Like horses

Stephen Mitchell, in the preface to his translation of the Bhagavad Gita, on the topic of Emerson and Thoreau's joy at discovering this poem, writes:

"Souls who love God," a Sufi sheikh said a thousand years ago, "know one another by smell, like horses. Though one be in the East and the other in the West, they still feel joy and comfort in each other's talk, and one who lives in a later generation than the other is instructed and consoled by the words of his friend."


(Though Sri Bhagavan is so, so far beyond "friend," I cannot help but think of Him and those who love Him profoundly when I read this.)