VII
Project Gutenberg EPUB edition
Sadi and Ross, James
A person who had not seen his friend for a length of time, said to him: "Where were you? for I have been very solicitous about you." He replied, "It is better to be sought after than loathed." Thou hast come late, O intoxicating idol! I shall not in a hurry quit my hold on thy skirt:—that mistress whom they see but seldom is at last more desired than she is whom they are cloyed with seeing.
The charmer that can bring companions along with her has come to quarrel; for she cannot be void of jealousy and discontent:—Whenever thou contest to visit me attended with comrades or rivals, though thou comest in peace yet thy object is hostile:—for one single moment that my mistress associated with a rival, it went well-nigh to slay me with jealousy. Smiling, she replied: "O Sa'di! I am the torch of the assembly; what is it to me if the moth consume itself?"