VIII: If thou takest into consideration the many favours…

If thou takest into consideration the many favours of the Almighty,
When wilt thou be able, for even one of them, fitting thanks to return?

One of the favours HE hath bestowed upon thee is Islam's true faith:
The other, that HE hath placed thee the great Huma's shadow beneath.

Let it not happen, that in the end, thou shouldst lament about that,
For which, like the nightingale, thou constantly sacrificest thyself.

The world shall embrace thy feet and thy hands with affection,
If thou make thyself the dust of the feet of holy men.

Thou shalt, at that time, attain unto the object of thy wishes,
When thou shalt make thy life and goods an oblation unto them.

It behoveth thee to consider each respiration as the last;
For death many people hath homeless and desolate made.

Mankind come into the world, and soon from it depart:
How canst thou then place any hope upon this transient abode?

But I will eschew even the sovereignty of the world itself,
If THOU make Khwajah Muhammad a beggar, at his loved one's door.