Sulaymān ibn Abī al-Shaykh narrated to me; Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd al-Umawī related, from Muḥammad ibn al-Sāʾib, who said: It was asked of Ḥassān ibn Thābit, “Who is the most poetic of people?” He answered, “The one who says:

‘I am of a folk who, when the strain grows fierce …
they step forth in devotion to Allah, and then in bountiful giving.’”