Mahometanism Unveiled - Vol I

MAHOMETANISM UNVEILED AN INQUIRY, IN WHICH THAT ARCH-HERESY, ITS DIFFUSION AND CONTINUANCE, ARF EXAMINED ON A NEW PRINCIPLE, TENDING TO CONFIRM THE EVIDENCES, AND ATP THE PROPAGATION, OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. BY THE REV. CHARLES FORSTER, B. D. CHANCELLOR OF ARDFERT, AND EXAMINING CHAPLAIN TO THE LORD BISHOP OF LIMERICK. Mahomctamsm began as a Christian heresy JOSEPH MEDB. Tlio extraordinary success, which has attended the imposture of Mahomet, has exercised the ingenuity of Christian writers, and yet does not appear to have been satisfactorily explained. PHILOSOPHY OP MODERN HISTORY. Ex Harare Ismaelem suscepit Abrahamus rem omnem, ad arcanos fines, ita dingente Numine. BUDDEUS IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON PRINTED FOR J. DUNCAN, 37. PATERNOSTER-ROW AND J. COCHKAN, 108, STRAND, MDCCCXXIX. TO THE RIGHT REVEREND JOHN JEBB, D. D. LORD BISHOP OF LIMERICK, ARDFEUT AND AGHADOE. MY LORD, IN inscribing these pages to Your Lord ship, were it my object simply to express my respect and grateful affection towards the friend of my youth, and the guide of my maturer years and studies, a sense of delicacy would have obliged me to convey these sentiments in the shortest and sim plest form of dedication. A 3 VI DEDICATION. But Your Lordship will not take the confession amiss, that I have another ob ject in view that I trespass on your indul gence a little further, as it may seem of some preliminary advantage, to notice briefly the circumstances, which led, first, to the con ception, and, gradually, to the design and execution, of this inquiry into the rise of Mahometanism, and the real causes of its success. These circumstances I can communicate to no living friend with so much propriety as to YourLordship since it was under your roof, and early in the period of that domestic intercourse, which, through a course of years, it has been the privilege and happiness of my life to enjoy, that the subject of the present work engaged my se rious attention. For a considerable time, I had read and thought on the Mahometan apos tasy, purely for my own satisfaction. But, while my judgment readily acquiesced DEDICATION. VII in parts of the explanation offered by ap proved authorities, to account for the case of Mahometanism, there remained still the painful conviction, that some of its most important features were left wholly unexplained. The most popular English work on the subject, the eloquent Bampton Lectures of the late Dr. White of Oxford, impressed me as labouring fatally under this defect notwithstanding the frequent acuteness of the reasoning, and the general force and beauty of the style. Nor was it possible to rest satisfied with the view of a subject so momentous, presented by a volume which was always supposed, and, by the appearance of a late publication, has been completely proved, the product of different pens the materials of which, contributed by minds the most unlike, in power, in principles of reasoning, and in their views even of the Christian scheme, necessarily lay under the disadvantages of a dubious and divided parentage in some parts, the chief arguments being inconsis-A 4 X DEDICATION. The plan of the work may be stated in few words. The principle on which the whole argument rests, is first presented in general terms and then confirmed and elucidated through a series of inductive proofs. The Introduction contains the announcement of that fundamental prin ciple theproofs of it will be found in the succeeding sections. With a view to the preservation of order, several topics of im portance have been transferred to the Ap pendix, at the close of the second volume. In the distribution of the notes, a method has been adopted, differing somewhat from those in ordinary use. Notes of moderate length, and of more immediate value to the argument, have, together with nearly all the references, been placed at the foot of the page. The larger and more discur sive annotations have been disposed at the end of the work...