They asked one of the Shaikhs of Sham, or Syria, saying: "What is the condition of the Sufi sect?" He answered, "Formerly they were in this world a fraternity dispersed in the flesh, but united in the spirit; but now they are a body well clothed carnally, and ragged in divine mystery." Whilst thy heart will be every moment wandering into a different place, in thy recluse state thou canst not see purity; but though thou possessest rank and wealth, lands and chattels, if thy heart be fixed on God, thou art a hermit. XXV On one occasion we had marched, I recollect, all the night along with the caravan, and halted towards morning on the skirts of the wilderness. One mystically distracted, who accompanied us on that journey, set up a loud lamentation at dawn, went a-wandering into the desert, and did not take a moment's rest. Next day I said to him, "What condition was that?" He replied, "I remarked the nightingales that they had come to carol in the groves, the pheasants to prattle on the mountains, the frogs to croak in the pools, and the wild beasts to roar in the forests, and thought with myself, saying, It cannot be generous that all are awake in God's praise and I am wrapt up in the sleep of forgetfulness!--Last night a bird was carolling towards the morning; it stole my patience and reason, my fortitude and understanding. My lamentation had perhaps reached the ear of one of my dearly-beloved friends. He said, 'I did not believe that the singing of a bird could so distract thee!' I answered, This is not the duty of the human species, that the birds are singing God's praise and that I am silent." XXVI