THE STORY OF ALMET.
Almet, the dervise, who watched the sacred lamp in the sepulchre of the Prophet, as he one day rose up from the devotions of the morning, which he had performed at the gate of the temple, with his body turned towards the east, and his forehead on the earth, saw before him a man in splendid apparel, attended by a long retinue, who gazed stedfastly at him, with a look of mournful complacence, and seemed desirous to speak, but unwilling to offend.
The Dervise, after a short silence, advanced, and saluting him with the calm dignity which independence confers upon humility, requested that he would reveal his purpose.
“Almet,” said the stranger, “thou seest before thee a man whom the hand of prosperity has overwhelmed with wretchedness. Whatever I once desired as the means of happiness, I now possess; but I am not yet happy, and therefore I despair. I regret the lapse of time, because it glides away without enjoyment; and as I expect nothing in the future but the vanities of the past, I do not wish that the future should arrive. Yet I tremble lest it should be cut off; and my heart sinks when I anticipate the moment in which eternity shall close over the vacuity of my life, like the sea upon the path of a ship, and leave no traces of my existence more durable than the furrow which remains after the waves have united. If in the treasures of thy wisdom there is any precept to obtain felicity, vouchsafe it to me: for this purpose am I come; a purpose which yet I feared to reveal, lest, like all the former, it should be disappointed.”
Almet listened, with looks of astonishment and pity, to this complaint of a being, in whom reason was known to be a pledge of immortality; but the serenity of his countenance soon returned; and stretching out his hand towards heaven, “Stranger,” said he, “the knowledge which I have received from the Prophet, I will communicate to thee.
“As I was sitting one evening at the porch of the temple, pensive and alone, mine eye wandered among the multitude that was scattered before me; and while I remarked the weariness and solicitude which was visible in every countenance, I was suddenly struck with a sense of their condition. ‘Wretched mortals,’ said I, ‘to what purpose are you busy? Do the linens of Egypt, and the silks of Persia, bestow felicity on those who wear them, equal to the wretchedness of yonder slaves, whom I see leading the camels that bring them? Is the fineness of the texture, or the splendour of the tints, regarded with delight by those to whom custom has rendered them familiar? or can the power of habit render others insensible of pain, who live onlyto traverse the desart; a scene of dreadful uniformity, where a barren level is bounded only by the horizon; where no change of prospect, or variety of images, relieves the traveller from a sense of toil and danger, of whirlwinds which in a moment may bury him in the sand, and of thirst, which the wealthy have given half their possessions to allay? Do those on whom hereditary diamonds sparkle with unregarded lustre, gain from the possession what is lost by the wretch who seeks them in the mine; who lives excluded from the common bounties of nature; to whom even the vicissitude of day and night is not known; who sighs in perpetual darkness, and whose life is one alternative of insensibility and labour? If those are not happy who possess, in proportion as those are wretched who bestow, how vain a dream is the life of man! and if there is, indeed, such difference in the value of existence, how shall we acquit of partiality the hand by which this difference has been made?”
While my thoughts thus multiplied, and my heart burned within me, I became sensible of asudden influence from above. The streets and the crowds of Mecca disappeared; I found myself sitting on the declivity of a mountain, and perceived at my right hand an angel, whom I knew to be Azoran, the minister of reproof. When I saw him I was afraid. I cast mine eye upon the ground, and was about to deprecate his anger, when he commanded me to be silent. “Almet,” said he, “thou has devoted thy life to meditation, that thy counsel might deliver ignorance from the mazes of error, and deter presumption from the precipice of guilt; but the book of nature thou hast read without understanding: it is again open before thee: look up, consider it, and be wise.”
I looked up, and beheld an inclosure, beautiful as the gardens of Paradise, but of a small extent. Through the middle there was a green walk; at the end a wild desart; and beyond, impenetrable darkness. The walk was shaded with trees of every kind, that were covered at once with blossoms and fruit; innumerable birds were singing in the branches; the grass was intermingled with flowers, which impregnatedthe breeze with fragrance, and painted the path with beauty; on one side flowed a gentle, transparent stream, which was just heard to murmur over the golden sands that sparkled at the bottom; and on the other were walks and bowers, fountains, grottoes, and cascades, which diversified the scene with endless variety, but did not conceal the bounds.