To conclude, whoever has made that idea his own and fixed his heart upon it, heeds not whether they call him “Poor” (_faqír_) or “Pure” (_Ṣúfí_), since both these appellations are forced names for an idea that cannot be brought under any name. This controversy dates from the time of Abu ´l-Ḥasan Sumnún. He, on occasions when he was in a state of revelation (_kashf_) akin to subsistence (_baqá_), used to set Poverty above Purity; and on being asked by spiritualists (_arbáb-i ma`ání_) why he did so, he replied: “Inasmuch as I naturally delight in annihilation and abasement, and no less in subsistence and exaltation, I prefer Purity to Poverty when I am in a state akin to annihilation, and Poverty to Purity when I am in a state akin to subsistence; for Poverty is the name of subsistence and Purity that of annihilation. In the latter state I annihilate from myself the sight (consciousness) of subsistence, and in the former state I annihilate from myself the sight of annihilation, so that my nature becomes dead both to annihilation and to subsistence.” Now this, regarded as an explanation (_`ibárat_), is an excellent saying, but neither annihilation nor subsistence can be annihilated: every subsistent thing that suffers annihilation is annihilated from itself, and every annihilated thing that becomes subsistent is subsistent from itself. Annihilation is a term of which it is impossible to speak hyperbolically. If a person says that annihilation is annihilated, he can only be expressing hyperbolically the non-existence of any vestige of the idea of annihilation; but so long as any vestige of existence remains, annihilation has not yet come to pass; and when it has been attained, the “annihilation” thereof is nothing but self-conceit flattered by meaningless phrases. In the vanity and rashness of youth I composed a discourse of this kind, entitled the “Book of Annihilation and Subsistence” (_Kitáb-i Faná ú Baqá_), but in the present work I will set forth the whole matter with caution, please God the Almighty and Glorious.