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    but the enthusiasm of the prophet would materially aid the valour and conduct of the soldier . But whence , it may be asked , was this enthusiasm derived ? Muhammed , it seems not unlikely to us , set up as a reformer , intending perhaps , at first , without thinking of fraud , to bring back his fellowcountrymen to a belief in pure theism , and to convert the Christians , from what appeared to him idolatry , to the simple unity of God . An object so important would easily awaken in his susceptible mind the ardour of enthusiasm , and that whieh he felt himself he would speedily communicate to others . That he remained simply an enthusiast all his life we do not say . How early some qualities of the impostor were grafted on those of the enthusiast can only be a matter of conjecture . At first , perhaps , he yielded to the idea of pious fraud under a sense of its necessity for securing the great

    and good object which he had proposed to himself . We find that others have been led to promote benevolent plans by similar means . Many of the great legislators and reformers of Greece and Rome thought it necessary to pretend to divine aid in order to effect the purposes which they had formed . But Muhammed was , by the force of circumstances , urged to greater lengths than any of these . One imposture led hiki to the necessity of another , difficulties fired his zeal and increased his enthusiasm , till at length it was not easy to say which had most empire over his heart , fanaticism or fraud * That in the later periods of his public life both were united in his character , we have no doubt ; and conceiving him to have been a deceiver as well as selfc-deceived , we have little difficulty in explaining the chief incidents of his life . Nor is the union which we have now supposed so infrequent of

    occurrence as some may imagine . We are disposed to think that no small share of fanaticism existed in the characters of most of those who are generally known under the name of religious impostors . Otherwise it is difficult to understand how they could have played their parts so well as many of them actually did . To deceive others the impostor must in part be selfdeceived .

    But Mr . Forster would rejoin , Supposing these things to be as you assert , what but the agency of the Deity led to them ? Assign what secondary causes you will as the immediate occasion of Islamism , do not these imply the agency of God ? Undoubtedly . All things are of God , and therefore the causes now alleged . But is there not a most material difference between the general and the special agency of his providence ? Under the former , surely not the latter , Mr . Forster has written his book ; so the

    former , not the latter , originated the religion of Muhammed . And except it can be shewn that God * s general providence , in conjunction with human agency , was insufficient to occasion Islamism , it is unphilosophical to refer to his special and miraculous interposition . This may be attempted , but can , we think , never succeed . All that is requisite to understand the origin of Islamism is to carry the mind back to the period when it arose , divesting it of modern notions and modes of thought , studying well the genius of the

    people among whom it spread , and the nature of the means , and the character of the person by whose agency it was originated . Nor do we participate in the difficulty which Mr . Forster feels respecting its continuance . H « indeed speaks of its " permanence , " and imagines that it will continue to exist as a kind of inferior Christianity . Recent events have no very

    favourable aspect on this speculation . Whether , however , its continuance be stiW for a longer or shorter period , this creates no difficulty in our mind . In general , what is will be , because it is . No adequate cause of change has yet appeared . The Christian world still acknowledges a tri-personal God ,

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    Higgins ' * Apology for Mohumed . 235

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• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1830, page 235, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2583/page/19/