Azadah (this was his adopted title) is a Brahman. One day he ate at table with some Muselmans and drank wine. They said to him: “Thou art a Hindu, and thou takest thy meal in common with Muselmans? Your people never eat but with persons of their religion.” Azádah replied: “I did not suppose that you were Muselmans; hereafter I will at eating and drinking keep myself separate from you.” Another day he found himself again drinking wine in company with them, and did not turn his head from the meal; during the repast they said to Azádah: “Yesterday we made ourselves known to thee as Muselmans.” He answered: “I knew that you were joking with me. God forbid that you should be Muselmans.” Binaváli is the son of Híráman, a Káyastha.[159] The Káyasthas are a tribe of the fourth cast which Brahma has created; among the illustrious poets his name was Walí;[160] from his childhood he liked very much the society of durvishes; and in his tender age he was with the religious chief, named Ularváh, a great durvish, whose continual exclamation was: “God, thou art present, thou art one, God, I attest this.” In the year of the Hejirah 1045 (A. D. 1634) he associated with the durvishes of India, and enjoyed the fruit of it; he came to Kashmir in the service of Mulla Shah Budakhshí, and acquired the desired knowledge. The Sufí is by no necessity bound to a creed; no faith nor religion fetters his choice; he befriends the idol and the temple of the idol, and is no stranger to the mosque; by the power of ecstacy, not by any external knowledge, he utters loud sublime speeches. In the year 1050 of the Hejira (1640 A. D.) the doors of friendship opened between him and the author of this work; from the refulgencies of his mind are the following lines: “We are not ourselves that what we are; we are that what thou art; Thou art without a mark; we are thy mark. These marks are the marks of thy being; They are the manifestations and the splendor of thy qualities, Thou art pure of our care, and of our imagination; O thou, who art manifest in this our garment; Manifestations of thee are all things. Thou art independent of the relation of ‘thou and we,’ and thyself art ‘thou and we.’ Thy being comes forth in thy qualities, Thy nature is the spring of thy being, O Lord! We are all nothing; whatever is, is thou! O thou! who art free of notion, imagination, and duality, We are all billows in the ocean of thy being; We are a small compass of the manifestations of thy nature.” Azadah and Binaválí appear in the dress of Hindus, and profess the belief of the Jnánís, to which they are reckoned to belong.