Page:Alchemyofhappiness en.djvu/84

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76
Ghazzali's Alchemy of Happiness.

paralyzed together and cease from movement. Although you still remain in being, you possess neither sensation nor motion. You know, also, that in infancy the ingredients of your body were drawn from pure blood. These underwent a change and disappeared, and the ingredients derived from food took their place. You know moreover that the form which you had on your entrance into the world, and your present form are not the same. It follows therefore that there is no necessity of your perishing on account of the perishing of the body. The body is earth and must therefore return to its original earth. Your spirit, however, is of an angelic nature, and you must therefore mingle with your original spirit. If the influences of the world operate with such power that you are separated from your original spirit, it is fixed and sure that you will have to endure the torment of separation and misery.

It should be kept in mind, that you possess two classes of qualities or attributes. One class includes those which result from the union existing between your body and your spirit, viz: hunger, thirst, sleep, eating and drinking. These qualities become useless at death. The other class includes qualities belonging solely to your spirit, such as the knowledge of God, and the love of God, and the qualities which tend to secure these two, as gratitude, submission and supplication. These are qualities of your individual self, which do not pass away with death, but on the contrary the fruits of them will be ever growing and developing. The language of the blessed God in the words, "the permanent things are the holy virtues,"[1] points to these qualities. That spirit is also enduring and eternal, which is destitute of love and knowledge, which indeed knows nothing and has no delight in or affection for these

  1. S. 18:44.