These Genii, according to our belief and
hope, are not altogether reprobate, but are still in the way of
probation, and may hereafter be punished or rewarded. Leave we
this to the mollahs and the imaums. Enough that with us the
reverence for these spirits is not altogether effaced by what we
have learned from the Koran, and that many of us still sing, in
memorial of our fathers' more ancient faith, such verses as
these."
So saying, he proceeded to chant verses, very ancient in the
language and structure, which some have thought derive their
source from the worshippers of Arimanes, the Evil Principle.
AHRIMAN.
Dark Ahriman, whom Irak still
Holds origin of woe and ill!
When, bending at thy shrine,
We view the world with troubled eye,
Where see we 'neath the extended sky,
An empire matching thine!
If the Benigner Power can yield
A fountain in the desert field,
Where weary pilgrims drink;
Thine are the waves that lash the rock,
Thine the tornado's deadly shock,
Where countless navies sink!
Or if he bid the soil dispense
Balsams to cheer the sinking sense,
How few can they deliver
From lingering pains, or pang intense,
Red Fever, spotted Pestilence,
The arrows of thy quiver!
Chief in Man's bosom sits thy sway,
And frequent, while in words we pray
Before another throne,
Whate'er of specious form be there,
The secret meaning of the prayer
Is, Ahriman, thine own.
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