prophet himself had given one of his cousins to Zayd in marriage, a lady who united much elegance of mind to great personal beauty,-Zeynab, the daughter of Djahch. On a visit to Zayd's house, Mahomet was deeply struck with the charms of Zeynab, and uttered words of admiration, which were probably involuntary. But Zayd, being informed of this, insisted on resigning his wife to one from whom he had received great benefits; and Zeynab certainly appears to have displayed no reluctance to make the exchange. Murmurs, however, were heard from some, it being contrary to Arabian usage, that any man should take the wife of an adopted son, however formally she might have been divorced. These murmurs were disregarded: the marriage was celebrated with greater magnificence than any of his former nuptials; and in the Koran (chap. xxxiii.) came forth a general permission to the Mussulmans to marry henceforth the divorced wives of adopted sons. The other occasion of this kind is far more lowering to his character. In March A.D. 630, his Coptic slave, Maria, gave birth to a son. In joy of the event-for he had no male issue-he enfranchised her. The son died at the end of the year, and, according to Arabian usage, Maria, having ceased to be a slave, was likewise obliged to resign a position which had been similar to that of Hagar in Holy Scripture. Mahomet's unwillingness thus to part led to quarrels with Hafsa, one of his wives, and subsequently with the rest. Hafsa he divorced, and the rest he kept separate for a month; but on the intercession of his fathers-in-law, Omar and Abu Beker, reinstated all into their old positions. He had first, however, by a fresh addition to the Koran (chap. lxvi.) freed himself from the oath he had made to Hafsa to resign Maria; and, in the same chapter, lectured his wives for their revolt.

Those who believe Mahomet to have been in the main sincere, may yet consider that on these, and some other occasions, he was inconsistent. Those who denounce him as wholly hypocritical, have, of course, not failed to make the most of such an extra ordinary course of procedure. The former of these conclusions is the one hinted at by Gibbon and Mr. Carlyle; and followed in the main by Dr. Weil, Mr. Irving, M. Renan, and others: the latter is that of men so different as Dean Prideaux and Voltaire. There is, however, a third line of argument, that, namely, in palliation of Mahomet's conduct, which is vigorously urged by Dr. Möhler. And it is only fair that it should be set forth; which we proceed to do, without committing ourselves either to the acceptance or rejection of the professor's views upon what appears to us a very curious and difficult question of psychology.

NO. LXXXVII.-N.S.

2

Möhler, then, after narrating, almost as we have done, the above transactions, asks what judgment we are to form upon them? do they not indicate the most thoroughly conscious deceit? Such, he observes, was the opinion of Voltaire, who supported his view of Mahomet by reference to the affair of Zayd. But I,' he replies, hold such a view to be unhistori'cal; and maintain that if one admits the possibility of his own individual impressions, ideas, and thoughts passing, without suspicion, for divine inspirations, I cannot perceive the impossibility of his considering God to be the author of all his other inward impulses." He then refers to the Herodotean account of the practice of the daughters of Babylon at the temple of Mylitta, and similar disgraceful customs in Carthage, Malta, Cyprus, Phoenicia, Syria, and India, (he might have added Nicaragua and Peru,) as a proof how men may come to regard the basest rites as allowable, and even divinely authorized. Mahomet, he proceeds to say, was in the above transactions inspired by the same spirit as these,-to wit, an earthly spirit (Erdgeiste). It was certainly a relapse into sheer paganism: but it is like'wise,' adds Möhler, at the same time clear, that he might be 'convinced of the divinity of that inspiration, and act upon it in good faith. The bona fides of Mahomet is especially evident from this, that the two events in question were the 'occasion of two Suras (i. e. chapters) of the Koran. Surely he would never have immortalised them in this manner, if he had been conscious of evil.' He further demands, how it came to pass that these events caused no diminution of the respect paid to Mahomet, as a prophet, by his followers; and were not adduced until modern times, to raise any doubt concerning his sincerity?

Such is the defence of Möhler. We leave it to do its work, simply observing, that while the phrase of an earthly spirit' seems somewhat lenient in such cases, and suggests the other epithets which an inspired writer has on one occasion added,* yet that learned men (we give an instance in a foot-note) corro

Ich halte eine solche Betrachtungsweise für unhistorich und gestehe, dass ich, wenn man die Möglichkeit zugibt, seine individuellen religiösen Empfindungen, Vorstellungen und Gedanken für gottliche Inspirationen ganz arglos auszugeben, die Unmöglichkeit nicht begreife, Gott auch als Urheber seiner übrigen inneren Bewegungen zu betrachten.'-P. 368 (note).

2 Herod. book i. c. 199. He calls it, ὁ αἴσχιστος τῶν νόμων.

36

Es leuchtet aber auch zugleich ein, dass er von der Göttlichkeit jener Inspiration überzeugt seyn und bona fide handeln konnte. Die bona fides Mahommeds ist aber besonders daraus ersichtlich, dass ihm die beiden beigebrachten Thatsachen Veranlassung zu zwei Suren gaben. Gewiss aber würde er das Andenken an die selben nicht in dieser Weise verewigt haben wenn er sich des Bösen bewusst gewesen wäre.'-P. 369. 4 S. James, iii. 15.

5 Neque omninò è corruptis Babyloniorum moribus hunc morem explicari posse

borate this view of Babylonian rites, and that the subsequent arguments are certainly deserving of the fullest consideration. But whatever be the reader's conclusion on these points, there remains an amount of positive evidence for the general sincerity of Mahomet, the force of which it is most difficult to gainsay. It may be, that the power of allurement which spiritual conquest over other hearts possesses for a mind like his, is somewhat overlooked by Irving, Caussin, and even by Möhler. But, taking into account the natural workings of an ardent imagination (exalted by meditation and solitude) on one who appeared at a season when many of his countrymen were looking for fresh light, and some even expecting the advent of a prophet; the late period of life at which he announced his mission; the conviction of Kadijah, and of others most dear to him, who had known him from his earliest youth; the endurance for twelve years of every species of raillery, insult, and persecution; the utter rejection of all offers of wealth and chieftainship, when made on the condition of his discontinuing his efforts; the simplicity of his mode of life to the very last (dates and water frequently the only food of himself and his household, and sometimes no fire in the house for a whole month); the thorough confidence in-wrought into the minds of such men as Omar and Abu Beker; we cannot, we repeat, see in this man the merely ambitious conqueror, or the deceiver without faith in himself or his own mission.' And then, again, the Koran: poor and monotonous as it may well appear beside the pages of the inspired seers of Israel; wearisome as its perusal must soon prove to us, who read it divested by translation of all charms of diction and of rhythm; yet does it, after all, look like the production of a mere impostor? Möhler recognises in it a very original piety, a moving devotion, a thoroughly individual religious poetry, which cannot possibly be forced or artificial.' And how is it possible, he eloquently asks, that a religious fire, wild though it may have been, which in so astonishingly short a period set all Asia in flames, could go forth from one in whom the kindling material had no real existence? Many 'millions of men,' he continues, with some change of metaphor, feed and foster from the Koran an estimable religious and 'moral life; and one cannot believe that they are drawing from an empty spring.'2

aut origines cepisse, quivis, me vel non animadvertente, sentiet. Ad ipsam enim religionem pravasque de diis conceptas opiniones respiciendum esse, ubi hæc et talia legimus, vix dubitandum,' &c.-Bähr in Herod. lib. i. cap. 199; (tom. i. p. 445. Lipsiæ, 1830.)

1 See Möhler, p. 370; Caussin (Preface); Irving; Carlyle, &c.

2 Ibid.

It is our earnest wish to expose with faithfulness, as we proceed, the grievous defects of the Mahometan creed, and the sins and short-comings, no less than the virtues, of the leading races which have adopted it. But considering, for a moment, merely the amount of influence (apart from the further question, whether it has been for good or evil) which Islamism has exercised, we cannot bethink us of any sheer impostor who has left such traces of his footsteps as has its founder. Zoroaster and Pythagoras may possibly be compared to Mahomet, in respect of the kind, if not the degree, of impression which they made. But unless it can be distinctly proved that they likewise were consciously deceivers, there is no room for reasoning from analogy from their cases to that of Mahomet, it being the very condition of this species of argument, ut incerta certis probet.' And, in truth, with all respect to the memory of a pious and truly learned author, to whom students of ancient history are deeply beholden,' we are by no means convinced of the existence of imposture in the sages either of Bactria or of Samos.

We have said that we are not prepared to enter at any length into the causes of Mahomet's success. In declining to investigate so important a branch of the subject, we may appear to be taking a leaf out of the writings of those Mahometan historians of Turkey, who, as M. Ubicini informs us,' refer everything to a Will above man, in such wise as to dispense with examination of the causes of events, or their probable results in the future. Such a mode of handling history is, indeed, neither Christian nor philosophic. Yet it may be allowable to suppose, that the contrary extreme is likewise evil; that the annalists and critics of the West, who seem almost to have adopted as their motto, the Virgilian

'Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas,'

may likewise be sometimes leading us astray. The previous state of Arabia (of which we have been endeavouring to afford some idea); the actual amount of truth which was taught by Mahomet; the principles acquired, directly or indirectly, from Christianity; the points of contact with the past, and with all the religions then obtaining in his country; the elegance and purity of the language of the Koran, and its applicability to law and the practical business of life; the native force of its author's mind, and the courage and confidence thence infused into his warriors; the evident need, if it may be said with

reverence, of some great scourge upon idolatry; all these have been named as probable causes of the success of Mahometanism, and we are not prepared to assert that they did not, each and all, contribute to the great result. But that they form a complete and satisfactory explanation, we cannot, for our own part, pretend to feel: and if they accounted ever so completely for the first propagation of Islamism, they would still fail to reveal the secret of its extraordinary permanence and freedom from change; a point which, after all, as Gibbon observes, is more wonderful than even its first success. Rather should we be disposed to admit, in the somewhat quaint but forceful language of Sir Francis Palgrave, That after all our cogitations, we are coerced to acknowledge that blessings and judgments are equally inscrutable: that many failures are unaccountable, and many successes inexplicable; legitimate expectations of good sorely disappointed-good resulting from evil-large promises and small forthcomings; or the hap and the halfpenny turning to ten thousand pounds."1

We must not, however, pass in silence one reason, which is usually alleged in our popular histories, and to which Gibbon has lent the sanction of his authority; that indulgence, namely, of voluptuousness which Mahomet has permitted in this world, and promised in the next. Those who have thus far followed our line of reasoning, will not be surprised to find that we agree with Mr. Hallam and Mr. Maurice, in thinking that the influence of this motive has been much exaggerated.

2

There may indeed be much truth in an observation of Dr. Arnold's," that the unworthy idea of Paradise in the Koran justifies the 5 ways of God in not revealing' [that is, we presume, fully and clearly revealing] a future state earlier, since man in early ages was not fit for it.' But the unseen is with the mass of mankind so far less potent than the visible and tangible world around them, that it is probably to the licence of the present life, rather than to the anticipations of a future state, that Gibbon, and those who follow him, mainly refer. this point we cannot do better than cite the remarks of Mr. Hallam.

On

'Although the character of the founder of Mahometanism may have been tainted by sensuality as well as ferociousness, I do not think that he relied upon inducements of the former kind for the diffusion of his system. We are not to judge of this by rules of Christian purity or of European practice. If polygamy was a prevailing usage in Arabia, as is not questioned,

1 History of Normandy and England, vol. i. page 128.

2 On the Religions of the World,' Lect. i. page 27.

3 Life. Note to Appendix C.