s of the
most ancient customs of Egypt, he imposed on the women an absolute
confinement; the restraint excited the clamors of both sexes; their
clamors provoked his fury; a part of Old Cairo was delivered to the
flames and the guards and citizens were engaged many days in a bloody
conflict. At first the caliph declared himself a zealous Mussulman, the
founder or benefactor of moschs and colleges: twelve hundred and ninety
copies of the Koran were transcribed at his expense in letters of gold;
and his edict extirpated the vineyards of the Upper Egypt. But his
vanity was soon flattered by the hope of introducing a new religion;
he aspired above the fame of a prophet, and styled himself the visible
image of the Most High God, who, after nine apparitions on earth, was at
length manifest in his royal person. At the name of Hakem, the lord of
the living and the dead, every knee was bent in religious adoration:
his mysteries were performed on a mountain near Cairo: sixteen thousand
converts had signed his profession of faith; and at the present hour, a
free and warlike people, the Druses of Mount Libanus, are persuaded
of the life and divinity of a madman and tyrant. [68] In his divine
character, Hakem hated the Jews and Christians, as the servants of his
rivals; while some remains of prejudice or prudence still pleaded in
favor of the law of Mahomet. Both in Egypt and Palestine, his cruel
and wanton persecution made some martyrs and many apostles: the common
rights and special privileges of the sectaries were equally disregarded;
and a general interdict was laid on the devotion of strangers
and natives. The temple of the Christian world, the church of the
Resurrection, was demolished to its foundations; the luminous prodigy of
Easter was interrupted, and much profane labor was exhausted to destroy
the cave in the rock which properly constitutes the holy sepulchre. At
the report of this sacrilege, the nations of Europe were astonished and
afflicted: but instead of arming in the defence of the Holy Land, they
contented themselves with burning, or banishing, the Jews, as the secret
advisers of the impious Barbarian. [69] Yet the calamities of Jerusalem
were in some measure alleviated by the inconstancy or repentance of
Hakem himself; and the royal mandate was sealed for the restitution of
the churches, when the tyrant was assassinated by the emissaries of
his sister. The succeeding caliphs resumed the maxims of religion and
polic