Produced by Fritz Ohrenschall, Emmanuel Ackerman and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net AVICENA’S OFFERING _to the_ PRINCE «E l’anima umana la qual è colla nobiltà della potenzia ultima, cioè ragione, participa della divina natura a guisa di sempiterna Intelligenza; perocchè l’anima è tanto in quella sovrana potenzia nobilitata, e dinudata da materia, che la divina luce, come in Angiolo, raggia in quella; e però è l’uomo divino animale da’ Filosofi chiamato.»[1] (=Dante=, _Convito_, III, 2.) STAMPERIA DI NICOLA PADERNO _S. Salvatore Corte Regia, 10_ VERONA, ITALIA A COMPENDIUM ON THE SOUL, BY _Abû-'Aly al-Husayn Ibn 'Abdallah Ibn Sînâ:_ TRANSLATED, FROM THE ARABIC ORIGINAL, BY EDWARD ABBOTT van DYCK, WITH Grateful Acknowledgement of the Substantial Help OBTAINED From Dr. S. Landauer’s Concise German Translation, AND FROM James Middleton MacDonald’s Literal English Translation; AND PRINTED AT _VERONA, ITALY, in THE YEAR 1906_, For the Use of Pupils and Students of Government Schools IN _Cairo, Egypt_. PREFACE Several sources out of which to draw information and seek guidance as to Ibn Sînâ’s biography and writings, and his systems of medicine and philosophy, are nowadays easily accessible to nearly every one. Among such sources the following are the best for Egyptian students: 1. Ibn Abi Uçaybi´ah’s “Tabaqât-ul-Atib-ba,” and Wuestenfeld’s “Arabische Aertzte.” 2. Ibn Khallikân’s “Wafâyât-ul-A´ayân.” 3. Brockelmann’s “Arabische Literatur.” 4. F. Mehren’s Series of Essays on Ibn Sînâ in the Periodical “Muséon” from the year 1882 and on. 5. Clément Huart’s Arabic Literature, either in the French Original or in the English Translation. 6. Carra de Vaux’s “Les Grands Philosophes: Avicenna,” Paris, Felix Alcan, 1900, pp. vii et 302. 7. T. de Boer’s “History of Philosophy in Islâm,” both in Dutch and in the English translation. The “Offering to the Prince in the Form of a Compendium on the Soul,” of which the present Pamphlet is my attempt at an English Translation, is the least known throughout Egypt and Syria of all Ibn Sînâ’s many and able literary works: indeed I have failed, after repeated and prolonged enquiry, to come across so much as one, among my many Egyptian acquaintances, that had even heard of it.