He was an intimate friend of Junayd, and also associated with Sahl b. `Abdalláh. He was learned in every branch of science and was the Imám of his day in jurisprudence, besides being well acquainted with theology. His rank in Ṣúfiism was such that Junayd said to him: “Teach my pupils discipline and train them!” He succeeded Junayd and sat in his chair. It is related that he said: “The permanence of faith and the subsistence of religions and the health of bodies depend on three qualities: satisfaction (_iktifá_) and piety (_ittiqá_) and abstinence (_iḥtimá_): if one is satisfied with God, his conscience becomes good; and if one guards himself from what God has forbidden, his character becomes upright; and if one abstains from what does not agree with him, his constitution is brought into good order. The fruit of satisfaction is pure knowledge of God, and the result of piety is excellence of moral character, and the end of abstinence is equilibrium of constitution.” The Apostle said, “He that prays much by night, his face is fair by day,” and he also said that the pious shall come at the Resurrection “with resplendent faces on thrones of light”. 52. ABU ´L-`ABBÁS AḤMAD B. MUḤAMMAD B. SAHL AL-ÁMULÍ. He was always held in great respect by his contemporaries. He was versed in the sciences of Koranic exegesis and criticism, and expounded the subtleties of the Koran with an eloquence and insight peculiar to himself. He was an eminent pupil of Junayd, and had associated with Ibráhím Máristání. Abú Sa`íd Kharráz regarded him with the utmost veneration, and used to declare that no one deserved the name of Ṣúfí except him. It is related that he said: “Acquiescence in natural habits prevents a man from attaining to the exalted degrees of spirituality,” because natural dispositions are the instruments and organs of the sensual part (_nafs_), which is the centre of “veiling” (_ḥijáb_) whereas the spiritual part (_ḥaqíqat_) is the centre of revelation. Natural dispositions become attached to two things: firstly, to this world and its accessories, and secondly, to the next world and its circumstances: to the former in virtue of homogeneousness, and to the latter through imagination and in virtue of heterogeneousness and non-cognition. Therefore they are attached to the notion of the next world, not to its true idea, for if they knew it in reality, they would break off connexion with this world, and nature would then have lost all her power and spiritual things would be revealed. There can be no harmony between the next world and human nature until the latter is annihilated, because “in the next world is that which the heart of man never conceived”. The worth (_khaṭar_) of the next world lies in the fact that the way to it is full of danger (_khaṭar_). A thing that only comes into one’s thoughts (_khawáṭir_) has little worth; and inasmuch as the imagination is incapable of knowing the reality of the next world,