The Seventh: Some of the people of illumination and ecstasy fall into an abyss in their spiritual jour-neyings by preferring pride, complaint, ecstatic utterances, public regard, and being referred to, to offering thanks and supplication, beseeching Almighty God, and self-sufficiency. Whereas the highest degree is Muhammadan worship, which is termed "belovedness." The basis and essence of worship is to manifest the perfection of that reality by supplicating and beseeching Almighty God, showing deep humility before Him, offering thanks, and through impotence and want, and by displaying self-sufficiency in the face of others. Some of the great saints have involuntarily and temporarily become proud and made complaints and ecstatic utterances, but they should not be followed voluntar­ily on such points; they are rightly-guided but not the guide; their way may not be taken!

The Eighth Abyss: Some of those who journey spiritually are self-centered and precipitate and want to consume in this world the fruits of sainthood, which will be given in the hereafter; they fall into an abyss by seeking them on their spiritual journeyings. But, as such verses as,

"The life of this world is but goods and chattels"²

proclaim, and as is proved decisively in many of the Words, a single fruit in the realm of eternity is superior to a thousand gardens in this fleeting world. For this reason, those blessed fruits should not be consumed here. If without being sought they are given to eat here, they should be thanked for, and deemed divine favours bestowed, not as reward, but for encouragement.

Here we shall describe briefly nine out of the truly numerous fruits and benefits of the Sufi path.

The First is the unfolding and clarification, by means of the Sufi paths that are on the straight way, of the truths of faith, which are the keys, sources, and springs of the eternal treasuries of everlasting happiness; it is their manifestation at the degree of the vision of certainty.

The Second: Since the Sufi path is a means of working the heart, the mainspring of the human machine, and of causing the heart to stir the other subtle faculties into motion, it drives them to fulfil the purposes of their creation, and thus makes a per­son into a true human being.
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2.Qur'an,3:185.