The unbridled license of the Arabian poet offers a curious commentary on national manners. The most exalted dignity, the sacred attributes of the gods, the pride of opulence, the delicacy of the sex, were not exempt from the attacks of his venom and sarcasm. He exposed with relentless severity the frailties of the wife and daughters of the sheik. He boasted of his own intrigues with a shameless audacity which, under more refined social conditions, could only be atoned for with blood. The immunity he enjoyed was one of the prerogatives of his calling. A certain sacredness of character was believed to attach to the latter by reason of the demoniac possession to which was popularly attributed the inspiration of the poetic faculty. His verses abounded in chivalrous sentiments, but uniformly ignored the claims of religion to the veneration of mankind. No beautiful mythology, like that of ancient Greece, was at hand to prompt the efforts of his muse. The maxims of the luxurious Epicurean were those that exerted the greatest power over his imagination and his life. An idea may be formed of the influence of poetry. on the public mind when we remember that the Koreish in vain attempted to bribe the pagan bard Ascha to deliver a panegyric on Mohammed at the commencement of the latter’s career, and, unable to secure his compliance, succeeded with much difficulty in purchasing his neutrality and silence at the expense of a hundred camels. The Prophet was so sensitive to the keen thrusts of the satirist, that when Mecca was captured and a general amnesty proclaimed, one of the four unfortunates whom he expressly excluded from this act of clemency was an obscure poet, Habbar-Ibn-Aswad by name, who had published a lampoon against him. The Arabian bard, like his literary descendant the troubadour, was attended by minstrels who chanted his verses, often to the accompaniment of musical instruments. The latter vocation, regarded as degrading by the Bedouin, was always exercised by a slave.

Islamism, while in other directions it zealously promoted the intellectual development of its adherents, fell like a blight upon the poetic taste and genius of Arabia. The dreams of the poet disappeared before the stern fanaticism of the soldier, who had no time for rhapsodies, and cared for nothing save indulgence in rapine, the acquisition of empire, and the extension of the Faith.

It is now generally admitted that the literary contests said to have taken place during the annual fair at Okhad, where, from poems read before an immense concourse, the one to be suspended in the Kaaba was selected, are apocryphal. Tribes of vagrant robbers who passed ten months of the year in plundering their neighbors would hardly consent to spend the other two in an orderly assembly, composed mainly of their enemies, in determining by a popular vote the comparative merit of their respective poets. The settlement of such rival claims for intellectual precedency by the voice of the people implies a degree of culture and critical acumen certainly not possessed by the Arabs of that age. This idle tale has doubtless been suggested by the literary exhibitions of the Olympian games, and is perhaps indebted to the imagination of some garrulous and mendacious Greek for its origin. It is, however, unquestionable that the poet, as well as the story-teller—that other important personage in the East—was in high favor at all the fairs and assemblies of Arabia. The mixed multitude which, impelled by motives partly mercenary, partly religious, collected on these occasions, and in its hours of leisure listened to the verses of the poet, constantly promoted his inspiration and refined his lays by the hope of applause, the fear of censure, the collision with foreigners, and the powerful influence of tribal emulation.

The later history of the Arabs is decked with all the gorgeous imagery of the East. The fascinations of romance invest and embellish it. With the commonplace facts incident to the various stages of national progress are interwoven narratives of indisputable truth, but which, in their demands upon human credulity, almost surpass the fabulous legends of chivalry or the enchanting tales of Scheherezade. The primitive life of the Arabian people previous to the advent of Mohammed offered no indication of their extraordinary capability for improvement. Commercial intercourse with other nations for ages had, however, enlarged their experience, expanded their faculties, and aroused their ambition. The caravan winding amidst the lonely sand-hills of the Desert—the precursor of those great expeditions which subsequently interchanged the commodities of Asia Minor, Egypt, Andalusia, and India—was also the more important agent of science, of refinement, of civilization. It increased the sum of geographical and historical knowledge. It familiarized the trader and his customers with the manners, the laws, the social systems, the mechanical skill, the arts, and the inventions of the most enterprising nations of the globe. These associations assisted in no small degree to generate the practical utility which, the most important feature of Arab learning, afterwards conferred such substantial blessings on mankind. The phenomenal advance of the race to maturity, impossible without previous preparation, was stimulated by perpetual wars and excitement. Less than one hundred and twenty years intervened between the vagabondage and ignorance of the Desert and the stability and intellectual culture of the great Abbaside and Ommeyade capitals. The career of the Arab was too rapid to be permanent. In four generations it had covered the ground ordinarily traversed in twenty. Its delusive splendor concealed the decay which was coincident with the era of its greatest prosperity. The same causes which facilitated the foundation and advancement of his power and culture were active during their decline, and contributed to their ultimate destruction.

The statement may appear paradoxical, in view of the acknowledged influence of mercantile associations upon the faculties of the human mind; but a certain degree of isolation seems to be necessary, at least in tropical and semi-tropical regions, for the complete development of the arts of civilization; and these arts have usually attained their highest perfection among nations which inhabit peninsulas. Egypt and China, whose reliance was entirely upon their own resources, were the most exclusive of nations in the ancient world, as were Mexico and Peru in the modern. The vast majority of the populations of India, Japan, and Spain had but little intercourse with those outside their boundaries, which were defended by stormy and mysterious seas. In no other countries have the powers of the human intellect, in the creation of all that is grand and imposing, of all that is beautiful, of all that is artistic, of all that contributes to the benefit, the cultivation, and the material improvement of mankind, been manifested as in Greece and Italy. And Arabia, although denied by Nature the advantages of soil and climate enjoyed by more favored lands, yet possessed what, in the crisis of her fate, rendered her superior to all her adversaries,—a race of bold and hardy warriors inured to hardship by the privations of an abstemious life, and by habit and inclination capable of the most arduous and desperate enterprises. Their experience with the surrounding effeminate nations had taught them not only the weakness of the latter, but also how their coveted wealth might be obtained; and at a propitious moment, under the guidance of an impassioned enthusiast, a horde of outlaws, driven from their homes by their scandalized neighbors, became the nucleus of victorious armies the fame of whose gallantry filled the world. And yet, while glorying in the deeds of martial heroism which insured the establishment and maintenance of her Prophet’s faith, she was conscious of the instability of an empire sustained by arms alone, and labored to raise upon more substantial and enduring foundations the splendid fabric of her greatness. The same fervid impulse which prompted and carried to a successful issue the conquest or extermination of those designated by the comprehensive term of infidel was able to adapt itself with singular facility to all the conditions of peace, and to enable the posterity of the half-naked banditti that swarmed around the banner of Mohammed to accomplish results worthy of the most exalted genius, and in every department of knowledge to ascend to the highest rank of those celebrated for their literary and scientific attainments in the most polished communities of Asia and Europe.

CHAPTER II
THE RISE, PROGRESS, AND INFLUENCE OF ISLAM
614–712

Comparative Religion, its Interest as a Study—The Benefits of Islam—Arabia at the Birth of Mohammed—Condition of Christendom and the Byzantine Empire—Popular Idea of the Prophet—His Family—His Early Life—The First Revelation—Persecution of the New Sect—The Hegira—Growing Prosperity of Islam—Character of Mohammed—Causes of His Success—Polygamy—The Koran—Its Arrangement, its Legends, its Sublime Maxims, its Absurdities—Its Obligations to other Creeds—The Kiblah—The Pilgrimage and its Ceremonies—Reforms accomplished by Islam—Universal Worship of Force—Corruption of the Religion of Mohammed—Its Wonderful Achievements—Mohammed the Apostle of God.

The study of Comparative Religion is one of the most fascinating, but at the same time one of the most unsatisfactory, of human employments. In historical research, in mathematical calculation, in chemical analysis, in the investigation of natural phenomena, either absolute certainty or an approximate degree of accuracy is attainable. This, however, is obviously impossible in the consideration of questions with which the eternal happiness or misery of mankind may be concerned. Who is competent to determine the relative value of the various religious systems,—always mutually antagonistic, often irreconcilable,—yet all alleged to have proceeded alike from the fiat of Almighty God? Who is to judge of the peculiar qualifications of those who have arrogated to themselves the important office of passing upon their respective merits? Why should certain doctrines be accepted and others repudiated by zealous but uncritical sectaries?, Where does this presumed inspiration begin and end? To use the words of the Koran, “What is the infallible? And who shall cause thee to understand what the infallible is?” Who, in short, possesses the touchstone of truth?

The experience of all ages, the history of all nations, have established the melancholy fact that systems of religion are, like institutions of human origin, subject to the ordinary incidents of mortality. They have their age of youthful vigor and enthusiasm; their stationary epoch, when their principles have lost their expansive power; their period of degeneracy and decay. Their duration, like that of created beings, corresponds to the degree of vitality which they may possess; their vitality is in proportion to the intrinsic merit of their doctrines, and their adaptability to the moral nature of man. As omniscience is denied to him, his estimate of the value of a divine revelation must necessarily be speculative and uncertain, largely dependent upon his intellectual capacity, and colored by the influences to which he has been exposed. On the other hand, many learned metaphysicians have argued with transcendent ability that faith is not accidental, and merely derived from volition and association, but is a matter of inexorable necessity, in which the will is absolutely powerless. As a result of inherited prejudice, the principles of every religion always appear heterodox, false, and absurd to sincere believers in other forms of faith. Of all theological dogmas, none have suffered more from the effects of ignorance and injustice than those of Islamism. The name of its founder has for thirteen centuries been a synonym of imposture. His motives have been impugned, his sincerity denied. His character has been branded with every vice which degrades or afflicts mankind. The greatest absurdities, the grossest inhumanity, have been attributed to his teachings. Ecclesiastical malice has exhausted its resources in efforts to blacken his memory. Even in our day, comparatively few persons are even superficially conversant with the doctrines which, in less than a century, were able to usurp the spiritual and temporal dominion of a considerable portion of the habitable globe.

The love of novelty which reigns supreme in the human breast is nowhere more striking in its manifestations than in the facility with which men adopt a fresh revelation. No new religion ever lacks proselytes. Imagination, sentiment, hope, fear, interest, combine to induce its acceptance, notwithstanding the obscurity which may invest its doctrines or the illiteracy which often is the most prominent characteristic of its interpreters; and if the conditions which attend its promulgation are not decidedly unpropitious, it is morally certain of success.