Forty Gems of Beauty — Page 133
133 the Holy Prophet (May peace and blessings of Allah be on him) declared that there was nothing weightier in the Divine scale than excellent conduct. In another Hadith, he says that whoso was not grateful to man was not grateful to God. In fact, the excellence of social conduct constitutes the basis of every virtue; even spirituality is but an advanced state of good conduct. It is therefore for this reason that our chief has laid so much stress on the improvement of social conduct, and the A ha d i th reported about this are far too many to be enumerated. Besides, in so far as the expression of social ethics through individual conduct is concerned, Islam does not omit to satisfy the rights of any claimant. From God down to men and from among men, from the monarch down to the humble servant, good conduct has been enjoined on all. The rights of the officers, of the subordinates, of the father and of the son, of a friend and of a foe, of man and of the beast, in short, of each and every one, have been assigned. And, again, it has been enjoined to discharge these obligations in the best possible manner. Even minor and secondary virtues have not been left out. The Holy Prophet (May peace and blessings of Allah be on him) went so far as to say that if a person meets his acquaintances with a smiling countenance to please them, it will be considered an act of moral excellence on his part, making him worthy of merit in the eyes of God. On another occasion, he advised that thorny or slippery or stinking objects, or stumbling blocks, should be removed from the way lest another brother should suffer thereby. In regard to the merciful treatment of others, he said,