Al-Rayyan b. al-Salt said: al-Rida recited a poem of `Abd al-Mutalib to me:

“All the people blame time, But there is nothing as blameworthy in our time as us, We blame our time when we are to blame, If time could talk, it would have attacked us. Surely, a wolf leaves the flesh of a wolf, But we knowingly eat [the flesh of] one another.”