CHAP. I.] FAVOURITE STUDIES. 7
emperor did not like to hear useless poetry, still less laudator' verses. But he made an exception in favour of poems containing good counsels."^^ The moral precepts of Sadi and Hafiz he had evidently learnt by rote in his youth, and he quoted them to his last day, but he does not seem to have studied these poets in later life. Once he asked for the works of a poet named MuUa Shah. I But we may rightly hold that, unlike his grandfather he was not fond of poetry, and unlike Shah Jahan he had no passion for history. " His favourite study was theological works,— Commentaries on the Quran, the Tradi- tions of Muhammad, Canon Law, the works of Imam Muhammad Ghazzali, selections from the letters of Shaikh Sharf Yahia of Munir, and Shaikh Zainuddin Qutb Muhi Shirazi, and other works of that class.":!: We also learn that he
- Masir-i-Alamgiri, 532.
f Asiatic Society of Bengal Pars. MS. F. 27, $a. He mentions another poet whose pen-name was Fani.
Masir-i-Alamgiri, 531-532. He spent his leisure in the
afternoon in investigating theological problems, deliberating on the philosophy of truth, (lit., 'the certain sciences,') reading the books and pamphlets of wisemen and saints. {Alamgirnamah, 1103.) Aurangzib speaks of his having read two books of Ghazzali (A.S.B. Pers. MS. F, 27, 126a and b.)
