cave of Hera, three miles from Mecca,* he consulted the spirit of fraud or enthusiasm, whose abode is not in the heavens, but in the mind of the prophet. The faith which, under the name of Islam, he preached to his family and nation, is compounded of an eternal truth, and a necessary fiction, THAT THERE IS ONLY ONE GOD, AND THAT MAHOMET IS THE APOSTLE OF GOD.

It is the boast of the Jewish apologists, that while the learned nations of antiquity were deluded by the fables of Polytheism, their simple ancestors of Palestine preserved the knowledge and worship of the true God. The moral attributes of Jehovah may not easily be reconciled with the standard of human virtue; his metaphysical qualities are darkly expressed; but each page of the Pentateuch and the Prophets is an evidence of his power; the unity of his name is inscribed on the first table of the law; and his sanctuary was never defiled by any visible image of the invisible essence. After the ruin of the temple, the faith of the Hebrew exiles was purified, fixed, and enlightened, by the spiritual devotion of the synagogue; and the authority of Mahomet will not justify his perpetual reproach, that the Jews of Mecca or Medina adored Ezra as the son of God. But the children of Israel had ceased to be a people; and the religions of the world were guilty, at least in the eyes of the prophet, of giving sons, or daughters, or companions to the supreme God. In the rude idolatry of the Arabs, the crime is manifest and audacious; the Sabians are poorly excused by the pre-eminence of the first planet, or intelligence, in their celestial hierarchy; and in the Magian system the conflict of the two principles betrays the imperfection of the conqueror. The Christians of the seventh century had insensibly relapsed into a semblance of Paganism; their public and private vows were addressed to the relics and images that disgraced the temples of the

* Abulfeda, in Vit. c. 7, p. 15. Gagnier, tom. i. p. 133. 135. The situation of mount Hera is remarked by Abulfeda (Geograph. Arab. p. 4). Yet Mahomet had never read of the cave of Egeria, ubi nocturnæ Numa constituebat amicæ, of the Idæan mount, where Minos Conversed with Jove, &c. + Koran, c. 9, p. 153. Al Beidawi, and the other commentators quoted by Sale, adhere to the charge; but I do not understand that it is coloured by the most. obscure or absurd tradition of the Talmudists.

Fast; the throne of the Almighty was darkened by a cloud of martyrs, and saints, and angels, the objects of popular veneration; and the Collyridian heretics, who flourished in the fruitful soil of Arabia, invested the virgin Mary with the name and honours of a goddess.* The mysteries of the Trinity and Incarnation appear to contradict the principle of the divine unity. In their obvious sense, they introduce three equal deities, and transform the man Jesus into the substance of the son of God;t an orthodox commentary will satisfy only a believing mind; intemperate curiosity and zeal had torn the veil of the sanctuary; and each of the Oriental sects was eager to confess that all, except themselves, deserved the reproach of idolatry and polytheism. The creed of Mahomet is free from suspicion or ambiguity; and the Koran is a glorious testimony to the unity of God. The prophet of Mecca rejected the worship of idols and men, of stars and planets, on the rational principle that whatever rises must set, that whatever is born must die, that whatever is corruptible must decay and perish. In the author of the universe, his rational enthusiasm confessed and adored an infinite and eternal being, without form or place, without issue or

* Hottinger, Hist. Orient. p. 225-228. The Collyridian heresy was carried from Thrace to Arabia by some women, and the name was borrowed from the kóλλupis, or cake, which they offered to the goddess. This example, that of Beryllus bishop of Bostra (Euseb. Hist. Eccles. 1. 6, c. 33,) and several others, may excuse the reproach, Arabia hæresewn ferax. The three gods in the Koran

(c. 4, p. 81; c. 5, p. 92,) are obviously directed against our Catholic mystery; but the Arabic commentators understand them of the Father, the Son, and the Virgin Mary, an heretical trinity, maintained, as it is said, by some Barbarians at the Council of Nice. (Eutych. Annal. tom. i. p. 440.) But the existence of the Marianites is denied by the candid Beausobre (Hist. du Manichéisme, tom. i. p. 532,) and he derives the mistake from the word Rouah, the Holy Ghost, which in some Oriental tongues is of the feminine gender, and is figuratively styled the mother of Christ in the Gospel of the Nazarenes. [The Hebrew term is Ruach, of which the first signification is breath; with this the German Rauch, smoke, is radically connected. Ruach hakodesch are the words, to which we have given the form of "The Holy Ghost."-ED.]

This train of thought is philosophically exemplified in the character of Abraham, who opposed in Chaldea the first introduction of idolatry. (Koran, c. 6, p. 106. D'Herbelot. Bibliot. Orient. p. 13.)

similitude, present to our most secret thoughts, existing by the necessity of his own nature, and deriving from himself all moral and intellectual perfection. These sublime truths, thus announced in the language of the prophet,* are firmly held by his disciples, and defined with metaphysical precision by the interpreters of the Koran. A philosophic theist might subscribe the popular creed of the Mahometans ;† a creed too sublime perhaps for our present faculties. What object remains for the fancy, or even the understanding, when we have abstracted from the unknown substance all ideas of time and space, of motion and matter, of sensation and reflection? The first principle of reason and revelation was confirmed by the voice of Mahomet; his proselytes, from India to Morocco, are distinguished by the name of Unitarians; and the danger of idolatry has been prevented by the interdiction of images. The doctrine of eternal decrees and absolute predestination is strictly embraced by the Mahometans; and they struggle with the common difficulties, how to reconcile the prescience of God with the freedom and responsibility of man; how to explain the permission of evil under the reign of infinite power and infinite goodness.

The God of nature has written his existence on all his works, and his law in the heart of man. To restore the knowledge of the one and the practice of the other, has been the real or pretended aim of the prophets of every age; the liberality of Mahomet allowed to his predecessors the same credit which he claimed for himself; and the chain of inspiration was prolonged from the fall of Adam to the promulgation of the Koran. During that period, some rays of prophetic light had been imparted to one hundred

* See the Koran, particularly the second (p. 30,) the fifty-seventh (p. 437,) the fifty-eighth (p. 441,) chapters, which rroclaim the omnipotence of the Creator. The most orthodox creeds are translated by Pocock (Specimen, p. 274. 284-292); Ockley (Hist. of the Saracens, vol. ii. p. 82-95); Reland (de Religion. Moham. 1. 1, p. 7-13); and Chardin. (Voyages en Perse, tom. iv. p. 4-28.) The great truth that God is without similitude, is foolishly criticised by Maracci (Alcoran, tom. i. part 3, p. 87-94,) because he made man after his own image. Reland, de Relig. Moham. 1. 1, p. 17-47. Sale's Preliminary Discourse, p. 73--76. Voyage de Chardin, tom. iv. p. 28-37, and 37-47, for the Persian addition, "Ali is the vicar of God!" Yet the precise number of prophets is

and twenty-four thousand of the elect, discriminated by their respective measure of virtue and grace; three hundred and thirteen apostles were sent with a special commission to recall their country from idolatry and vice; one hundred and four volumes had been dictated by the holy spirit; and six legislators of transcendent brightness have announced to mankind the six successive revelations of various rites, but of one immutable religion. The authority and station of Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Christ, and Mahomet, rise in just gradation above each other; but whosoever hates or rejects any one of the prophets is numbered with the infidels. The writings of the patriarchs were extant only in the apocryphal copies of the Greeks and Syrians; the conduct of Adam had not entitled him to the gratitude or respect of his children; the seven precepts of Noah were observed by an inferior and imperfect class of the proselytes of the synagogue,† and the memory of Abraham was obscurely revered by the Sabians in his native land of Chaldea; of the myriads of prophets, Moses and Christ alone lived and reigned; and the remnant of the inspired writings was comprised in the books of the Old and the New Testament. The miraculous story of Moses is consecrated and embellished in the Koran; and the captive Jews enjoy the secret revenge of imposing their own belief on the nations whose recent creeds they deride. For the author of Christianity, the Mahometans are taught

*For the apocryphal books

not an article of faith. of Adam, see Fabricius, Codex Pseudepigraphus V. T. p. 27-29; of Seth, p. 154-157; of Enoch, p. 150–219. But the book of Enoch is consecrated, in some measure, by the quotation of the apostle St. Jude; and a long legendary fragment is alleged by Syncellus and Scaliger. [Copies of the book of Enoch were brought from Abyssinia by Bruce. That which he deposited in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, was translated by Archbishop Laurence, and published at Oxford in 1821. A third edition in vols. 8vo. revised and accompanied by the original text in Ethiopic characters, appeared in 1838. Another copy of the MS. was presented to the King's Library at Paris.-ED.]

The seven precepts of Noah are explained by Marsham (Canon. Chronicus, p. 154-180,) who adopts, on this occasion, the learning and credulity of Selden. The articles of Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, &c., in the Bibliothèque of D'Herbelot, are gaily bedecked with the fanciful legends of the Mahometans, who have built on the ground-work of Scripture and the Talmud.

by the prophet to entertain a high and mysterious reverence. * Verily, Christ Jesus, the son of Mary, is the apostle of God, and his word, which he conveyed unto Mary, and a spirit proceeding from him; honourable in this world, and in the world to come; and one of those who approach near to the presence of God." The wonders of the genuine and apocryphal gospels are profusely heaped on his head; and the Latin church has not disdained to borrow from the Koran the immaculate conception of his virgin mother. Yet Jesus was a mere mortal; and at the day of judgment, his testimony will serve to condemn both the Jews, who reject him as a prophet, and the Christians, who adore him as the Son of God. The malice of his enemies aspersed his reputation, and conspired against his life; but their intention only was guilty, a phantom or a criminal was substituted on the cross, and the innocent saint was translated to the seventh heaven.T During six hundred years the gospel was the way of truth and salvation; but the Christians insensibly forgot both the laws and the example of their founder; and Mahomet was instructed by the Gnostics to accuse the church, as well as the synagogue, of corrupting the integrity of the

* Koran, c. 7, p. 128, &c.; c. 10, p. 173, &c. D'Herbelot, p. 647, &c. + Koran, c. 3, p. 40; c. 4, p. 80. D'Herbelot, p. 399, &c.

+ See the gospel of St. Thomas, or of the Infancy, in the Codex Apocryphus N. T. of Fabricius, who collects the various testimonies concerning it (p. 128-158). It was published in Greek by Cotelier, and in Arabic by Sike, who thinks our present copy more recent than Mahomet. Yet his quotations agree with the original about the speech of Christ in his cradle, his living birds of clay, &c. (Sike, c. 1, p. 168, 169; c. 36, p. 198, 199; c. 46, p. 206. Cotelier, c. 2, p. 160, 161.)

§ It is darkly hinted in the Koran (c. 3, p. 39,) and more clearly explained by the tradition of the Sonnites. (Sale's Note, and Maracci, tom. ii. p. 112.) In the twelfth century, the immaculate conception was condemned by St. Bernard as a presumptuous novelty. (Fra Paolo, Istoria del Concilio di Trento, 1. 2.)

nec

See the Koran, c. 3, v. 53, and c. 4, v. 156, of Maracci's edition. Deus est præstantissimus dolose agentium (an odd praise). crucifixerunt eum, sed objecta est eis similitudo: an expression that may suit with the system of the Docetes; but the commentators believe (Maracci, tom. ii. p. 113–115. 173; Sale, p. 42, 43. 79,) that another man, a friend or an enemy, was crucified in the likeness of Jesus; a fable which they had read in the gospel of St. Barnabas, and which had been started as early as the time of Irenæus, by some Ebionite heretics. (Beausobre, Hist. du Manichéisme, tom. ii. p. 25.