Page 10 - Book of Crates

The book begins in this way.

In the name of the lenient and merciful God!

I had completed the study of the stars, and of the surface of the
earth, its position and its various elements; I had finished the survey of
the science of the law and the forms of logic, when I came to the
temple of Serapis, while proclaiming that there is no other divinity only
God the Creator.

I found there, in the king’s library, a clear book, without obscure
expressions, that treated of the sublime work and knowledge that God
reserved for the people who possess wisdom and [...]. Never has a
more admirable and clearer book been composed before mine and
nothing similar will be composed hereafter, because I acquired the true
science. I brought my book and I hid it in the sanctuary of the temple of
Serapis; it is only with God’s permission and on his special nomination
that someone will be able to obtain this.

While I was praying and asking my Creator to move away from me
the snake who slips into the human heart, and to help me in the
enterprise that I had formed to compose my book, I felt all of a sudden
taken up in the air, following the same path of the sun and the moon. I
saw then in my hand a parchment entitled Modzhib ed-dholma ou
monawwir ed-dhou (The one that chases away darkness and produces a
resplendent clarity). On this parchment were drawn images representing
the seven heavens, a picture of the two brilliant stars and the five
planets which follow an opposite path. Each heaven was surrounded
with a legend written with stars.

Then I saw an old man, the most beautiful of men, seated in a
chair. He was dressed in white clothing and held with his hand a board
of the chair, on which was placed a book. Some admirable vessels were
in front of him, the most marvelous which I had ever seen.

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