excess of their impudicities and whore- doms ? We must exclude those born to queendom. I can think but of one, Jeanne d’Arc, an example of the opposite abnormality, frigidity.
1910 · PDF PAGE 122
…y which from each root is extracted a great number of deriva- tives, according to fixed rules. The Satire is of course against those who think that the difficulty of self-created matter is overcome by postulating a self-created God. Thus [Persian text] Jade might become [Persian text] a maker of Jade, were only Jade a verbal root. As [Persian text] slayer from the root [Persian text] to slay. 5. The Takhallus being absent from this Ghazal, it is either spurious or unfinished ; or else affords us a ground for rejecting those Ghazals which but fo…
1910 · PDF PAGE 59
…the whole passage is that unredeemed (i.e. uninitiated) man, however ordina- rily devout, is liable to become a sorcerer ! I cannot help thinking that Mahbub must have been hung up by his heels at one time ; nobody could ever think all that out right way up !
1910 · PDF PAGE 123
…exposing its po- dex. Thou, Habib, though otherwise not at all like a bird, dost expose thy podex, even when in no danger.1 I cannot but think that all this was in the mind of the Mullah, when in his sermon on Friday he reproached us openly with beastliness. It is true that no beast does anything in the hope of receiving money ; it is in my mind to take an hundred dinars2 to this one-eyed dotard, so that the orthodox of Shiraz may speak of the beau- ty and chastity of Habib, the piety of El Qahar, and of the great wisdom and tunefulness of his …
1910 · PDF PAGE 107
…h the simplest cast is : 492 357 816 are attributed to the planets, and credited with su- pernatural powers. There is an Arab saying — I think by Averrhoes — “ God is the square root of man ” : and a certain very holy Fakir (only recently dead) determined to discover the nature of God by working out √3. He is said to have engraved over a thousand pounds weight of thin silver plates — supplied by the faithful — with the minute charac- ters of his calculations. At his death these plates were distributed and of course worked innumera- ble miracles…
1910 · PDF PAGE 70
…ife is applauded in Persia not as virtue but as policy. But Platt attributes the title to Poti- phar himself. (Q’uran XII “ Joseph ”). I think he is wrong. 2. Affirms the subjective value of Devotion. Cf. Fuller, “ The Star in the West ”, who speaks of
1910 · PDF PAGE 126
…w nothing, while on the contrary about his mother everything is known. For himself, since we know so much, none desireth to know more. I think, however, that we will make him some- what drunk, or even excessively drunk, and that in that condition we will lead him to the house of Fatma, where the old humbug3 shall fornicate with the ugliest of the slave girls. Also setting him upon an ass4 with his face to the tail, we will conduct him to the Qazi saying : “ These, O Qazi, be broth- ers ; but the malice of a wizard hath changed the elder and mor…
1910 · PDF PAGE 80
72 The Pains and Pleasures of Redemption. XV THE COMPLAISANCES It is a pleasure to be thy tutor,1 Habib ; thou learnest swiftly, and (I think) wilt not soon for- get. When thou camest in to me at night thou wast all in tears ; and clasping my feet didst moan exceedingly, and beseech pity. Yet when I smote thy buttocks with the whip, bidding thee be cheerful, thou didst rise instant with laughter and smiles. Thou didst put on thy old provoking coquetry ; though for many days thou hadst drunk nothing but water, thou didst comport thyself as one i…
1910 · PDF PAGE 125
…, “ As long as I obey God’s law, I care nothing for phi- losophy ! ” A. L. I cannot admit that huqqa is an altogether un- usual word ; I think hukm rather merits the title. Besides, the pun is not obvious and less to a Persian than an Indian at that. Ed.
1910 · PDF PAGE 18
…ethnographical, critical, and other interesting points. We went to work accordingly during my last leave in England, and accomplished (I think) a good deal. (Major Lutiy’s death left this paragraph incom- plete. I need only add that on his departure for the front he sent the MSS., with numerous further ad- ditions, to me. I have retained the paragraph to explain the occasional diversity of opinion in read- ing or interpretation, and the way in which ‘ I ’ and ‘ We ’ are alternatively used in the notes. Ed.) The verse rendering are in every case…
1910 · PDF PAGE 157
… an effect of the Brahminical (or post-Fichtean) metaphysic, in which an Absolute is reached by denying to it all possible predicates as thinkable and therefore derogatory. Even when one retorted, “ He is then Unthinkable ” the wary Rabbi would reply, “ Neither Thinkable nor Un- thinkable.” You can’t win ; but you don’t want to play any more ! All this is far, far indeed from the true practical Qabalah, which contents itself with leading the student to the next stage, which teaches the ani- mal to think, the thinker to aspire, the aspirant to w…
1910 · PDF PAGE 84
…h, Kaiser, Tsar, Shah, sirdar, sirkar, sire, signor, señor, siegneur, and a host of others. 2. [Persian text] the temple at Mecca. But I think here it means the House not made with hands. The letter [Persian text] itself (not [Persian text] but the Hebrew ב. Ed.) means house, and connotes (says Mahbub) a great Magus — “ The Magus of Power.” The passage means therefore that mystic Union is the key to Practical Magic. 3. This sort of individualization of ideas is common in Eastern literature. We had a bad attack of it ourselves with Thomas Haines…
1910 · PDF PAGE 25
Introduction 17 even rapturous piety he joins a passionate love for the pleasures of the table and the bed : and the reader will I think grant him both acuteness of in- tellect and elegance of diction. It is instructive : indeed, beyond all comparison better than the laborous and pedantic exposition I had conceived it my duty to attempt : it gives the inside view, and references to the scholars and paederasts who have previously enlarged on this fascinating topic : the style is impassioned and the matter impeccable. I therefore turn my readers …
1910 · PDF PAGE 77
… Riff tribe. The Moors are considered a very wild and boisterous crew, but very good-tempered. They are the Irish of Islam. Burton is, I think, a little hard on them when he writes : “ What conscience has the mur-
1910 · PDF PAGE 78
…elephant, but small and without an hand, how will thou escape if thou dost fall ? And in fact the ass fell, and perished misera- bly. [I think it far more likely that it refers to another fable, the following, told by Persians against Omar and Ayeshah who as the daughter of Abu Bekr is supposed by the Shiahs to have influ- enced Mohammed’s conduct for evil. There are numerous scandals regarding her. Yet the more decent Persian tells the story of Zuleikah (Poti- phar’s wife) and of Joseph. A certain dog meeting an ass, greeted him cheer- fully. …