worships except as an awakening to their hidden secrets and by way of setting parables.

The determined one—who subdues his sensory self by stripping away its lowly obstacles, unsheathes the sword of his resolve to fight his desires, and diverts his aspiration from worldly foods to sacred information—embarks on his journey from the world of imagination to the Shadow of Shadows and the Place of Perfection. He rides the mount of Diligence, provides himself with Piety, armors himself with Fear, accompanies Patience, and joins the Righteous; for it was said: "The companion before the road." Indeed, the believer of solitude is not the believer of misguidance.

He relies on Sincerity and drives his mount with Good Expectations [of Allah]; for He (Mighty is His speech) said in one of the revealed books: "I am as My believing servant thinks of Me, so let him think well of Me."

He makes Contentment [Al-Rida] his leader and the Rising Star from the horizon of heaven his guide. He strips himself [his soul] in the removal of the stitched garment [al-makhit]—which is an expression for the acquisitions of the World of Composition—using the water of pure internal knowledge, free from the mixture of falsehood, so that the Ihram of Acceptance may be bestowed upon him by entering into the Right Sanctuary and the circumambulation of the Inhabited House [Al-Bayt al-Ma'mur],