OF THE SPY
ANOTHER of the misfortunes of Love is the Spy: he is truly an inward fever, a persistent delirium, a haunting obsession. Spies are of various kinds.
The first type of spy is the bore who squats himself down without malice prepense in a spot where a man is apt to meet with his beloved, and where the two intend to disclose something of their secret and to reveal their passion, amiably conversing alone. Such a kind of spy will occasion the lover more disquiet than a more serious type: even though he may take himself off quickly enough, all the same he is an obstacle preventing the realization of desire, and frustrating the most ample hopes.
One day I saw a pair of lovers in a place where they supposed themselves to be alone; they addressed themselves to their tender protests, and made ready to exploit their sweet solitude. But the spot which they had chosen for their interview was not a private sanctuary, and it was not long before the tiresome intruder appeared on the scene. Observing me, he at once turned aside and sat down next to me, remaining with me a long time. If you could only have seen the young lover, and the mixture of evident despair and anger on his face, you would have witnessed a truly wonderful spectacle. I have commemorated the scene in some verses, of which the following is an extract.
A boring presence at the best,
And drools on matters wherein I
Have not the slightest interest.
Ridwa, and Yadhbul, and Shamam,
Samman, and mighty Lebanon,
The mount of Hazn, and of Lukam
He far outweighs them, every one.
Then there is the spy who has discovered an inkling of what the loving pair are about, and has some suspicion of what is going on; he desires to ferret out the whole truth of the case, and therefore hangs about and squats for hours on end, watching their movements, eyeing their expressions, counting their very breaths. Such a man is more pestilential than the mange. I know of a young fellow who had every intention of manhandling a spy of this sort. These verses of mine illustrate the type.
But constantly, with purpose vile
What greater headache can there be
Than such unwelcome company?
He perseveres to such excess
In leis absurd attentiveness,
That we are known throughout the town
As Messrs Adjective and Noun!
Next there is the spy who watches over the beloved. There is no other way of dealing with him, but to conciliate him; if he can be won over, then that is the very acme of delight. This is the spy commonly mentioned by the poets in their verses.
I have observed a man who was so adroit in his efforts to conciliate a spy, that in the end the spy spied on his behalf; he feigned inattention when inattention was called for, he defended him from all danger, and in every way exerted himself in his interests. This too I have put into verse.
Was posted o'er the lady I
Aspired to win, by every art
Resolved to keep us two apart.
But presently my gentle way
So mastered him beneath my sway
That soon my worst presentiments
Were changed to careless confidence.
He was a sword unsheathed and bare,
Ready to slay me then and there;
But now he has become my friend,
And to his kindness ne'er an end.
Here is a stanza from another poem on the same subject.
But now he is my life and breath;
He was rank poison in my throat,
But now my only antidote.
I know of a man who set a spy to watch over a person about whom he was anxious, and had every confidence in the spy's loyalty; as things turned out he proved his greatest bane and the source of all his calamity.
If there proves to be no strategem whereby the spy may be overcome, no way in which he can be con ciliated, then the only hope that remains is to be able now and again to signal surreptitiously with the eyes or the eyebrows and to make subtle allusions in speaking: that is enjoyment of a kind, and secures for the passionate lover some temporary satisfaction. I have a poem on this theme, which begins as follows.
My darling mistress evermore;
To his employer he is true,
And faithful to his compact, too.
Later in the same poem these two stanzas occur.
To satisfying my heart's needs,
And so a work accomplishes
Else wrought by dire calamities.
It is as though a demon lives
Within his heart, that all perceives,
And in his either eye one dwells
Who every least adventure tells.
The following stanza also belongs to the same set of verses.
To overlook all men but me
God, sitting on His heavenly throne,
Assigns a third to me alone.
The most disgusting kind of spy is the man who has been tried in love long ago, and suffered its misfortunes over many years, and then, after having known its manifestations very fully, has now detached himself from it: he is therefore desirous in the extreme to protect the person over whom he is watching from the calamities of love. God be praised, what a splendid spy he makes, and what mischief stands poised to fall upon lovers through his instrumentality! These verses of mine suit that topic.
The mischief love can do
He drank of passion deep,
And was denied his sleep;
Encountered in desire
Sharp pains, and torment dire
Love well nigh proved his doom
And laid him in the tomb.
All tricks he knew in truth
Of love-afflicted youth,
Scorned not to try each ruse,
Each wink and word to use.
Then, after all his pains,
Oblivion attains,
Calls passion to its face
A shame and a disgrace.
And now, o'er her whom I
Adore he's set to spy,
His charge, to keep apart
From her my lovesick heart.
Ah, what calamitous
Afflictions light on us,
And what misfortunes fell
Have come with us to dwell!
One of the most curious examples of spying I ever recall is the following. I know two lovers who are both in love with the same person, and conduct themselves in identical fashion; each of them, as I have observed, spies upon the other. On this subject I have also composed a short poem.
And by the same love bitten;
Each turns against the other,
Each wrestles with his brother.
The dog beside the manger
Comports himself no stranger
Too sick to eat, too greedy
To entertain the needy.
OF THE SLANDERER
ANOTHER of the misfortunes of Love is the Slanderer he is of two kinds. The first sort of slanderer desires simply to part the loving couple. He is the less mischievous of the two; but for all that he is a deadly poison, a bitter colocynth, an imminent doom and an impending calamity. Sometimes his embroideries are ineffective. Generally the slanderer addresses himself to the beloved; the lover, poor fellow-" the choking throat can't sing a note ", and " whom rage destroys knows little joys "he is far too occupied with his own troubles to listen to what the slanderer has to say. Slanderers are well aware of this, and therefore direct their efforts only towards those whose minds are free of other cares, and who are therefore ready to pounce with the fury of a mighty *potentate, prepared to find fault at the least provocation.
Slanderers have various methods of tale bearing. For instance, they will inform the beloved that the lover is not concealing the secret. That is a difficult situation to deal with, and slow to remedy unless it so happens by coincidence that the beloved resists the lover's advances-a circumstance which in any case makes aversion inevitable. There is no relief for the beloved when such rumours are about, unless the fates take a hand by acquainting her of something of the lover's secret feelings, and then only if the beloved is intelligent and has a modicum of discretion; she will in that case defer judgment on the lover. When the beloved discovers, after behaving with due aloofness and reserve, that the slanderer's story' was a lie, and that the lover has in fact not divulged the secret at all, she of course realises that the tale was a fabrication from beginning to end, and all her dark doubts vanish.
I once saw this very drama enacted between a pair of lovers. The beloved was very watchful, and excessively discreet; but many slanderous tales were carried about, and in the end the marks of these were evident in the beloved's countenance. He spoke of " a love that never was in truth "; he became a prey to conjectures and, ugly thoughts, and was so dumbfounded and distraught that, he could no longer bottle up his feelings; finally he disclosed what had been reported to him. If you could have been present at the scene when the lover offered his excuses, you would have realized that passion is indeed a tyrant who must be obeyed, an edifice most strongly bound together, a lance exceeding sharp and penetrating. His apologies were a pretty mixture of groveling, confession, denial, penitence, and unconditional surrender. So after a certain amount of pother all was well once more between the happy pair.
Sometimes the slanderer alleges that the love which the lover is protesting is not true, and that his real purpose is to relieve himself and gratify his sensual impulses. This is a kind of slander which, while serious enough when whispered abroad, is nevertheless easier to deal with than the preceding variety. The state of the lover is quite different from that of the mere pleasure-seeker; the evidences of emotion are wholly at variance in the two cases. This topic has however been discussed amply enough in the chapter on Compliance.
Sometimes the slanderer reports that the lover is divided in his affections: this is a consuming fire, and an ache pervading all the members. When the purveyor of such a story happens to be dealing with a youthful lover who is handsome, graceful, desirable, inclined to sensual pleasures, and of a worldly disposition, while the beloved is a lady of illustrious position and high rank, the likeliest thing imaginable is that she will endeavour to destroy her suitor, and to be the instrument of his death. How many a fair young lover has been struck down on this account, or been given poison to drink, or had his belly ripped up, all for a like cause! Such was the end of Marwan Ibn Ahmad Ibn Hudair, the father of Ahmad the ascetic and of Musa and `Abd al-Rahman, better known as the sons of Lubna: he met his doom at the hands of his slave-girl Qatr al-Nada. This was my motive in writing a cautionary poem for a comrade of mine, from which I will quote.
Put his trust in womankind?
What a stupid he must be
So to court catastrophe!
Ah, how many fools have come
To the murky pool of doom,
Thought it clean, and wholesome too,
And sucked up the deadly brew!
The second sort of slanderer labours to part the lovers in order that he may enjoy unique possession of the beloved, and have her for himself. This is the most difficult, deadly and decisive kind of all, because of the strenuous efforts the slanderer will make in view of the personal advantage he looks to gain.
There is yet a third class of slanderer: the man who traduces lover and beloved alike, and so reveals the secrets of both. Such a type may be disregarded, if the lover is co-operative. I have put this matter into a poem.
Who seeks to worm our secret out:
He only has our news to bear,
And nothing else to blab about.
Why should he worry at my gloom,
Or trouble if I faint and fret?
Myself the pomegranate consume
The children's teeth on edge are set!
Here I find myself obliged to set down some observations closely analogous to the subject now under discussion, even though they may be slightly off the point. I would like to say a few words of explanation about tale bearing and backbiting. In talking, one thing always leads on to another, as we envisaged at the beginning of this essay.
There are no people on earth worse than slanderers and backbiters. Backbiting is a characteristic proving' the tree to be rotten, and the branch diseased; it shows that the nature itself is corrupt, and that the upbringing is also depraved. The born backbiter must needs lie; for backbiting is one of the branches, one of the authentic species of lying. Every backbiter is a liar.
I have never loved a liar. Though I am ready to be indulgent, and to be friendly with every man whatever his fault, even if it be a grave fault, committing his case to the tender mercy of his Creator and liking him for his good points, I cannot stomach anyone whom I know to be in the habit of lying: that for me wipes out all his virtues, destroys his merits, and discounts any worth there may be in him. I look for no good in such a man whatsoever. Of every other sin a man may repent every other vice can be concealed and abandoned; but as for telling a lie, there is no turning back from that, and that can never be hidden, wherever it may be. I have not seen in all my life, neither have I heard from any man, a case of a liar who eschewed lying and did not return to the habit again. I have never taken the initiative in breaking off relations with an acquaintance, except when I have detected him in a lie; in such a case it is I who take the first step, and go out of my way to avoid and to forsake him. Lying is a mark which I have never seen on any man, without his being suspected of having some dark fissure in his soul, and diagnosed as suffering from some frightful spiritual deformity. I pray that God may never abandon us, nor deny us the protection of His grace!
A wise man of old has said, "Make friends with whom you will, but avoid three sorts of men-the fool, who desiring' to help you only harms you; the weary, because in the hour when you rely upon him most, on account of the long and firm friendship between you, in that very hour he lets you down; and the liar, since the more you believe in him the more surely he will do you a dirty trick when you least expect it."
The Prophet of Allah is reported to have said, " To keep one's covenant is a part of faith"; and again," No man is a believer in the complete sense of the word, so long as he had not given up lying even in jest." I received these two Traditions from Abu `Umar Ahmad Ibn Muhammad Ibn Muhammad Ibn `Ali Ibn Rifa'a, who had them from `Ali Ibn `Abd al-`Aziz, from Abu 'Ubaid al-Qasim Ibn Sallam, from his teachers. The second of them has the ultimate authority of `Umar Ibn al-Khattab, and of his son `Abd Allah (God be well pleased with them both).
Allah says, "O ye who believe, why say ye that which ye do not? Hateful it is to God, that ye should say that which ye do not " (Koran LXI 3).
The Prophet of Allah was once asked, " May a believer be a miser? "He replied, "Yes." "And may a believer be a coward?" "Yes." "And may a believer be a liar?" "No." I received this Tradition from Ahmad Ibn Muhammad Ibn Ahmad Ibn Ahmad Ibn Sa'id, who had it from 'Ubaid Allah Ibn Yahya, from his father, from Malik Ibn Anas, from Safwan Ibn Sulaim. By the same chain of authorities I am informed that the Prophet of Allah also said, "There is no good in lying ": this dictum was likewise issued in answer to a question. Another Tradition, which I have on the same chain up to Malik, reporting in this case from Ibn Masud, quotes the Prophet of Allah as saying, "A man will go on lying, and making one black spot after another on his heart, until his heart is wholly black, and his name will be inscribed in God's book as one of the liars." This chain, depending upon Ibn Masud, quotes the Prophet of Allah further as saying, " Practise truthfulness; for truthfulness leads on to piety, and piety leads on to Paradise. And beware of lying; for lying leads on to sinfulness, and sinfulness leads on to Hell."
It is said that a man came to the Prophet of Allah and said to him, "O Prophet of Allah, I have three besetting sins-drink, fornication, and lying. Command me which of these I should give up." The Prophet of Allah said, " Give up lying." The man departed from him, and then desired to commit fornication; but he thought a while and then said to himself, " I will come to the Prophet of Allah, and he will say to me, `Hast thou fornicated?' And if I admit it, he will punish me as the law requires; but if I deny it, I shall break my pledge. I will therefore give up this sin." Thereafter he was tempted in the same way to drink, and reasoned after the same manner. Finally he returned to the Prophet of Allah and said, "0 Prophet of Allah, I have given up all three sins." Lying is thus seen to be the root of every abomination, and to comprise all evil; it attracts the hatred of Almighty God.
We have Abu Bakr al-Siddiq's authority for the statement that the Prophet of Allah said, " That man is without faith, in whom faith cannot be placed." Ilm Masudd is the ultimate source of the Prophet of Allah's saying, " The believer is liable to all innate dispositions, except treachery and lying." The Prophet of Allah further declared, " Three qualities there are which, if they dwell with a man, that man is a hypocrite: to promise and not to fulfill, to lie when speaking, and to betray when trust is placed in him."
What is unbelief, if it is not lying against Almighty God? Truth belongs to God, and God loves truth; by truth the heavens and the earth stand fast.
I have never seen any man more shameful than a liar. Empires do not perish, kingdoms are not destroyed, blood is not shed unjustly, honour is not violated, except through backbiting and lying. It is backbiting, which exacerbates hatred and deadly rancour. The lot of the back-biter is nothing but hatred and shame and humiliation; he deserves to be looked down upon by the person to whom he carries his filth-and all the more by others-as one looks down upon a cur.
Almighty God says, " Woe unto every slanderous defamer! " (Koran CIV I). Again Allah says, " O ye who believe, if there cometh unto you a sinful man bearing tidings, do ye make the matter clear " (Koran XLIX 6). Here God calls the talebearer a sinful man. Allah also says, "Obey thou not the contemptible, back-biting perjurer, who goeth about with slander, and is a hinderer of good, being a transgressor, a criminal, a low-born churl withal " (Koran LXVIII 10-13)
The Prophet of Allah said, " No calumniator shall enter Paradise." He also said, " Beware of the three babblers! " By this last saying he meant the talebearer, the man who receives tales, and the man who issues them.
Al-Ahnaf said, " The trustworthy man does not carry reports about, and the double-faced man deserves to be held in no regard by God." Such is the burden of vileness and depravity with which he is loaded.
A comrade once carried a lying report about me to Abu Ishaq Ibrahim Ibn `Isa al-Thaqafi, the well-known poet (God have mercy on his soul!), just as a joke. But the poet, being very imaginative, believed the story, which enraged him. I should add that both the talebearer and the poet were good friends of mine; the former was not really a backbiter at all, but he was a great jester and loved practical jokes. I therefore sent to Abu Ishaq, who was much troubled by the report, an epistle in verse, which included the following lines.
A story thou hast heard men tell,
When thou canst not determine well
By what thou knowest where is Booth.
So might a man in too great haste,
Beholding a mirage, pour out
The precious drops he totes about,
And perish in the howling waste.
I also addressed a poem to my friend the talebearer, containing these stanzas.
Like some psychologist, who brings
Corruption to the very soul
He tends, that else is sane and whole.
The man whose sharpest weapon is
The hawking of mendacities
Is like the bustard, whose defence
Is broadly based on excrements.
I once had a friend, but so many lies were carried to him about me that at last the campaign had its effect on him; the marks were apparent in his expression and his glance. Now it is my nature to act with great deliberation, to watch with patience, and to be as conciliatory as is humanly possible. I found in quiet submission a way to restore our friendship, and then sent him a poem, from which I will quote just one stanza.
Which, had it seen the light of day;
Wahriz could scarce have claimed to be
The champion of archery.
'Ubaid Allah Ibn Yahya al-Jaziri, who transmits by heart his uncle's famous elegant essays, was a natural liar. The habit has so dominated him and overmastered his reason, that in the end it has become as much his constant companion as hope is to the human breast. He will reinforce his lying tales with the most solemn oaths, which he is ready to shout from the housetops. So he has become more false than a mirage in the desert, being a complete addict to lies, which he seems to love with a passionate devotion; so much so that he will go on telling his stories to people even though he knows quite well that they do not believe him; that little detail does not put him off in the slightest, he still carries on with his falsehoods.
This is the man to whom I addressed the following verses.
Stands now uncovered and revealed
Report, and what myself could see,
Have proven thy malignity.
So circumstance is often shown
By other circumstance alone,
And tribunals take pregnancy
As witness to adultery.
Here is an extract from another short poem I composed in his honour.
Than mirror, mirror on the wall:
He strikes more swiftly friends apart
Than Indian sabres split the heart.
I think that Fate and sundering Time
Are his disciples in the crime
All practise to one common end
Of separating friend from friend.
I honored him with a third effusion, a full-length ballad from which I will here quote no more than five stanzas.
Of good opinion worst misplaced,
More hateful than a load of debt
And poverty oppressing yet.
The Lord's Commandments on his ear
Fall with less chance that he may hear,
And are unlikelier to impress
Than protests the compassionless.
In him unite, to grace his fame,
All ignominy and all shame,
Which leave no room for any worse
That men may vilify and curse.
He is more odious than reproof
To one who feigns to be aloof
From censure, and he strikes the bone
More chill than Salim's frozen stone.
More loathed is he, than to be rent
From the beloved, and banishment,
And spying eyes, to mind perplexed,
And heart athirst, and spirit vexed.
But he who rouses a heedless brother, or counsels a friend, or protects a fellow Moslem, or lays information concerning a malefactor, or re orts about an enemy, and in doing so does not lie, and is not proved a liar, and intends not to rouse rancour or ill-will, such a man cannot be called a tale-bearer. Have the weak ever perished, or the feeble-minded ever come to ruin for any other reason than that they were unable to distinguish' well between the true counselor and the back-biter? For these attributes are very close to each other on the surface, but inwardly lie far apart: the one is a disease, the other a cure. To the sagacious man the distinction between the two will not be hidden.
The authentic talebearer is one whose purveying of tales is not approved by the canons of religion, whose purpose is to part friends and provoke strife between comrades, to stir up trouble, to create commotion, to embellish and adorn a tale. If a man fears to embark upon the course of good counsel, lest he fall into the ways of back-biting, and has insufficient confidence in his own perspicacity and the accuracy of his personal judgment when involved in worldly affairs and in commerce with his fellows, then let him take his religion as a guide, and as a lamp to lighten his path, following after it wherever it may lead him on, and halting whenever it bids him halt. The light of his faith will be a sure guarantee that he will see the road ahead, a valid assurance that he will reach his goal, a certain pledge of success and salvation. The Divine Lawgiver, and He Who sent down His Messenger to mankind, He Who dispenseth all commandments and all forbiddings-surely He knows better the path of truth, and is more fully apprised of the happy issue and of deliverance at the end, than any mortal man who boasteth to look into his own soul, and delveth into his mind's conjectures according to his own imperfect reasoning.
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