which is alleged to have founded itself in an artful accommodation to existing systems of belief, and to have addressed itself to the prejudices and passions of mankind: satisfactory grounds have been advanced for the successful progress of a faith, which silenced opposition by force, and seconded its pretensions with the sword: but no sufficient account has yet been given or attempted of that character of permanence, which the lapse of twelve centuries has impressed upon Mahometanism.* If its duration were commensurate merely with that of the empire to which it gave birth; if its spiritual sway could be measured, in after ages, by the rise and fall of its temporal power; much of the difficulty would be removed. The case, however, admits of no such relief. The whole facts of it, on the contrary, go to demonstrate, that the creed of Mahomet possesses an + inherent spiritual influence, wholly distinct and separable from its secular domination; and that it is not more remarkable, for its despotism over the fortunes, than for its absolute dominion in the minds, of men.

+

6. The completeness of its mental domination is one of the most noted and best ascertained facts

* «Mille annorum flexus est et fluxus (is the nervous expression of Hottinger in the seventeenth century) ex quo infelicissimus Muhammedis fœtus, ab orbis magna parte exceptus est, et retentus." P. 279. Compare Dr. White, Bampt. Lect. pp. 46, 47.

in the early history of Mahometanism. * It is legible in the high enthusiasm which characterised the first Moslems, from the near friends of the Prophet, to his meanest followers, from the leaders of the Saracen armies, to the servile refuse of the camp. But the point which now claims attention, is the durability of that first impression, the permanence of this mental subjection.14 To determine this point in the affirmative, it will not be enough to consider the effects of Mahometanism upon the mind, in countries where it is dominant as connected with the state; for here it may be contended, that the fanatical spirit of the religion is fostered from motives of policy, and factitiously sustained by its alliance with the temporal power. Its genuine and undoubted influence can be seen only in a state of society, where its votaries are unshackled by the restraints imposed by a Mahometan government; and where, consequently, neither policy nor personal interest can be supposed to operate. Such a state of society happens to obtain in a quarter of the world, where Mahometanism has existed in an unestablished and insulated form, since the times of the first Saracen conquests. In their progress westward, through the deserts of Africa,

*White, p. 47.

the primitive Moslems left behind them the seeds of colonies, which continue to the present day thinly sprinkled over that vast wilderness; the Bedoween being naturally attracted and detained by the suitableness of the region to his desultory and predatory habits, and by the similarity of the soil and climate to those from which he had

*

recently emerged. These roving tribes have preserved the purity of their race, with hereditary jealousy, from admixture with the native Africanst; and holding little or no intercourse with foreigners, beyond the bare interchange of a few necessary commodities with the Moorish states, they present at this day the most genuine portrait extant of the character of their forefathers, the first Moslems. In the great desert of Africa, accordingly, there is a singular opportunity afforded of estimating the influence of Mahometanism, apart from its original and ordinary alliance with political domination. The result establishes, in the fullest extent, the fact of its permanent dominion over the human mind. The Arabs of the western desert graphically exemplify in the nineteenth century, the recorded

So early as the eighth century of the Christian era, and second of the Hejra, we find Bedoween tribes in the African desert, already relapsed into their primitive migratory state. See De Marlès, Histoire de la Domination des Arabes en Espagne, tom. i. pp. 189, 190.

+ Burckhardt, p. 217.

spirit of the Saracen conquerors in the seventh. The same high enthusiasm and anti-social zeal are strikingly visible, both in their intercourse among themselves, and in their carriage towards strangers. The perpetual maintenance of their independence is still their glory and boast; and they guard with a zealous and unceasing vigilance the traditions and the faith of their Arabian ancestors. Copies of the Koran, written on skins, are carefully preserved, and constantly studied, in each family* ; and the calamities of shipwreck have recently afforded an opportunity of ascertaining the fanatical avidity with which its lessons are imbibed; and the opinions entertained by these sons of Ishmael respecting the character and situation of Christians. "The heads of their discourse concerning us," says a shipwrecked mariner, who learned the conversation of this savage people through the medium of a negro interpreter, "was, that we were a poor, miserable, degraded race of mortals, doomed to the everlasting punishment of hell-fire after death, and, in this life, fit only for the company of dogs."+ If he forgets only the intervals of time and place, this language at once transports the reader among "the com

* Riley's Narrative of the Loss of the Ship Commerce, p. 400, &c. Lond. 1817.

+ Paddock's Shipwreck of the Oswego, p. 148. Lond. 1818.

panions" of the false prophet: its genuine fanaticism might have fallen from the lips of the fiery Kaled, or the ferocious Derar. *

7. The feature of Mahometanism which next lays claim to notice, is nearly connected with the preceding heads, of its permanence, and its mental dominion. This trait is, its power, as conquering, to change the creeds and characters of the subject nations†; and, as conquered, to absorb the conquerors and their religions in submission to its faith. +

Under the former aspect, its prompt and effectual extirpation of the idolatry of Arabia, and the unparalleled revolution of mind and manners which the action of the new religion produced among its tribes, were but preludes and precursors to succeeding triumphs, in every clime where Paganism flourished, over Paganism in its best, and in its most degrading, forms. The rude idolatry of Scythia or of Inner Africa, and the refined and venerable superstition of the Persian Magi, alike fell prostrate before the law of the Koran; while the new converts, bound together as brethren by this common tie, forgot their per- + sonal prejudices, and national antipathies, as

• See Ockley, vol. i. pp. 12, 13. 33. 45. 65. 86. 91, &c. 115, 116.

+ White, Bampt. Lect. p. 295.

Mills, History of Muhammedanism, p. 180. London, 1818.