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taught me, may the Prophet multiply to thee.
"Under the instruction of the physician Aluazer, I obtained an early knowledge of his art. To those who were smitten with diseases, I could administer plants, which the sun had impregnated with the spirit of health. But the scenes of pain, languor, and mortality, which were perpetually rising before me, made me often tremble for myself. I saw the grave open at my feet: I determined therefore to contemplate only the regions beyond it, and to despise every acquisition which I could not keep. I conceived an opinion, that as there was no merit but a voluntary poverty, and silent meditation, those who desired money were not proper objects of bounty; therefore money was despised. I buried mine in the earth; and renouncing society, I wandered into a wild and sequestered part of the country; my dwelling was a cave by the side of a hill: I drank the running water from the spring, and ate such fruits and herbs as I could find. To encrease the austerity of my life, I frequently watched all night; sitting at the entrance
