ut nothing more. Conversion by the sword was not enforced on any
proselyte by Mohammad.

[Sidenote: 120. Major Osborn quoted.]

Major Osborn has drawn a very dark picture of what he calls "The
Doctrine of Jehad," in his _Islam under the Arabs_.[314] The defensive
wars of Mohammad are explained by him as "means of livelihood congenial
to the Arab mind, and carrying with it no stain of disgrace or
immorality. This was robbery. Why should not the faithful eke out their
scanty means by adopting this lucrative and honourable profession, which
was open to everyone who had a sword and knew how to use it?... Surely,
to despoil these infidels and employ their property to feed the hungry
and clothe the naked among the people of God, would be a work well
pleasing in His sight.... And thus was the first advance made in the
conversion of the religion of Islam with the religion of the sword"
(pages 46-47). After this the Major writes again: "The ninth Sura is
that which contains the Prophet's proclamation of war against the
votaries of all creeds other than that of Islam" (page 52). Then he
quotes several verses, some of them half sentences, violently distorted,
from the eighth and ninth Suras, in a consecutive form, without giving
the numbers. These are Sura IX, 20, 34, 35, 82, 121; Sura VIII, 67; Sura
IX, 36, 5, 29, 19; Sura XLVII, 4; Sura IX, 5; and Sura VIII, 42. Lastly,
the learned Major concludes by saying,--"Such was the character of the
Sacred War enjoined upon the Faithful. It is Muhammad's greatest
achievement and his worst. When subjected himself to the pains of
persecution he had learned to perceive how powerless were torments
applied to the body to work a change of conviction in the mind. 'Let
there be no violence in religion' had then been one of the maxims he had
laid down. 'Unto every one of you,' he had said in former days, speaking
of Jews and Christians, 'have we given a law, and an open path; and if
God had pleased He had surely made you one people; but He hath thought
fit to give you different laws, that he might try you in that which He
hath given you respectively. Therefore, strive to excel each other in
good works; unto God shall ye all return, and then will He declare unto
you that concerning which ye have disagreed.' But the intoxication of
success had long ago stilled the voice of his better self. The aged
Prophet standing on the brink of the grave, and leaving as his last
legacy a mandate of universal war