i accompanied them upon the lute with so much
delicacy as to win the admiration of all present. He then drew out, at the
Sultan's request, a piece of his own composition, and sang it with his own
accompaniment, and had the audience first in laughter, and then in
tears--and to complete his Magic, changed to another piece and put them
all asleep.

The Sultan in vain urged Farabi to remain near his person, and offered him
a high position in his household.

Voluminous writings of Farabi are preserved in the library at Leyden.

"A tale of the Arabian Nights," you may say, and yet it is historic. It
reveals the fact that resources, character, and wisdom, in the end triumph
and surmount all obstacles. They are intrinsic and permanent values.

They may remain unknown or unappreciated by others, but they are none the
less riches to him who possesses them.

It was during this same tenth century in which Alfarabi lived, that there
existed at Baghdad a Society composed of Mohammedans, Jews, Christians,
and Atheists, for the purpose of Philosophical discussions and scientific
investigation; and it was doubtless under this influence that Alfarabi was
educated and enabled to cope with the philosophers of the world. Here in
Arabia was the highest culture known at the time, in Medicine and all the
Arts and Sciences, while the Ecclesiastics were inaugurating the dark ages
elsewhere, to eventually spread over the whole of Europe.

Here and there have always appeared individuals superior to their age and
time; men who dug to the foundations of knowledge, built character,
accumulated resources, and left their impress upon all subsequent time.

Nor has this accumulation of real knowledge been derived from books and
schools, though these resources have not been neglected.

Real culture of the Individual has always consisted in the realization of
the latent powers of man, in bringing these to light, in learning by
experience how to use them. Hence arise self-knowledge, self-control, and
a higher evolution.

It is not a mere technical, intellectual acquirement, the ability to
define principles and formulate propositions. It rather consists in
testing them out in actual experience; first by self-analysis to become
familiar with the real self, its capacities and powers, its motives and
aims in life; and having grasped and adjusted all these, then to start
consciously, deliberately, determinedly, and intelligently, on "the road
to the Sou