After coming to himself on one of these occasions and learning what blasphemous language he had uttered, Bāyazīd ordered his disciples to stab him with their knives if he should offend again. Let me quote the sequel, from Mr. Whinfield’s abridged translation of the _Masnavī_ (p. 196): “The torrent of madness bore away his reason And he spoke more impiously than before: ‘Within my vesture is naught but God, Whether you seek Him on earth or in heaven.’ His disciples all became mad with horror, And struck with their knives at his holy body. Each one who aimed at the body of the Sheykh-- His stroke was reversed and wounded the striker. No stroke took effect on that man of spiritual gifts, But the disciples were wounded and drowned in blood.” Here is the poet’s conclusion: “Ah! you who smite with your sword him beside himself, You smite yourself therewith. Beware! For he that is beside himself is annihilated and safe; Yea, he dwells in security for ever. His form is vanished, he is a mere mirror; Nothing is seen in him but the reflexion of another. If you spit at it, you spit at your own face, And if you hit that mirror, you hit yourself. If you see an ugly face in it, ’tis your own, And if you see a Jesus there, you are its mother Mary. He is neither this nor that--he is void of form; ’Tis your own form which is reflected back to you.” The life of Abu ’l-Hasan Khurqānī, another Persian Sūfī who died in 1033 A.D., gives us a complete picture of the Oriental pantheist, and exhibits the mingled arrogance and sublimity of the character as clearly as could be desired. Since the original text covers fifty pages, I can translate only a small portion of it here. “Once the Sheykh said, ‘This night a great many persons (he mentioned the exact number) have been wounded by brigands in such-and-such a desert.’ On making inquiry, they found that his statement was perfectly true. Strange to relate, on the same night his son’s head was cut off and laid upon the threshold of his house, yet he knew nothing of it. His wife, who disbelieved in him, cried, ‘What think you of a man who can tell things which happen many leagues away, but does not know that his own son’s head has been cut off and is lying at his very door?’ ‘Yes,’ the Sheykh answered, ‘when I saw that, the veil had been lifted, but when my son was killed, it had been let down again.’”