Part 1

THE PROPHET

By Kahlil Gibran

New York: Alfred A. Knopf

1923

The Twelve Illustrations In This Volume Are Reproduced From Original Drawings By The Author

“His power came from some great reservoir of spiritual life else it could not have been so universal and so potent, but the majesty and beauty of the language with which he clothed it were all his own?”

--Claude Bragdon

THE BOOKS OF KAHLIL GIBRAN

The Madman. 1918 Twenty Drawings. 1919 The Forerunner. 1920 The Prophet. 1923 Sand and Foam. 1926 Jesus the Son of Man. 1928 The Forth Gods. 1931 The Wanderer. 1932 The Garden of the Prophet 1933 Prose Poems. 1934 Nymphs of the Valley. 1948

CONTENTS

The Coming of the Ship On Love On Marriage On Children On Giving On Eating and Drinking On Work On Joy and Sorrow On Houses On Clothes On Buying and Selling On Crime and Punishment On Laws On Freedom On Reason and Passion On Pain On Self-Knowledge On Teaching On Friendship On Talking On Time On Good and Evil On Prayer On Pleasure On Beauty On Religion On Death The Farewell

THE PROPHET

Almustafa, the chosen and the beloved, who was a dawn unto his own day, had waited twelve years in the city of Orphalese for his ship that was to return and bear him back to the isle of his birth.

And in the twelfth year, on the seventh day of Ielool, the month of reaping, he climbed the hill without the city walls and looked seaward; and he beheld his ship coming with the mist.

Then the gates of his heart were flung open, and his joy flew far over the sea. And he closed his eyes and prayed in the silences of his soul.

*****

But as he descended the hill, a sadness came upon him, and he thought in his heart:

How shall I go in peace and without sorrow? Nay, not without a wound in the spirit shall I leave this city.

Long were the days of pain I have spent within its walls, and long were the nights of aloneness; and who can depart from his pain and his aloneness without regret?

Too many fragments of the spirit have I scattered in these streets, and too many are the children of my longing that walk naked among these hills, and I cannot withdraw from them without a burden and an ache.

It is not a garment I cast off this day, but a skin that I tear with my own hands.

Nor is it a thought I leave behind me, but a heart made sweet with hunger and with thirst.

*****

Yet I cannot tarry longer.

The sea that calls all things unto her calls me, and I must embark.

For to stay, though the hours burn in the night, is to freeze and crystallize and be bound in a mould.

Fain would I take with me all that is here. But how shall I?

A voice cannot carry the tongue and the lips that gave it wings. Alone must it seek the ether.