Gabie and to fetch the answer to that question. Then Abdu-l-Massiah went to Satih; and on reaching him, found him in the agonies of death. When he saluted Satih and gave him the salutations and felicitations of Chosroes, there came no reply. Then Abdu-l-Massiah recited to him some verses which Chosroes had sent to Satih, and in which he had expressed the hope of receiving a favourable reply to his query. When Satih heard those verses, he raised his head, and said, "Abdu-l-Massiah has come to Satih upon a laggard camel, when Satih had already received the honour of entering the grave. O Abdu-l-Massiah, the king of the Assanides, i.e. Nushirvan, has sent thee to me, because his palaces have been distressed and shaken, and their towers fallen to the earth, and the fire-altars of the Persians have been extinguished, and the chief fire-priest has seen in his dream unruly camels, drawing after them Arab horses beyond the Tigris, to be spread over the land of Persia: in the time when the reading of the Koran is to come to pass, and when the Lord of the stick,¹ i.e. Mohammed, is to appear, and the Wady of Semawa shall flow with water, and the sea of Sawa shall overflow the land, and the fire of the fire-worshippers shall be extinguished, — in that time shall Babylon be no longer Persian, and Syria shall no longer belong to Satih, i.e. the Persians shall be driven out of the empire of Babylon, and Satih shall quit the world, so that the science of prophecy shall no longer remain in Syria; and according to the fourteen dilapidated towers of the palace of Chosroes there shall still be fourteen rulers from amongst his males and females, after which mighty and great things will come to pass and all that is to be will be."

'Satih had no sooner given utterance to these words than he collapsed, and expired. But Abdu-l-Massiah returned to Chosroes, and told him all he had heard from Satih. Chosroes was somewhat comforted, and said, "It will take a long time before the reigns of fourteen of our descendants can have passed away." But Chosroes had no knowledge of the Divine decrees. It is reported that ten of

their kings passed away in four years; and the reigns of the four other kings were completed under Omar; and God granted the overthrow of Yezdejerd, who was the last king of Persia, by the hand of Saad Ibn Abi Wakaz. Yezdejerd escaped, and many times collected soldiers to war against the Mussulmans, till A.H. 31, under the Califate of Osman, he fled from the battle of Nehavend to Khorassan, where a miller killed him. But God knows best.

'The masters of biographical and historical science have stated that when Satih died, prophecy was taken away from the world.¹ This statement indicates that the original object of the existence of prophets and diviners was, as it were, to make known in Arabia the mission of Mohammed; and the expression in the traditions, "There is no more prophecy after the mission of the prophet," confirms this meaning. And the import of the word "prophet" in the tradition, "They believed in what came to the prophets and diviners, but they rejected in unbelief what was sent down upon Mohammed," shows, that whoever claims the gift of prophecy, after the prophetic mission of Mohammed, is a mere diviner, whereas he who disclaims it, has the reality of prophetic gift and is not a diviner. For whoever disclaims prophetic gifts after Mohammed's prophetic mission, is a true prophet, like Satih and Suwad, and to testify to what is true is not unbelief: but whoever lays claim to being a prophet, after God had taken away the prophetic gift from amongst men, when He made known the prophetic mission of Mohammed the Chosen, he is a liar and makes the prophet a liar; and whoever bears testimony in favour of such a liar, must certainly be counted an infidel."' ² (R.)