For this reason, they hold that a person has no ultimate goal beyond himself. His only goal is for the veil over his own self to be lifted, so that he sees that his self is the Real. Previously, he had been veiled from it; when he beholds the reality, he sees that he himself is it. As Ibn Isrā’īl said:

“What ails your pale camels, that they never come to rest? … How long will you wander astray, ever moving on?
When you reach your destination, you will surely learn … That your journey was only to yourself.”

And as some of them say:

“In everything there is a sign of Him … Indicating that He is its very self.”
[Things]
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Yet Allah says:

“Indeed, to your Lord is the return.”

And He says:

“O mankind, indeed you are laboring toward your Lord with great exertion.”

And He says:

“Then they are returned to Allah, their true Master.”

And He says:

“Indeed, we belong to Allah, and indeed to Him we will return.”

And there are other verses to the same effect.

Al-Tilmisānī, who was deeply entrenched in this heresy—which they called monotheism and reality—said:

“I once imagined that Laylā had veiled her face … And that a veil before her prevented a kiss.
Then she appeared: no, by Allah, her concealment was nothing … But my gaze being blind to her love.”

He has much poetry of this kind:

“She is the pure, beginningless substance; and if there appears … Any impurity in her that she has brought forth, it is of later origin.