herent predictions, combined with laws which were very good for the country in which he lived, and all which continue to be followed, without having been changed or weakened, either by Mahometan interpreters or by new decrees. The poets of Mecca were hostile to Mahomet, but above all the doctors. These raised the magistracy against him; and a warrant was issued for his apprehension as one duly accused and convicted of having said that God must be adored, and not the stars. This, it is known, was the source of his greatness. When it was seen that he could not be put down, and that his writings were becoming popular, it was given out in the city that he was not the author of them, or that at least he was assisted in their composition by a learned Jew, and sometimes by a learned Christian, supposing that there were at that time learned Jews and learned Christians. So, in our days, more than one prelate has been reproached with having set monks to compose his sermons and funeral orations. There was one Father Hercules (Père Hercule) who made sermons for a certain bishop, and when people went to hear him preach, they used to say, "Let us go and hear the labours of Hercules." To this charge Mahomet gives an answer in his 16th chapter, occasioned by a gross blunder he had made in the pulpit, about which a great deal had been said. He gets out of the scrape thus:: "When thou readest the Koran, address thyself to God, that he may preserve thee from the machinations of Satan. He has power only over those who have chosen him for their master, and who give associates unto God. certain man who labours with him composing the Koran. But how can this man, to whom they attribute my works, have taught me, speaking, as he does, a foreign language, while the Koran is written in the purest Arabic ?" He who, it was pretended, assisted Mahomet, was a Jew named Bensalen or Bensulon. It is not very likely that a Jew should have lent his assistance to Mahomet in writing against the Jews; yet the thing is not impossible. The monk, who was said to have contributed to the Koran, was by some called Bohaira, by others Sergius. There is something pleasant in this monk's having had both a Latin and an Arabic name. As for the fine theological disputes which have arisen amongst the Mussulmans, I have no concern with them, I leave them to the decision of the mufti. In The Triumph of the Cross (Le Triomphe de la Croix) the Koran is said to be Arian, Sabellian, Carpocratian, Cardonician, Manichean, Donatistic, Origenian, Macedonian, and Ebionitish. Mahomet, however, was nothing of all this; he was rather a Jansenist, for the foundation of his doctrine is the absolute degree of gratuitous predestination. SECTION II. This Mahomet, son of Abdallah, was a bold and sublime charlatan. He says, in his tenth chapter, “Who but God can have composed the Koran? Mahomet, you say, has forged this book. Well; try then to write one chapter resembling it, and call to your aid whomsoever you please." In the seventeenth he exclaims, Praise be to Him who, in one night, transported his servant from the sacred "When I substitute one verse for ano-temple of Mecca to that of Jerusalem !” ther in the Koran (the reason for which This was a very fine journey, but changes is known to God) some unbe-nothing like that which he took the very lievers cry out, Thou hast forged those verses; but they know not how to distinguish truth from falsehood. Say rather that the Holy Spirit brought those verses of truth to me from God. Others say, still more malignantly, there is a{ same night from planet to planet. He pretended that it was five hundred years' journey from one to another, and that he cleft the moon in twain. Ilis disciples who, after his death, collected, in a solemn manner, the verses of this Koran, suppressed this celestial journey, for they dreaded raillery and philosophy. After all, they had too much delicacy; they might have trusted to the commentators, who would have found no difficulty whatever in explaining the itinerary. Mahomet's friends should have known by experience that the marvellous is the reason of the multitude: the wise contradict in silence, which the multitude prevent them from breaking. But while the itinerary of the planets was suppressed, a few words were retained about the adventure of the moon: one cannot be always on one's guard. decrees the primum mobile of all. A reiigion so simple and so wise, taught by one who was constantly victorious, could hardly fail to subjugate a portion of the earth. Indeed the Mussulmen have made as many proselytes by their creed as by their swords; they have converted the Indians and the negroes to their religion; even the Turks, who conquered them, submitted to Ismalism. Mahomet allowed many things to remain in his law which he had found established among the Arabs-as circumcision; fasting; the pilgrimage to Mecca, which was instituted four thouThe Koran is a rhapsody, without con- sand years before his time; ablutions, nection, without order, and without art. so necessary to health and cleanliness in This tedious book is, nevertheless, said to a burning country, where linen was unbe a very fine production, at least, by the known; and the idea of a last judgment, Arabs, who assert that it is written with which the Magi had always inculcated, an elegance and purity which no later and which had reached the inhabitants of work has equalled. It is a poem, or sort Arabia. It is said, that on his announcof rhymed prose, consisting of three thou-ing that we should rise again quite naked, sand verses. No poem ever advanced his wife Aishca expressed her opinion' the fortune of its author so much as the that the thing would be immodest and Koran. It was disputed among the dangerous: "Do not be alarmed, my Mussulmen whether it was eternal, or dear," said he, "no one will then feel God had created it in order to dictate it { any inclination to laugh." According to to Mahomet. The doctors decided that the Koran, an angel will weigh both men it was eternal; and they were right; this and women in a great balance: this idea, eternity is a much finer opinion than the too, is taken from the Magi. He also stole other, for with the vulgar we must always from them their narrow bridge which adopt that which is the most incredible. must be passed over after death, and their The monks who have attacked Ma- elysium, where the Mussulmen Elect homet, and said so many silly things will find baths, well-furnished apartabout him, have asserted that he could ments, good beds, and houris with great not write. But how can we imagine that black eyes. He does, it is true, say a man who had been a merchant, a poet, that all these pleasures of the senses, a legislator, and a sovereign, did not so necessary to those that are to rise know how to sign his name? If his book again with senses, will be nothing in is bad for our times and for us, it was comparison with the pleasure of convery good for his contemporaries, and his templating the Supreme Being. He religion was still better. It must be ac- has the humility to confess that he knowledged that he reclaimed nearly the himself will not enter paradise through whole of Asia from idolatry. He taught his own merits, but purely by the will of the unity of God, and forcibly declaimed God. Through this same pure Divine against all those who gave him associates. will, he orders that a fifth part of the Ile forbade usury with foreigners, and spoil shall always be reserved for the commanded the giving of alms. With prophet. him prayer was a thing of absolute necessity, and resignation to the eternal It is not true that he excludes women from paradise. It is hardly likely that so able a man should have chosen to embroil himself with that half of the human race by which the other half is led. Abulfeda relates, that an old lady one day importuned him to tell her what she must do to get into paradise. "My good lady," said he, "paradise is not for old women." The good woman began to weep; but the prophet consoled her by saying, "There will be no old women, because they will become young again." This consolatory doctrine is confirmed in the fifty-fourth chapter of the Koran. He forbade wine because some of his followers once went intoxicated to prayers. He allowed a plurality of wives, conforming in this point to the immemorial usage of the Orientals. In short, his civil laws are good; his doctrine is admirable in all which it has in common with ours; but his means are shocking-villainy and murder! say you, the simplicity of the heroic ages; but what were these heroic ages ?-times when men cut one another's throats for a well or a cistern, as they now do for a province? The first Mussulmen were animated by Mahomet with the rage of enthusiasm. Nothing is more terrible than a people who, having nothing to lose, fight in the united spirit of rapine and of religion. It is true that there was not much art in their proceedings. The contract of marriage between Mahomet and his first wife expresses, that while Cadisha loves him, and he in like manner loves Cadisha, it is thought meet to join them. But is there the same simplicity in having composed a genealogy which makes him descend in a right line from Adam, as several Spanish and Scotch families have likewise been made to descend? The great prophet experienced the disgrace common to so many husbands, after which no one ought to complain. The name of him who received the favours of his second wife, was Assam. The be He is excused by some, on the first of these charges, because, say they, the Arabs had a hundred and twenty-four thousand prophets before him, and there could be no great harm in the appear-haviour of Mahomet, on this occasion, ance of one more men, it is added, require to be deceived. But how are we to justify a man who says, "Believe that I have conversed with the angel Gabriel, or pay me tribute?" How superior is Confucius-the first of mortals who have not been favoured with revelations ! He employs neither falsehood nor the sword, but only reason. The viceroy of a great province, he causes the laws to be observed, and morality to flourish; disgraced and poor, he teaches them. He practises them alike in greatness and in humiliation; he renders virtue amiable; and has for his disciples the most ancient and wisest people on the earth. In vain does Count de Boulainvilliers, who had some respect for Mahomet, extol the Arabs. Notwithstanding all his boastings, they were a nation of banditti, They robbed before Mahomet, when they adored the stars: they robbed under Mahomet in the name of God. They had, was even more lofty than that of Cæsar, who put away his wife, saying, "The wife of Cæsar ought not to be suspected." The prophet would not suspect his. He sent to heaven for a chapter of the Koran, affirming that his wife was faithful. This chapter, like all the others, had been written from all eternity. He is admired for having raised himself, from being a camel-driver, to be a pontiff, a legislator, and a monarch; for having subdued Arabia, which had never before been subjugated: for having given the first shock to the Roman empire in the East, and to that of the Persians; and I admire him still more for having kept peace in his house amongst his wives. He changed the face of part of Europe, one half of Asia, and nearly all Africa; nor was kis religion unlikely, at one time, to subjugate the whole earth. On how trivial a circumstance will revolutions sometimes depend! A blow from a stone, a little harder than that which he received in his first battle, might have changed the destiny of the world! His son-in-law Ali asserted, that when the prophet was about to be inhumed, he } was found in a situation not very common to the dead. The words of the Roman sovereign might be well applied in this case" Decet imperatorem stantem mori." having always united the greatest magnanimity with the greatest courage-having respected the wife and daughters of Darius when in his power, he did not in any way deserve either to be confined as a madman or hanged as a robber. Rollin asserts, that Alexander took the famous city of Tyre only to oblige the Jews, who hated the Tyrians: it is, however, quite as likely that Alexander had other reasons; for a naval commander would not leave Tyre mistress of the sea, when he was going to attack Egypt. Alexander's friendship and respect for Jerusalem were undoubtedly great; but Never was the life of a man written more in detail than his; the most minute particulars were regarded as sacred. We have the name and the numbers of all that belonged to him-nine swords, three lances, three bows, seven cuirasses, three bucklers, twelve wives, one white cock,{it should hardly be said that the Jews seven horses, two mules, and four camels, besides the mare Borac, on which he went to heaven. But this last he had only borrowed; it was the property of the angel Gabriel. set a rare example of fidelity-an example worthy of the only people who at that time had the knowledge of the true God, in refusing to furnish Alexander with provisions, because they had sworn fidelity to Darius, It is well known that the Jews took every opporBe-tunity of revolting against their sovereigns; for a Jew was not to serve a profane king. If they imprudently refused contributions to the conqueror, it was not with a view to prove themselves the faithful slaves of Darius, since their law expressly ordered them to hold all It is no longer allowable to speak of idolatrous nations in abhorrence: their Alexander, except in order to say some-books are full of execrations pronounced thing new of him, or to destroy the fables, historical, physical, and moral, which have disfigured the history of the only great man to be found among the conquerors of Asia. All his sayings have been preserved. } One was, that the enjoyment of women made him more fervent in prayer. sides all his other knowledge, he is said to have been a great physician; so that he wanted none of the qualifications for { deceiving mankind. ALEXANDER. against them; and of reiterated attempts to throw off their yoke. If, therefore, they at first refused the contributions, it was because their rivals, the Samaritans, had paid them without hesitation, and After reflecting a little on the life of they believed that Darius, though vanAlexander, who, amid the intoxicationsquished, was still powerful enough to of pleasure and conquest, built more support Jerusalem against Samaria. towns than all the other conquerors of Asia destroyed, after calling to mind that, young as he was, he turned the commerce of the world into a new channel, it appears very strange that Boileau should have spoken of him as a robber and a madman. Alexander, having been elected at Corinth Captain-general of Greece, and commissioned as such to avenge the invasions of the Persians, did no more than his duty in destroying their empire; and, It is wholly false that the Jews were then the only people who had the knowledge of the true God, as Rollin tells us. The Samaritans worshipped the same God, though in another temple; they had the same Pentateuch as the Jews, and they had it in Tyrian characters, which the Jews had lost. The schism between Samaria and Jerusalem was, on a small scale, what the schism between the Greek and Latin churches is on a large one. The hatred was equal on both sides, of animadversion, were even any shadow having the same foundation-Religion. of it to be found in the sacred writings; Alexander, having possessed himself but as they do not make the slightest of Tyre by means of that famous cause-mention of it, we are quite at liberty to way which is still the admiration of all see that it is ridiculous. generals, went to punish Jerusalem, which lay not far out of his way. The Jews, headed by their high priest, came and humbled themselves before him, offering him money-for angry conquerors are not to be appeased without money. Alexander was appeased, and they remained subject to Alexander and to his successors. Such is the true as well as the only probable history of the affair. There can be no doubt that Alexander subdued that part of India which lies on this side the Ganges, and was tributary to the Persians. Mr. Holwell, who lived for thirty years among the Brahmins of Benares, and the neighbouring countries, and who learned not only their modern language but also their ancient sacred tongue, assures us, that their annals attest the invasion by Alexander, whom they call Mahadukoit Kounha-great people could not call him otherwise; indeed, it is hardly to be supposed that they gave any other name to the kings of Persia. The same annals say, that Alexander entered by the province now called Candahar, and it is probable that there were always some fortresses on that frontier. Rollin repeats a story told about four hundred years after Alexander's expedi-robber, great murderer. These peaceful tion, by that romancing, exaggerating historian, Flavius Josephus, who may be pardoned for having taken every opportunity of setting off his wretched country to the best advantage. Rollin repeats, after Josephus, that Jaddus the highpriest, having prostrated himself before Alexander, the prince, seeing the name of Jehovah engraved on a plate of gold Alexander afterwards descended the attached to Jaddus's cap, and understand-river Zombodipo, which the Greeks called ing Hebrew perfectly, fell prostrate in his Sind. In the history of Alexander there turn, and paid homage to Jaddus. This is not a single Indian name to be found. excess of civility having astonished Par- The Greeks never called an Asiatic town menio, Alexander told him, that he had or province by their own name. They known Jaddus a long time; that he had dealt in the same manner with the Egypappeared to him, in the same habit and tians. They would have thought it a the same cap, ten years before, when dishonour to the Greek tongue, had they he was meditating the conquest of Asia introduced into it a pronunciation which (a conquest which he had not then even they thought barbarous-if, for instance, thought of); that this same Jaddus had they had not called the city of Moph exhorted him to cross the Hellespont, as- Memphis. suring him that God would march at the Mr. Holwell says, that the Indians head of the Greeks, and that the God of never knew either Porus or Taxiles; inthe Jews would give him the victory over deed these are not Indian words. Nethe Persians. This old woman's tale vertheless, if we may believe our mismakes but a sorry figure in the history{sionaries, there are still some Indian lords of such a man as Alexander. who pretend to have descended from Porus. Perhaps the missionaries have flattered them with this origin until they have adopted it, There is, at least, no country in Europe, in which servility has not invented and vanity received genealogies yet more chimerical. An Ancient History well digested was an undertaking calculated to be of great service to youth; it is to be wished that it had not been in some degree marred by the adoption of some absurdities. The story of Jaddus would be entitled to our respect-it would be beyond the reach If Flavius Josephus has related a ri |