ibn Hishām said: No one could have moved quicker than the Playboy in bringing inkwell and paper. He put it gleefully in front of the ʿUmdah and asked him to fill out the check. Once he had signed it, the three of them left. The ʿUmdah kept dragging the edge of his coat behind him and scratching his head. Meanwhile the Pāshā kept looking on in amazement and pondering. We followed them out to see how things would work out.
مصباح الشرق ٨٨، ١١ يناير ١٩٠٠
Miṣbāḥ al-sharq 88, January 11, 190016
١،٢٨
قال عيسى بن هشام: فخرجنا والباشا يقول: ما هذا الذي نرى من أحوال هذا الورى كأن ناقعًا فقعهم في جابيه جمعت اخلاط الكبائر أو غامًا غمهم في خابيه وعت أمشاج الجرائر فإننا كلما خطونا خطوة رأينا من المكر والغش صنوفًا وأضرابا أو نجونا نجوة قرأنا من الخداع والنفاق فصولاً وأبوابًا فما أتعس من يعاشرهم وما أنحس من يحيى فيهم وما أشقى من يجاورهم وما أسعد من يجافيهم واغوثاه من الإنسان في هذا الزمان فقلت له قدك بل وفي كل زمان:
لن تستقيم أمور الناس في عصر
ولا استقامت فذا أمنًا وذا رعبا
ولا يقوم على حق بنو زمن
من عهد آدم كانوا في الهوى شعبا
Īsa ibn Hishām said: As we left, the Pāshā was saying: “What is going on with the things we see people doing? It’s almost as though someone has soaked everyone in a jar containing a mixture of all the worst faults to be found in man or else dipped them in a pool full of the various categories of crime. With each step we take we seem to be encountering every conceivable type of fraud and deceit. Whenever we investigate something, we read whole chapters involving swindling and hypocrisy. Pity the poor devils who have to deal with them and live among them! How miserable their neighbours must be, and how delighted those who can elude them—so God help me against mankind in this era!” “Enough of such talk!” I replied, and quoted these lines to him:
In no age will people’s affairs be in sound order,
nor have they ever been; here security, there alarm.
In no age do people uphold any right;
from Adam’s time they were divided by caprice.17
٢،٢٨
هكذا كان بنو آدم تأخر عهدهم أو تقادم فهم على ما هم فيه أبدا أمس واليوم وغدا وما عساك تقول في ذرية الشيخ آدم وحواء وقد قالت فيهم من قبلك ملائكة السماء {أَتَجْعَلُ فِيهَا مَن يُفْسِدُ فِيهَا وَيَسْفِكُ الدِّمَاءَ} وما عساك تذكر قومًا ترى أصغر صغير منهم وأحقر حقير فيهم يود لو افتدى بمنطقة البروج ومجرة الكواكب ما أسفَ من الدنايا وسفل من المطالب وما عساك تصف خلقًا أفضل ما في أعضائه أكبر سبب لشقاء الخلق وشقائه:
أفضل ما في النفس يغتالها
فنستعيذ الله من جنده
هذه المضفة التي بفيه ويقال أنها أفضل ما فيه لو نسجت مضفة على قدرها حماة العقارب حماك الله لحمتها ولعاب الأفاعي وسمام الأسلود أعاذك الله سداها وصبغتها لكانت مع ذلك أخف شرا ولكان هذا اللسان أشد منها ضرا وما عساك تنعت نوعا نعت الله واحدًا منهم في القرآن الكريم يتسع صفات:
{حَلَّافٍ مَّهِينٍ هَمَّازٍ مَّشَّاءٍ بِنَمِيمٍ مَّنَّاعٍ لِّلْخَيْرِ مُعْتَدٍ أَثِيمٍ عُتُلٍّ بَعْدَ ذَٰلِكَ زَنِيمٍ}
فأف لمصيرهم نهار وحندس
وجني رجال منهم ونساء
وليت وليدًا مات ساعة وضعه
ولم يرتضع من أمه النفساء
يقول لها من قبل نطق لسانه
تفيدين بي أن تشكي ونائي
Whether the era was backward or advanced, mankind was always this way; people now are exactly as they’ve always been, yesterday, today, and tomorrow. What can you possibly say about the descendants of Shaykh Adam and his wife Eve, when the angels have already had the following to say about them: «Do you put in it someone who will do mischief amongst them and will spill blood?»18 How can you describe a society when, as you can see, utterly despicable and insignificant people aspire to be ransomed for the very zodiacal sphere and galaxy of stars? What despicable behaviour, what lewd desires! How can you characterize a created species when its most outstanding members are the chief cause of mankind’s and their own distress?
The best things in the heart destroy it,
so we seek refuge in God from its army.19
“The morsel inside the man’s mouth is the best thing in it,” as the saying goes. If another identical morsel could be made with a scorpion sting as its meat—may God protect you!—and viper spittle as its pigment—may God shield you!—it would still be less harmful and pernicious when juxtaposed with this type of language. How can you describe a species, one of whom God Himself has described in a verse of the Qurʾan with nine epithets:
«An oath taker, despicable, a slanderer proceeding in his libel, a preventer of good, a transgressor and criminal, harsh as well and impure by birth»20?
So to blazes with their periods of day and night
and their two sexes, men and women!
Would
