Note 156 — Chapter IV
Edward Rehatsek translation
Núshírván, surnamed ’Adil, or the Just (the Chosroes of the Greeks), was of the Sassanian dynasty of ancient Persian kings, and died, after a very prosperous reign of 48 years, A.D. 579. Muhammed was wont to boast of his good fortune in having been born during the reign of so wise and just a prince. His dying injunctions to his son and successor, Hormuz, are thus recorded by Sa’dí (Bustán, B. i): “Be thou in heart the guardian of the poor. Be not in bondage to thine own ease. No one will live in comfort in thy kingdom if thou desirest only thine own comfort and sayest, ‘It is enough.’ He will receive no praise from the wise who passeth his nights in sleep whilst the wolf is amidst his flock. Keep watch over the necessitous poor; for the peasant it is from which the king deriveth his throne. The king is the tree, the peasant the root: the tree, O my son, deriveth its strength from the root.”