Excerpt from The Sacred Anthology: A Book of Ethnical Scriptures Sacred Anthology contains some writings that can not be strictly defined by the phrase in its secondary title ethnical scriptures.' desire to introduce passages full of truth and beauty, and at the same time not very accessible, overcame my desire for technical conformity with the only title I could find descriptive of the main purport of the volume. At the same time, it may be maintained that these instances are few, and that the word 'scripture is not so limited as to exclude those classics of a nation Which have exerted a wide and profound influence on its religious life. The division of sacred books into canonical and uncanonical is, in every country, more or less arbitrary, and often of doubtful value. Thus in the case of sadi, - from whom I have largely quoted, - no writer, perhaps, after Mohammed is so universally read in his own country, or oftener quoted by public teachers. To this day the chant of the dervish is frequently taken from his glowing sentences, - especially the last nine lines of CLXXVII. P. 112 of this volume. The same, measurably, may be said of Hafiz the Tongue of the Secret, ' of Nizami, of Kheyam. Their parables and verses have survived time and tide until now. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.