The Institutes of Akbar 2.3.3

2.3.3

Abul Fazl was so completely taken up with study that he preferred the life of a recluse to the unstable patronage of the great and to the bondage which attendance at court in those days rendered inevitable. But from the time Faizí had been asked by Akbar to attend the court, hopes of a brighter future dawned, and Abul Fazl, who had then completed his seventeenth year, saw in the encouragement held out by the emperor, in spite of Mubarak’s numerous enemies at court, a guarantee that patient toil, on his part, too, would not remain without fruit. The skill with which Faizí in the meantime acquired and retained Akbar’s friendship, prepared the way for Abul Fazl; and when the latter, in the very end of 981 (beginning of 1574, A. D.), was presented to Akbar as Faizí’s brother, the reception was so favorable that he gave up all thoughts of leading a life among manuscripts. “As fortune did not at first assist me,” says Abul Fazl in the Akbarnámah, “I almost became selfish and conceited, and resolved to tread the path of proud retirement. The number of pupils that I had gathered around me, served but to increase my pedantry. In fact, the pride of learning had made my brain drunk with the idea of seclusion. Happily for myself, when I passed the nights in lonely spots with true seekers after truth, and enjoyed the society of such as are empty-handed, but rich in mind and heart, my eyes were opened and I saw the selfishness and covetousness of the so-called learned.