is impossible that we can, with sound hearts and clear consciences, seek to evangelize the world. Yet they are not to be spoken of as if they proceeded from a merely denying, unbelieving spirit: they are often entertained by minds of deepest earnestness; they derive their plausibility from facts which cannot be questioned, and which a Christian should not wish to question. They may, I believe, if fairly dealt with, help to strengthen our own convictions, to make our duty plainer and to shew us better how we shall perform it. All their danger lies in their vagueness: if we once bring them fairly to those tests by which the worth of hypotheses in another department is ascertained, it may not perhaps be hard to discover what portions of truth and what of falsehood, they contain. I think I shall be carrying out the intention of Boyle's Will, if I attempt, in my present course, to make this experiment. I propose to examine the great Religious Systems which present themselves to us in the history of the world, not going into their details, far less searching for their absurdities, but enquiring what is their main characteristical principle. If we find, as the objectors say, good in each of them, we shall desire to know what this good is, and under what conditions it may be preserved and made effectual. These questions may, I think, be kept distinct from those which will occupy us in the latter half of the course. In what relation does Christianity stand to these different faiths? If there be a faith

MAHOMETANISM-ITS PROGRESS.

11

which is meant for mankind, is this the one or must we look for another?

I shall not take these systems in their historical order, but rather according to the extent of the influence they have exerted over mankind; a reason which would at once determine me to begin in the present Lecture with MAHOMETANISM.

For the first ninety years after the publication of this religion in the world, the Christians of Europe could do little more than wonder at its amazing and, as it seemed, fatal, progress in Asia and Africa. Before the end of a century it had obtained a settlement in a corner of their own Continent and threatened every part of it. But the new Western Empire established itself, Christian champions appeared in Spain, the power of the Caliphs declined. Then Islamism appeared again in another conquering, proselytising tribe. For two centuries the European nations wrestled to recover its conquests in the Holy Land. A period followed during which the disciples of both religions seemed almost equally threatened by Tartar hordes. These stooped to the Crescent; in the 15th century a mighty Mahometan government was seen occupying the capital of the East, threatening the Latin world, profiting by the disputes of Christian sovereigns with one another, exhibiting its own order and zeal in melancholy contrast to the quarrels, unbelief, and heartlessness of monarchs and prelates. It became a question with the thoughtful men of that time, whether the Ottoman empire

did not possess a polity which was free from the tendencies to weakness and decay that had existed in all previous governments, and whether it might not last for ever.

In the 17th and 18th centuries, when the fallacy of this notion was making itself evident, Christians began to speculate coldly and quietly upon the causes which had given such prevalency to this faith in past days, and which still kept it alive in their own. It may be well to consider a few of the explanations which different persons, according to their different observations or habits of mind, have offered of this fact, that we may not lose the benefit of any light which has been thrown from any quarter upon the nature or principle of the religion itself.

I. It was an easy and obvious method of solving the difficulty, to say that the Mahometans had triumphed by the force of their arms; personal valour, and a compact military organization being comprehended under that term. That they were warriors from the first, that their courage was often amazing, and that the Ottomans for a long time possessed the secret of military subordination, as scarcely any nation has ever possessed it, is evidently true. And it is a truth of which Christian apologists would very naturally avail themselves. The opposition, not in some accidental points, but in their whole scheme and conception, between the Sermon on the Mount, and the doctrine which could require or sanction such methods for its diffusion, would of course be

FIRST MODE OF EXPLAINING IT- -CONQUEST. 13

carefully noted.

Plain men would be asked to declare which teaching bore clearest tokens of belonging to the earth, which of a Divine origin. Nor was this argument an unfair one, however it might be, and has been again and again traversed by an appeal to the practice of Christians, and the weapons to which they have resorted for the defence and propagation of their faith. For it is quite clear that the Mahometan wars were no accidental outgrowth of the system-that they were not resorted to with a doubtful conscience, with any uneasy feeling that they might by possibility be inconsistent with the intentions of their Founder. On the contrary, the very spirit and life of Mahometanism exhibited themselves in these wars. In them came forth all the most striking and characteristic virtues which the doctrine has a right to boast of.

The Mahometan ruler felt that he was fulfilling his vocation, when he was going forth against the infidel; he could scarcely fulfil it in any other way. We know indeed that Bagdad and Cordova became celebrated for all graceful refinements, for letters, even for toleration. We know that science, physical and metaphysical, became a distinctive mark of the Arabians. Where a book like the Koran, written in a beautiful language, is regarded with unbounded reverence, by degrees it will be studied; and out of that study will be produced a literature which may spread itself in various directions. Monarchs would feel the influence of such pursuits, and would consider it their chief

honour to direct them. But though periods like those of Haroun-al-Raschid were sure to occur in the history of Mahometanism, though in one sense they may be considered natural developments of it, they assuredly do not belong to the religion as such; they rather shewed that the original spirit which possessed its disciples was becoming feeble; they portended a further decline of it, and probably its revival in some more vigorous form. Whenever a Mahometan ruler quite allows his arms to rust, whenever he does not feel that it is his main work in the world to diffuse his doctrine by those means which are most simple and direct, we may be sure, whatever temporary prosperity may be vouchsafed him, that his dynasty cannot last very long.

But though on these grounds it may be fair to represent Mahometanism as essentially warlike, it is surely a great mistake to suppose that by saying so we have accounted for its spread over so large a portion of the earth. No thoughtful man could accept such a solution, because when he hears of valour in men and discipline in armies, he must ask himself whence these proceeded, how they came to attach themselves to this particular faith, and because that question must inevitably lead him to seek for the real ground of success elsewhere. It cannot satisfy any Christian, because the very belief which he opposes to that of the Mahometan, must teach him that arms are not the most mighty things; that there are secret invisible influences which are stronger than they.