The Improvement of Human Reason: Exhibited in the Life of Hai Ebn YokdhanIbn Tufayl, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Malik
Islamic
The Improvement of Human Reason: Exhibited in the Life of Hai Ebn Yokdhan
Ibn Tufayl, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Malik
Islamic philosophy -- Early works to 1800
Sec.. 59. Then he consider'd all the kinds of Animals, and how this Agent
had given such a Fabrick of Body to every one of them, and then taught
them how to use it. For if he had not directed them to apply those Limbs
which he had given them, to those respective Uses for which they were
design'd, they would have been so far from being of any Service that
they would rather have been a Burden. From whence he knew, that the
Creator of the World was supereminently Bountiful, and exceedingly
Gracious. And then when he perceiv'd among the Creatures, any that had
Beauty, Perfection, Strength, or Excellency of any kind whatever, he
consider'd with himself, and knew that it all flow'd from that Voluntary
Agent, (whose Name be praised) and from his Essence and Operation. And
he knew, that what the Agent had in his own Nature, was greater than
that, [which he saw in the Creatures,] more perfect and compleat, more
beautiful and glorious, and more lasting; and that there was no
proportion between the one and the other. Neither did he cease to
prosecute this Search, till he had run through all the Attributes of
Perfection, and found that they were all in this Agent, and all flow'd
from him; and that he was most worthy to have them all ascrib'd to him,
above all the Creatures which were describ'd by them.
Sec. 60. In like manner he enquir'd into all the Attributes of
Imperfection, and perceiv'd that the Maker of the World was free from
them all: And how was it possible for him to be otherwise, since the
Notion of _Imperfection_ is nothing but _mere Privation,_ or what
depends upon it? And how can he any way partake of _Privation_, who is
_very Essence_, and cannot but exist; who gives Being to every thing
that exists, and besides whom there is no Existence? But HE is the
Being, HE is the Absoluteness, HE the Beauty, HE the Glory, HE the
Power, HE the Knowledge, _HE is HE, and besides Him all things are
subject to perishing_[19].
Sec. 61. Thus far his Knowledge had brought him towards the end of the
fifth Septenary from his Birth, _viz._ when he was 35 Years old. And the
Consideration of this Supream Agent was then so rooted in his Heart,
that it diverted him from thinking upon any thing else: and he so far
forgot the Consideration of the Creatures, and the Enquiring into their
Natures, that as soon as e'er he cast his Eyes upon any thing of what
kind soever, he immediately perceiv'd in it the Footsteps of this Agent;
and in an instant his Thoughts were taken off from the Creature, and and
transferred to the Creator. So that he was inflam'd with the desire of
him, and his Heart was altogether withdrawn from thinking upon this
inferior World, which contains the Objects of Sense, and wholly taken up
with the Contemplation of the upper, Intellectual World.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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