Later on, wholly left to his own resources, yet nothing daunted, by sheer pluck and energy he builds himself up a material existence, then by the sharpness of his wit, the originality and penetration of his thought, the incisiveness of his intuition, he rapidly builds up a spiritual structure of Nature, Heaven, and its Mover and Ruler, God, until, at the age of fifty, he has attained to that highest stage of Sufic evolution, the Ecstasy, the complete immersion in, and absorption by, the One Essence, the True One, that Eternal Being: Ecstasy, the same state which is so beautifully described by that famous Arabian philosopher, Avicenna, when he says:--"Then when a man's desires are raised to a high pitch, and he is sufficiently well exercised in that way, there will appear to him some small glimmerings of the Truth, as it were flashes of lightning, very delightful, which just shine upon him and then go out. Then the more he exercises himself, the more often he'll perceive them . . . till through frequent exercise he at last attains to a perfect tranquillity: and that which used to appear to him only by fits and starts, becomes habitual; and that which was only a glimmering before, a constant light." To detach and deliver the soul--if only for a few hours--from the withering despotism of everyday life and strife, grey and monotonous with its eternal round of toil, worry, and trouble; to bathe the soul in the full sunshine of sublime wisdom, depicted and represented in this simple romance, with its exquisite charm and captivating grace, clear as crystal yet pregnant with ideas that have moved the world--this was the idea which guided me in embarking upon this work. If I have succeeded in this task, even only in a small degree, by resuscitating this gem of Arabian philosophical literature--then I consider myself richly repaid for the labour I have bestowed on this little book, which has, indeed, been a labour of love. PAUL BRÖNNLE. _25th April 1904._ THE AWAKENING OF THE SOUL A PHILOSOPHICAL ROMANCE. _Different Accounts of the Birth of Hayy Ibn Yokdhan._ Our good Forbears--may God be gracious unto them--report: there is an Island amongst the Indian Islands (in the Indian Ocean), situated under the Equinoctial, where men spring into being without father or mother. There is also planted a tree that produces women, and they are those whom al-Mas`udi calleth the Wakwak Damsels. The Island is so blessed with the influence of light and sun as to be the most temperate and perfect of places; an opinion, however, that does not agree with that of the greatest philosophers and most famous physicians, who hold that there is nothing more temperate in the world than the fourth climate. According to them Hayy Ibn Yokdhan belonged to the number of those that are born without father or mother. Others, however, relate the story in a different manner. They tell us: