Early Writings — Page 9
HADRAT MIRZA GHULAM AHMAD AS 9 may view in bodies and souls than those that are found in them at present. For instance, man has two eyes, and the human intellect: it as a possibility that he might have had four: two on the front of the face and two at the back, so that he could see what was behind him just as he is able to observe what is in front of him. And, there is no doubt that to have four eyes instead of two would be far more beneficial and advantageous. Likewise, man does not have wings. It could have been possible that he too had wings like birds. Similarly, the human mind is confined within specific parameters of activity. Just as it cannot easily fathom hidden real- ities without the instruction of a teacher, and just as it cannot function properly if affected by an externally oppressing force such as madness or intoxication due to which it quickly begins to lose its abilities and faculties; similarly, it cannot easily perceive the infinitesimal particulars of a thing as the learned scholar and researcher Avicenna has explained in the seventh chapter of his book Remarks and Admonitions, even though it was rationally possible for man to have been preserved from such shortfalls and inadequacies. Therefore, the question is what is the underly- ing reason in man being deprived of a whole array of capabilities and merits which, as rationality suggests, he could have possibly possessed? Is it because someone else proposed these shortcom- ings for man or is it because man voluntarily proposed them for himself? If someone says that man himself opted for them, this would surely be false, because no one prefers to be deficient. On 1. This is comprehensive philosophical work entitled Al-Ishärät Wat- Tanbihāt which was originally written in Arabic by the renowned philosopher Ibni Sīnā (Avicenna) on logic and metaphysics. [Publisher]