The Book of Akbar 341.3

341.3

and as the wicked spirits of Transoxiana in the darkness of their heart have no respect to glory and majesty, and apply a sublime name to impure, tainted wretches, saying, "My Padshah, my Padshah," so did this depraved one used to address Shaham Beg, and bow down before him and perform the kornish. In the superfluity of his naughtiness, of which only a little may be said, he left the way of auspiciousness and trod the path of destruction. A greater evil was the coming to him of flatterers, whose crooked glances regarded nothing but their own interest. For this reason they continually gave a good complexion to his wickednesses, and worked for their own preferment. Whenever a man of evil nature is in high position, and gives way to intoxication, and a crowd of flatterers beset him, the spiritual and temporal condition of such a man deteriorates, and he ends in the ruin of his health and wealth. The evil-ending career of 'Ali Quli Khan is an illustration of this. When the irreverence and shamelessness of those ill-fated ones came to the knowledge of H.M., admonitory letters were sent and wise exhortations and commands were issued. The lofty order was: "Our Court is a sea of pardon and beneficence. The man who by submitting himself to desire and the society of wicked flatterers is overpowered by the lord of lust and passion becomes the mark of various disgraces.