historians-from-spain

"Although he never visited America, he appeals particularly to Americans."

"India has not changed much in the course of ages. Invasions have taken place, wars have been waged in her vast plains, new nations and races have conquered the land and ruled over it, foreign civilizations have brought new notions and new ideals; but everybody and everything has been remodeled and reshaped and recast by the influence of the Indian nation and its ancient civilization. The ancient civilizations of Egypt, Babylonia, and Assyria have been blotted out from the map of the world. But that of India, the first lights of which have been discovered in modern times along the banks of the Indus, is still alive ...."

"Though the spiritual life of our countrymen, thanks to linguistic and cultural affinities with Italy, is nourished now also in the parishes of the City, nevertheless, we keep up the liturgical and community life that befits a priestly dwelling."

"That the stars are celestial bodies with no mind or soul. They neither know the future nor affect people. Their effect on people however can be through their physical characteristics, such as the effect of the sun’s heat and rays on the planets and the effect of the moon on the tides of seas."

"What fixes and preserves a nation’s language, as well as its sciences and its history, is simply the strength of its political power, accompanied by the happy welfare and leisure of its inhabitants."

"Compare yourself, for wealth, status and health to those lower than you. For faith, science, and virtue, compare yourself to those who are higher than you."

"Sciences are like powerful drugs, which suit the strong and exhaust the weak. Likewise, complex sciences enrich a vigorous mind, and keep it off evil, but exhaust the mediocre mind."

"We know with certainty that never could man have acquired the sciences and arts by himself guided only by his natural abilities and without the benefit of instruction. (This applies, e.g., to) medicine, the knowledge of the physiological temperaments, the diseases and their causes, in all their numerous varieties, and the invention of adequate treatment and cure of each of them by drugs or preparations, which could never have been actually tried out. For how could anyone test every prescription on every disease since this would take tens of thousands of years and necessitate the examination of every sick person in the world?"

"I have come across most people- with the exception of those that God most High has protected-they rush into misery, worry, the exhaustion of this world, and amassing terrible sins, that will earn them hell-fire, gaining nothing in pursuing their evil deeds… And they know that their evil intentions will neither fulfill their wishes, nor bring any gains; and that with purer intentions they will obtain great rest for their souls."

"Whoever harms his kinship and his neighbors is worse than them. Whosoever returns ill that he receives from them is like them. Whosoever does not return ill done to him is the master, the best and most virtuous amongst all."

"Whosoever rises above things of this world, in front of which you kneel is much stronger than you."

"Blame from a man with a corrupt soul in opposing him, and refraining from evil deeds is better for you than his esteem if you did evil."

"Should the merit of science being fear of the ignorant, and love and honour for the scholars, that alone should encourage striving for it. What then about its other virtues in this world and the other."

"If science, and devoting oneself to it, had no other use than avoiding exhausting temptations, rushes of hope that give worry, and thoughts that sadden the soul, that alone should give us reasons to seek it… Kinglets have sought distraction in chess, wine, music, hunting and much else that only bring harm in this world and the other."

"There is no worse calamity for science and for scholarship than those intruders who are foreign to them. They are ignorant and yet think they know; they ruin everything whilst convinced they are fixing all."

"Whosoever has a natural leaning towards a science, even if it was less noble than another, should not abandon it for the other because if he did he would be like someone who would be growing coconuts in al-Andalus and olive trees in India, crops that would never fructify."

"Whosoever is miserly with the gift of his knowledge deserves more blame than whosoever is miserly with his money, because the man miserly with his money fears exhausting what he has, but the one miserly with his science is with an object which does not become exhausted with use, and that he would lose nothing in sharing it."

"If you pride yourself with your science, then you must realize that you have no merit; science is a gift that God has granted you. Thus do not acknowledge it in a way that angers the Highest, because he could erase it from your head through an illness of some sort."

"Also be aware that many men eager for science, read, study, and research with application, but derive no fruit. The man of science must realize that if application alone was enough, many other men would be superior to him. Science, thus, is certainly a gift from the Highest. What place is left for pride, thus? We can only accept in humility, and give thanks to God, asking him to increase his bounty, and beg him not to deprive us of it."

"The most noble sciences, are those which bring us closer to the Creator; those which help us be pleasing to Him."

"Whosoever wishes for happiness in the other life, wisdom in this world, equity in their deeds, having all moral qualities, the practice of all virtues, ought to follow in his deeds the example of Mohammed (PBUH) the Messenger of God."

"I have seen men who had studied the sciences, who knew the messages of the Prophets, the recommendations of the wise, and yet who surpassed the most evil men in their worse deeds, and their depravation. This is very frequent, and so I have understood that these two moral attitudes were favours granted or denied by the Most High."

"The use of science in the practice of virtue, is considerable: the man who knows the beauty of virtue will follow it, however possible. Knowing the evil of wrong, he will avoid it, however possible. He listens to worthy praise, and keeps his distance from unworthy praise. From this is derived that science has a part in every virtue, and that ignorance has one in every vice. Man who is illiterate and who still practices virtue must be extremely pure, a virtuous being. This is the state of Prophets (PBUH) because God had conveyed goodness to them without they acquiring it from men."

"If you attend a study session, only behave like a man wishing to expand his knowledge and seeking a higher reward from God. Do not act like a man content with what he holds, who is waiting for a weakness (from someone) to criticize (it or him), or an oddity to raise. This will be acting like vile people who have never mastered science.’ ‘If you attend with good intentions you will obtain the best results. Otherwise just stay at home, awarding yourself rest, a good morality, and a salutary outcome in front of God."

"If you attended (a study session) strictly adopt three attitudes; there is no fourth. First: You can lock yourself in the silence of ignorance. Second: If you do not behave as such, ask for the questions a man seeking to learn asks…. This man will ask only about what he does not know, not about what he knows. Asking about matters one knows is making proof of ineptitude; this is only ranting, waste of time for everyone…. If the person you are questioning does not give satisfactory answers, stop questioning… Third: You can answer like a scientist, refuting clearly the other’s arguments. If you are not capable of that, do not insist….”"

"Ask questions stubbornly, very proud men who seeing themselves right without knowing anything about the matter. This shows lack of piety, a tendency to ranting, a weak mind, and excessive vanity. [...] If you hear, or read writing (you object to), do not react with violence until you have proof that what is expressed is wrong. Do not accept that with the enthusiasm of the credulous man either until being wholly convinced of that. In both situations you blind yourself and drift away from truth… Act like a person who has no preconceived views, one ready to know and accept what is right and reject what is wrong."

"There are mobile objects and stationary objects, but there is neither motion nor staticness."

"The Earth is spherical despite what is popularly believed … the proof is that the Sun is always vertical to a particular spot on Earth."

"May God make us amongst those he allows to do good, and to practice it, and those who see the right path as none of us is without weakness; whosoever sees his weakness will forget those of others. May God make us die in the faith of Muhammad. Amen, Oh Master of the Universes."

"You came to me just before the Christians rang their bells. The half-moon was rising looking like an old man's eyebrow or a delicate instep. And although it was still night when you came a rainbow gleamed on the horizon, showing as many colours as a peacock's tail."

"(His book The Decisive word on sects, heterodoxies and denominations is)The first of its genre, and it is surprising that it was written in the 11th century when nothing like it existed in Christian Europe. Ibn Hazm proceeds like a scholar and a theologian who is acquainted through his own study and experience with the religions of his time and he analyses them in detail, quoting their texts."

"Law will be honorable, just, possible, according to nature, according to the custom of the country, adapted to the place and time, necessary, useful, clear also, lest it contain anything in its obscurity that tends to fraud, drawn up for no one’s private advantage, but for the common good of all citizens."

"[The abbot] will exhibit himself as one to be imitated in all examples of works; nor shall anyone be allowed to command anything that he has not done himself."

"Through idleness, lusts and harmful thoughts grow, but through the exercise of labor, vices are likewise diminished."

"If [the monks] wish to devote themselves to reading so that they do not work, they are contumacious to reading itself, because they do not do what they read there."

"Monks who are working should meditate or sing so that they may be consoled in their labor by the delight of the words and songs of God. For if secular workers do not cease to sing lewd songs among their labors, and thus entangle their mouths in songs and fables, so that they do not withdraw their hands from work, how much more should the servants of Christ, who must work with their hands in such a way that they always have the praise of God in their mouths, and serve with their tongues in psalms and hymns!"

"A detected vice is quickly cured, but the hidden vice, the more it is concealed, the more deeply it creeps, for truly he who neglects to make it known does not wish to be cured at all."

"Offenses are either grave or light. A person guilty of a lighter offense is one who has chosen to be idle; who has come late to duty, to a meeting, or to the table; who has laughed in the choir or engaged in idle tales... who has used a book carelessly... Therefore, these and similar offenses must be corrected with a three-day excommunication."

"For brothers who pass from this life, before they are buried, a sacrifice should be offered to the Lord for the remission of their sins."

"Theological necessity was among the main reasons which led St. Isidore of Seville, in the seventh century, to incorporate this theory [of the later development of insects out of carrion, following the initial creation], supported by St. Basil and St. Augustine, into his great encyclopedic work [Etymologiae] which gave materials for thought on God and Nature to so many generations. He familiarized the theological world still further with the doctrine of secondary creation, giving such examples of it as that "bees are generated from decomposed veal, beetles from horseflesh, grasshoppers from mules, scorpions from crabs," and, in order to give still stronger force to the idea of such transformations, he dwells on the biblical account of Nebuchadnezzar, which appears to have taken strong hold upon medieval thought in science, and he declares that other human beings had been changed into animals, especially into swine, wolves, and owls."

"After the wars and the killings had ended, when usually there survived only some boys, some women, and children, these survivors were distributed among the Christians to be slaves."

"And of all the infinite universe of humanity, these people are the most guileless, the most devoid of wickedness and duplicity, the most obedient and faithful to their native masters and to the Spanish Christians whom they serve."

"These people are the most devoid of rancors, hatreds, or desire for vengeance of any people in the world."

"Their reason for killing and destroying such an infinite number of souls is that the Christians have an ultimate aim, which is to acquire gold, and to swell themselves with riches in a very brief time and thus rise to a high estate disproportionate to their merits."

"It should be kept in mind that their insatiable greed and ambition, the greatest ever seen in the world, is the cause of their villainies."

"With my own eyes I saw Spaniards cut off the nose and ears of Indians, male and female, without provocation, merely because it pleased them to do it. ...Likewise, I saw how they summoned the caciques and the chief rulers to come, assuring them safety, and when they peacefully came, they were taken captive and burned."

"They usually dealt with the chieftains and nobles in the following way: they made a grid of rods which they placed on forked sticks, then lashed the victims to the grid and lighted a smoldering fire underneath, so that little by little, as those captives screamed in despair and torment, their souls would leave them...."

"They took infants from their mothers' breasts, snatching them by the legs and pitching them headfirst against the crags or snatched them by the arms and threw them into the rivers, roaring with laughter and saying as the babies fell into the water, "Boil there, you offspring of the devil!""

"They attacked the towns and spared neither the children nor the aged nor pregnant women nor women in childbed, not only stabbing them and dismembering them but cutting them to pieces as if dealing with sheep in the slaughter house."

"They made some low wide gallows on which the hanged victim's feet almost touched the ground, stringing up their victims in lots of thirteen, in memory of Our Redeemer and His twelve Apostles, then set burning wood at their feet and thus burned them alive."