abstinence:--of course, the skill of the physician is advice, and the
patient's regimen and diet yield the fruits of health!


V

A certain person would be making vows of abstinence and breaking them.
At last a reverend gentleman observed to him, "So I understand that you
make a practice of eating to excess; and that any restraint on your
appetite, namely, this vow, is weaker than a hair, and this
voraciousness, as you indulge it, would break an iron chain; but the day
must come when it will destroy you." A man was rearing the whelp of a
wolf; when full grown it tore its patron and master.


VI

In the annals of Ardishir Babagan it is recorded that he asked an
Arabian physician, saying, "What quantity of food ought to be eaten
daily?" He replied, "A hundred dirams' weight were sufficient." The king
said, "What strength can a man derive from so small a quantity?" The
physician replied: "_So much can support you; but in whatever you exceed
that you must support it_.--Eating is for the purpose of living, and
speaking in praise of God; but thou believest that we live only to eat."


VII

Two dervishes of Khorasan were fellow-companions on a journey. One was
so spare and moderate that he would break his fast only every other