of learning to read their Koran over the grave of the deceased and in
his chapel; and, as long as the endowment lasted, the tomb continued
to be at the same time a college. They read the Koran morning and
evening over the grave, and prayers in the chapel at the stated
periods; and the rest of their time is commonly devoted to the
instruction of the youths of their neighbourhood, either gratis or
for a small consideration. Apartments in the tomb were usually set
aside for the purpose, and these tombs did ten times more for
education in Hindustan than all the colleges formed especially for
the purpose.[4] We might suppose that rulers who formed and endowed
such works all over the land must have had more of the respect and
the affections of the great mass of the people than we, who, as my
friend upon the Jumna has it, 'build nothing but private dwelling-
houses, factories, courts of justice, and jails', can ever have; but
this conclusion would not be altogether just.[5] Though every mosque
and mausoleum was a seat of learning, that learning, instead of being
a source of attraction and conciliation between the Muhammadans and
Hindoos, was, on the contrary, a source of perpetual repulsion and
enmity between them--it tended to keep alive in the breasts of the
Musalmans a strong feeling of religions indignation against the
worshippers of idols; and of dread and hatred in those of the
Hindoos.

The Koran was the Book of books, spoken by God to the angel Gabriel
in parts as occasion required, and repeated by him to Muhammad; who,
unable to write himself, dictated them to any one who happened to be
present when he received the divine communications;[6] it contained
all that it was worth man's while to study or know--it was from the
Deity, but at the same time coeternal with Him--it was His divine
eternal spirit, inseparable from Him from the beginning, and
therefore, like Him, uncreated. This book, to read which was of
itself declared to be the highest of all species of worship, taught
war against the worshippers of idols to be of all merits the greatest
in the eye of God; and no man could well rise from the perusal
without the wish to serve God by some act of outrage against them.
These buildings were, therefore, looked upon by the Hindoos, who
composed the great mass of the people, as a kind of religions
volcanoes, always ready to explode and pour out their lava of
intolerance and outrage upon the innocent people of the surrou