the sages of India were discussing, but could at last not reproach him with anything except slowness of speech, because he delayed long and his hearers were obliged to wait till he delivered himself of what he had to say. When Barzachumihr heard of this he said: "It is better for me to consider what to speak, than to repent of what I have spoken. A trained orator, old, aged, first meditates, and then speaks; do not speak without consideration; speak well, and if slow what matters it? Deliberate and then begin to talk; say thyself enough, before others say enough. By speech a man is better than a brute, but a beast is better unless thou speakest properly."
How then [could I venture to appear] in the sigh of the grandees of my Lord, may His victory be glorious, who are an assembly of pious men and the centre of profound scholars? If I were to be led in the ardour of conversation to speak petulantly, I could produce only a trifling stock-in-trade in the noble presence; but glass beads are not worth a barley-corn in the bazâr of jewellers, a lamp does not shine in the presence of the sun, and a minaret looks low at the foot of Mount Alvend.[1]
Who lifts up his neck with pretentions, foes hasten to him from every side. Sa'di has fallen to be a hermit; no one came to attack a fallen man. First deliberation, then speech; the foundation was laid first, then the wall.
I know bouquet-binding, but not in the garden; I sell a sweetheart, but not in Canaan.[2] Loqman the philosopher,[3] being asked from whom he had learnt wisdom, replied: "From the blind, who do not take a step before trying the place."
xix
