These passages show that God has saints (_awliyá_) whom He has specially distinguished by His friendship and whom He has chosen to be the governors of His kingdom and has marked out to manifest His actions and has peculiarly favoured with diverse kinds of miracles (_karámát_) and has purged of natural corruptions and has delivered from subjection to their lower soul and passion, so that all their thoughts are of Him and their intimacy is with Him alone. Such have been in past ages, and are now, and shall be hereafter until the Day of Resurrection, because God has exalted this (Moslem) community above all others and has promised to preserve the religion of Muḥammad. Inasmuch as the traditional and intellectual proofs of this religion are to be found among the divines (_`ulamá_), it follows that the visible proof is to be found among the Saints and elect of God. Here we have two parties opposed to us, namely, the Mu`tazilites and the rank and file of the Anthropomorphists (_Ḥashwiyya_). The Mu`tazilites deny that one Moslem is specially privileged more than another; but if a saint is not specially privileged, neither is a prophet specially privileged; and this is infidelity. The vulgar Anthropomorphists allow that special privileges may be conferred, but assert that such privileged persons no longer exist, although they did exist in the past. It is all the same, however, whether they deny the past or the future, since one side of denial is no better than another. God, then, has caused the prophetic evidence (_burhán-i nabawí_) to remain down to the present day, and has made the Saints the means whereby it is manifested, in order that the signs of the Truth and the proof of Muḥammad’s veracity may continue to be clearly seen. He has made the Saints the governors of the universe; they have become entirely devoted to His business, and have ceased to follow their sensual affections. Through the blessing of their advent the rain falls from heaven, and through the purity of their lives the plants spring up from the earth, and through their spiritual influence the Moslems gain victories over the unbelievers. Among them there are four thousand who are concealed and do not know one another and are not aware of the excellence of their state, but in all circumstances are hidden from themselves and from mankind. Traditions have come down to this effect, and the sayings of the Saints proclaim the truth thereof, and I myself—God be praised!—have had ocular experience (_khabar-i `iyán_) of this matter. But of those who have power to loose and to bind and are the officers of the Divine court there are three hundred, called _Akhyár_, and forty, called _Abdál_, and seven, called _Abrár_, and four, called _Awtád_, and three, called _Nuqabá_, and one, called _Quṭb_ or _Ghawth_. All these know one another and cannot act save by mutual consent.