And plume him whose plumage hath fallen in calamity great or small; and sorrow not at the loss, and be not covetous in amassing.
And resist thy base nature, and accustom thy hand to liberality, and listen not to blame for it, and keep thy hand from hoarding.
And make provision of good for thy soul, and leave that which will bring on ill, and prepare the ship for thy journey, and dread the deep of the sea.
Thus have I given my precepts, friends, and shown as one who showeth clearly: and happy the man who walketh by my doctrines and maketh them his example.
Then he drew back his sleeve from an arm strong of sinew, on which he had fastened the splints of deceit not of fracture; presenting himself to beg in the garb of impudence: and by it he beguiled those people until his sleeve was brimmed and full; then he came down from the hillock merry at the gift. Said the narrator: But I pulled him from behind by the hem of his cloak; and he turned to me submissively, and faced me, saluting me: and lo! it was our old Abu Zayd, in his very self, and in all his deceit: and I said to him,
How many, Abu Zayd, will be the varieties of thy cunning to drive the prey to thy net? and wilt thou not care who censures?
And he answered without shame and without hesitation:
Look well, and leave thy blaming; for, tell me, hast thou ever known a time when a man would not win of the world when the game was in his hands?
Then I said to him: Away with thee, Old Shaykh of Hell, laden with infamy! For there is nothing like thee for the fairness of thy seeming and the foulness of thy purpose; except silvered dung or a whited sewer. Then we parted; and I went away to the right, and he went away to the left; and I set myself to the quarter of the south, and he set himself to the quarter of the north.