“One evening Jesus lingered in the market-place, Teaching the people parables of truth and grace, When in the square remote a crowd was seen to rise And stop with loathing gestures and abhorring cries. The Master and His meek disciples went to see What cause for this commotion and disgust could be, And found a poor dead dog beside the gutter laid: Revolting sight! at which each face its hate betrayed. One held his nose, one shut his eyes, one turned away, And all among themselves began aloud to say, ‘Detested creature! he pollutes the earth and air!’ ‘His eyes are bleared!’ ‘His ears are foul!’ ‘His ribs are bare!’ ‘In his torn hide there is not a decent shoe-string left!’ ‘No doubt the execrable cur was hung for theft!’ Then Jesus spake and dropped on him this saving breath: ‘Even pearls are dark before the whiteness of his teeth!’” We add the following quotations which set forth the poverty, humility and homelessness of the Christ taken from Al-Ghazali’s “Precious Pearl”: “Consider Jesus Christ, for it is related of him that he owned nothing save one garment of wool which he wore for twenty years and that he took nothing with him on all his wanderings save a cruse and a rosary and a comb. One day he saw a man drinking from a stream with his hands, so he cast away the cruse and did not use it again. He saw another man combing his beard with his fingers so he threw away his comb and did not use it again. And Jesus was accustomed to say, ‘My steed is my legs, and my houses are the caves of the earth, and my food are its vegetables, and my drink is from its rivers, and my dwelling-place among the sons of Adam!’” In another connection he writes: “It was said to Jesus: ‘If you would take possession of a house and live there it would be better for you,’ and he said: ‘Where are the houses of those who lived before us?’” (_Ihya_, Vol. III, p. 140.) A story is related (Vol. IV, p. 326) to show that Christ knew what was in the hearts of men and could change their purposes by prayer to God. In this case He makes an old man cease from his work of cleaning the ground, go to sleep and afterwards return to his work. Another story is as follows: “It is related that Jesus (upon him be peace) in his wanderings passed by a man asleep, wrapped up in his garment. So he wakened him and said: ‘O thou that sleepest! arise and make mention of God.’ He replied: ‘What do you want from me? I have forsaken the world to its own.’ Jesus replied: ‘Sleep on then my beloved.’” (Vol. IV, p. 140.) “It is related concerning Jesus that he sat in the shade of a wall of a certain man, who saw him and made him get up, but he replied: ‘You have not made me arise but verily God made me arise. He does not wish me to delight in the shade by day.’” (Vol. IV, p. 163.) The least of life’s pleasures is not for the ascetic saint.