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revailed in Arabia down to his time. For an abandoned profligacy was substituted a carefully regulated polygamy, and the practice of destroying female infants was effectually abolished. "As Islam gradually extended its conquest beyond the boundaries of Arabia, many barbarous races whom it absorbed became in like manner participators in its benefits. The Turk, the Indian, the Negro, and the Moor were compelled to cast away their idols, to abandon their licentious rites and customs, to turn to the worship of one God, to a decent ceremonial and an orderly way of life. The faith even of the more enlightened Persian was purified: he learned that good and evil are not co-ordinate powers, but that just and unjust are alike under the sway of one All-wise and Holy Ruler, who ordereth all things in heaven and earth. "For barbarous nations, then, especially--nations which were more or less in the condition of Arabia itself at the time of Mahomet--nations in the condition of Africa at the present day, with little or no civilisation, and without a reasonable religion--Islam certainly comes as a blessing, as a turning from darkness to light and from the power of satan unto God."[137] [Footnote 133: The Life of Mahomet by Sir W. Muir, LL.D., Vol. II, pp. 269-71.] [Footnote 134: The Life of Mahomet by Sir W. Muir, Vol. IV, pp. 320-21.] [Footnote 135: Mohammed, Buddha and Christ, by Marcus Dods, D.D., pp. 17-19 & 119.] [Footnote 136: Christianity and Islam: The Bible and the Koran, by Rev. W.R.W. Stephens, pp. 94, 104, 112, London, 1877.] [Footnote 137: Christianity and Islam: The Bible and the Koran, by the Rev. W.R.W. Stephens, pp. 129-30, London, 1877.] [Sidenote: Indictment against Mohammad.] 36. What the opponents of Mohammad can possibly say against his mission is his alleged moral declension at Medina.[138] They accuse him of cruelty[139] and sensuality[140] during his sojourn in that city after he had passed without any blame more than fifty-five years of his age, and had led a pious missionary life for upwards of fifteen years. These moral stains cannot be inconsistent with his office of being a prophet or reformer. It is no matter if a prophet morally degrades his character under certain circumstances, or morally degrades his character at the end of his age--after leading for upwards of fifty-five years a life of
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