One of the disciples is the son of the Moojtahid who, greatly to the vexation of his father, is entirely devoted to the Soofi doctor. He attended his kalean (pipe) with the utmost humility. On observing the pensive countenance of the young man, and knowing something of his history from Seyd Ali, how he had left all to find happiness in the contemplation of God, I longed to make known the glad tidings of a Saviour, and thanked God on coming away, that I was not left ignorant of the Gospel. I could not help being a little pleasant on Seyd Ali afterwards, for his admiration of this silent instructor. ‘There you sit,’ said I, ‘immersed in thought, full of anxiety and care, and will not take the trouble to ask whether God has said anything or not. No: that is too easy and direct a way of coming at the truth. I compare you to spiders, who weave their house of defence out of their own bowels; or to a set of people who are groping for a light in broad day.’
August 26.—Waited this morning on Mahommed Nubbee Khan, late ambassador at Calcutta, and now prime minister of Fars. There were a vast number of clients in his court, with whom he transacted business while chatting with us. Amongst the others who came and sat with us, was my tetric adversary—Aga Akbar, who came for the very purpose of presenting the minister with a little book he had written in answer to mine. After presenting it in due form, he sat down, and told me he meant to bring me a copy that day—a promise which he did not perform, through Seyd Ali’s persuasion, who told him it was a performance that would do him no credit.
August 29.—Mirza Ibrahim begins to inquire about the Gospel. The objections he made were such as these: How sins could be atoned for before they were committed? Whether, as Jesus died for all men, all would necessarily be saved? If faith be the condition of salvation, would wicked Christians be saved, provided they believe? I was pleased to see from the nature of the objections that he was considering the subject. To this last objection, I remarked that to those who felt themselves sinners, and came to God for mercy, through Christ, God would give His Holy Spirit, which would progressively sanctify them in heart and life.
August 30.—Mirza Ibrahim praises my answer, especially the first part.
It was on the sacred rock of Behistun, on the western frontiers of Media, on the high road eastward from Babylonia, that Darius Hystaspes, founder of the civil policy of ancient Persia, carved the wonderful cuneiform inscriptions which made that rock the charter of Achæmenian royalty. At Persepolis only the platform, the pillared colonnade, and the palace seem to have been built by him; the other buildings, with commemorative legends, were erected by Xerxes and Artaxerxes Ochus. Lassen, Westergaard, and our own Sir Henry Rawlinson,[62] did not decipher these inscriptions for some twenty years after Martyn’s visit. How deaf had Ormuzd proved all through the centuries to the prayer which Darius the king cut on a huge slab, twenty-six feet in length and six in height, in the southern wall of the great platform at Persepolis: ‘Let not war, nor slavery, nor decrepitude, nor lies obtain power over this province.’ Henry Martyn thus wrote of his visit:
After traversing these celebrated ruins, I must say that I felt a little disappointed: they did not at all answer my expectation. The architecture of the ancient Persians seems to me much more akin to that of their clumsy neighbours the Indians, than to that of the Greeks. I saw no appearance of grand design anywhere. The chapiters of the columns were almost as long as the shafts:—though they are not so represented in Niebuhr’s plate;—and the mean little passages into the square court, or room, or whatever it was, make it very evident that the taste of the Orientals was the same three thousand years ago as it is now. But it was impossible not to recollect that here Alexander and his Greeks passed and repassed; here they sat and sung, and revelled; now all is in silence, generation on generation lie mingled with the dust of their mouldering edifices:
Alike the busy and the gay,
But flutter in life’s busy day,
In fortune’s varying colours drest.
As soon as we recrossed the Araxes, the escort begged me to point out the Keblah to them, as they wanted to pray. After setting their faces towards Mecca, as nearly as I could, I went and sat down on the margin near the bridge, where the water, falling over some fragments of the bridge under the arches, produced a roar, which, contrasted with the stillness all around, had a grand effect. Here I thought again of the multitudes who had once pursued their labours and pleasures on its banks. Twenty-one centuries have passed away since they lived; how short, in comparison, must be the remainder of my days. What a momentary duration is the life of man! Labitur et labetur in omne volubilis ævum, may be affirmed of the river; but men pass away as soon as they begin to exist. Well, let the moments pass:
They’ll waft us sooner o’er
This life’s tempestuous sea,
And land us on the peaceful shore
Of blest eternity.
The true character of Martyn’s Mohammedan and Soofi controversialists comes out in the fast of Ramazan, the ninth month of the lunar year, when from dawn to sunset of each day a strict fast is observed, most trying to the temper, and from sunset to dawn excess is too naturally the rule, especially, as in this case, when Ramazan falls on the long hot days of summer. Of this month the traditions declare that the doors of heaven are opened and the doors of hell shut, while the devils are chained. At this time the miracle play of Hasan and Husain[63] is acted in the native theatres from night to night. In scene xxxi. are enacted the conversion and murder of an English ambassador. Dean Stanley used to tell that Henry Martyn, horrified at the English oaths put into the mouth of the Persian who represented the ambassador in the tragedy, took him and taught him to repeat the Lord’s Prayer instead.