The Illusion of Freedom

The Other Side of Death T he Greek king Alexander conquered many lands, but when his time to leave this world arrived, he lamented, ‘I wanted to conquer the world, but Death has conquered me. I couldn’t get even that peace that an ordinary man is able to enjoy.’ Napoleon Bonaparte’s last words were on these lines: “I thought despair was a crime, but today there is none in the world who is more utterly in despair than me. I was hungry for two things: power and love. I got the former, but it did not remain with me. I searched a lot for love but never found it. If human life is what I got, then it is absolutely meaningless, because its final result is nothing but despair and destruction.” The Caliph Harun al-Rashid was the ruler of a vast dominion. At the end of his life, he commented: “For my whole life, I tried to run away from my sorrow, but, yet, that sorrow still remained. I have led a life of great sorrow and worry. Not a single day of my life have I spent without worrying. Now, I am at the verge of death. Very soon, my grave will eat up my body.” This is what is going to finally happen to every human being. Yet, every one of us is oblivious to this. When the time came for the Abbasid Caliph Mansoor to die, he rued: