"Let Lew. Yes, surely he is my son!us this day cease to question who is right and who is wrong.-Wife, we have now found one who will mourn for us!"Child, call me father!-[the Boy calls him "Father."]-"Ah, that sound has transported me!-How could he harbour such jealousy, and in his contrivances to get a little money, endeavour to cut off my posterity from the root !"-Yin-sun, tell my daughter and her husband to come here. Daughter, where has Seaou-mei been these last three years? Daugh. Father, if you do not know, listen to me while I tell you the whole history. When Seaou-mei had been pregnant six months, Chang-lang was seized with a fit of jealousy, and wished to make away with her. Your daughter, reflecting that you were old, and that if any thing happened to Seaon-mei, your posterity would be cut off, concealed her in a place of safety, and brought up the child. For three years, whatever they required, both as to food and clothing, was secretly provided by your daughter.-Repenting of your former kindness, you took away all your effects from my charge.-But, from this day, let your resentment cease against your daughter.-Though you have a dutiful nephew, how can he be compared to your own child? Lew. How was I to know all this, child, without your telling me!" Since it proves thus, you have acted as my daughter; but my former displeasure was not without its excuse. My son-in-law yonder is of another house; but my daughter is worthy to be recognised by her family." Wife. Who could have thought that Lew Yuen-wae would still have a son! Lew. "We need not apprehend being buried in that desolate spot; for our family has now a representative. Your sorrow has met with its cure." Daugh. "Father, though you have this day found a son, do not cease to remember your daughter!" Lew. "Daughter, how can I be sensible of a benefit and not requite it?" Yin. Since you have found a son, I return all the keys to you, uncle.-I have thus been rich for only one day! Lew. My daughter, my nephew, and my son-"I take the whole of my property, and divide it among you."-Do you all listen to my words. For sixty years I had been heaping up wealth; but as I had not a son, my sorrow was without an end. My brother unhappily died early, and Yin-sun, my nephew, was long banished from the family. That villain Chang-lang falsely plotted to get possession of my wealth; but my dutiful daugh-ter secretly preserved my son.- -When we went to the tombs, at the usual season to perform the rites, the feelings of affection returned, and jealousy became changed to love. Thus by pointing out the desolate spot, I taught a bitter lesson to my old wife; nor did I give away a part of my wealth in vain, for, by the favour of Heaven, I have an heir in my old age! We believe that the comedy is accurately translated and are gratified by the introduction of the songs. But cannot suppress our fears that its paucity of interesting events and weakness of plot will prevent an Heir in his Old Age inheriting the honor enjoyed by his predecessor of being transformed into popular theatrical pieces in England and France. The brief view of the Chinese Drama prefixed to Mr. Davis's translation ofthe " Laou-seng-urh" was written, we discover, by the English editor of the work. We think that he should have announced this in his advertisement, as surprise might be created by supposing that Mr. Davis had neglected personal observations and Chinese authors, to compile from European missionaries and travellers. An History of Muhammedanism; comprising the Life and Character of the Arabian Prophet, and succinct Accounts of the Empires founded by the Muhammedan Arms; an Inquiry into the Theology, Morality, Laws, Literature and Usages of the Muselmans; and a View of the present Extent and Influence of the Muhammedan Religion. By Charles Mills. 2d edition, revised and augmented. Pp. 510. Black, Kingsbury, Parbury, and Allen. London, 1817. THE circumstance that in an age like the present, when intellectual labour is so much facilitated and abridged, no history of Muhammedanism existed, carried our attention to Mr. Mills' book soon after its public appearance. It was astonishing, and the idea had often floated in our minds, that when kingdoms formed the stage, princes cted, and monarchs beheld the swelling scene, the events in the imperial tragedy should be known only to a few, and lie scattered in the waste without one hand to collect and organize them. In our review of the first edition of the History of Muhammedanism, we praised the general intention of the author, and much of the execution of the design. We clearly saw, that on a subject of such an extensive nature, excellence could not be attained at once, and we have anxiously looked for a renewal of the endeavour. The public have gone along with us in our sentiments, and have shewn that a work of this nature was a desideratum in literature. The second edition is now before us. We have carefully compared it with the last, and hasten to present our readers with the results of our labours. We do not mean to notice any variations in the manner, or those of slight consequence in the matter, of these volumes. There are various instances of both. Many of those respecting language might as well have been omitted, for although they may shew a feverish desire for correctness, yet that desire too often leads an eer, author into an imitation of that great man Mr. Prig the auction"whose manner was so inimitably fine that he had as much to say upon a ribbon as a Raphael." The only change of importance in the life of Mr. Mills' hero is, the marking of the time of Muhammed's private efforts at conversion, and his public preaching. It appears he was three years gaining proselytes in secret and fourteen disciples, including his wife, his cousin, and his slave, were the fruits of his exertions. But even these were not instances of the spontaneous conversion of independent minds. Abu Beker was his first convert of any note, for the devotion of Fatima, Ali, and Zeid, must have been regarded with suspicion. Abu Beker admired the sublimity of Muhammed's first principle, and in that admiration overlooked the errors and imperfections of the system. His example influenced many, and as opinions are always contagious, the new religion spread. Muhammedanism met with no checks, or rather only such checks, as, according to the well known principles of human nature, were likely to increase rather than diminish its influence. It is a fine remark of Hume, that, (6 any opposition which does not entirely discourage and intimidate us, has rather a contrary effect, and inspires us with more than ordinary grandeur and magnanimity. In collecting our force to overcome the opposition, we invigorate the soul, and give it an elevation with which otherwise it would never have been acquainted." The enthusiasm of the authors and propagators of Islamism knew no bounds, and the world was in the seventh century in such a dreadful state of political and religious lassitude, that success surely attended any attempt at in novation. The first thing that struck us in the second chapter, was the increase of philological learning which the author exhibits in his explanation of the words "Moors and Barbars." 1818.] Mr. Mills's History To most readers that is a matter of very slight consequence. Few, however, will feel uninterested about the materials upon which the art of letters is displayed, and without which, genius would live only for an hour, and pass away into mere air. The Tartars taught the Saracens the way to manufacture paper, and by their means it was diffused over the western world. in no danger of running into Don Adriano de Armado's error of 66 drawing out the thread of his "verbosity finer than the staple of "his argument." The author should have filled up the portrait, and he would by that means have made his essay more satisfactory. The Arabs were the inventors of paper from linen; or, to speak more correctly, they revived the art; for Livy (lib. 4, cap. 7) mentions some lintei libri; and Symmachus five centuries afterwards notices lineu and silken paper lib. 4, epist. 34). Linen or cotton cloth as the Indian materials for writing is mentioned by Arrian. See Vincent's Nearchus, p. 15, note. The linen manufactories at Valentia (the classical reader remembers the sudaria Setaba of Catullus) suggested the idea of the substitution of linen for cotton, as probably the cotton manufactories in the north east of Tartary, induced the people to make paper from cotton and not from silk, or bamboo, or other substances used by their instructors the Chinese. The only material variation in the fourth chapter is, an enlarged account of those wholesale murderers, the Zingishanidan Tartars. The author seems impressed with the idea, that they were more important in history than any other Scythian shepherds and the general reader may fancy for a moment the magnitude of the subject, on learning that their power extended north to south, from the south of China to the northern extremity of Siberia, and east to west, from the eastern sea to the western districts of Poland. The Saracenian conquests in the Mediterranean are mentioned in a proper manner. Nothing escaped them. Not a corner of the Cyclades was unexplored ;-explored by them, not for the purpose of taking the gage and dimensions of misery, depression, and contempt, and of diffusing in their stead, liberty, learning, and happiness, but with the satanic view of filling the dreadful measure of fury, havoc, and desolation. Rome herself was scarcely saved. Who can, indeed, think without indignation, that the Arabic war-cry should be heard round the walls of a city, which, even in the hour of her decay, recalls to a mind filled with liberal enthusiasm, a respectful remembrance of her ancient prosperity and grandeur. The fifth chapter is now before us and it is in this part of the work the chief alterations have been made. In addition to the Koran, the author has now taken in a view of the traditionary law. We remember to have marked the difference in the two systems, in our first reading of the book; and we could not object to Mr. Mills' following such respectable authorities as Sale and Gibbon. It is true, we could have advised him to profit by the lights which have been thrown on Oriental subjects since their days, yet as the difference would have been one of plan and not of execution, we examined the subject with the canon of Bishop Butler in our minds, to see " whether that which We pass over the third chapter. We wish the author had detailed more at length the causes of the success of the Muhammedan religion. We do not mean to say that the causes he states are not adequate to the effects, but as he has enlarged other parts of his book, this was proposed to be made out, were really made out or not." We are glad, however, at the change of method, for the public are now in possession of a most interesting view of all the principal and remark able parts of the Muhammedan Divinity, Ethics, and Jurisprudence. It will not even suffer in the comparison with Mr. Gibbon's celebrated outline of Roman law. Not that we mean for a moment to compliment Mr. Mills by telling him, that he possesses even a moiety of Mr. Gibbon's erudition. Our meaning is, that the authors have treated their respective topics equally well. The fifth chapter of the History of Muhammedanism will be acceptable to all classes of readers. To the learned it will serve as a text book : and no gentleman or student can be contented to remain in ignorance of the opinions and the manners of one half the world. One small omission in the present chapter must be noticed. The author generally gives reasons for things, and he should therefore have stated the cause of Muhammed's prohibiting the eating of blood. The reason was, that the eating or drinking of blood was an idolatrous usage. In the Western world, the burning of incense was the great mark of Idol worship; in the Eastern, the partaking of blood denoted the same thing. In Muhammed's earnes.ess therefore for the abolition of idolatry, he could not fail to prohibit the chief expressive sign. We are much inclined to think that the Muselman theology and morality should have occupied one chapter, and that the jurisprudence should have stood by itself, in Justinian form, of rights of persons, rights of things, private injuries and actions, and crimes and punish ments. In behalf of the present arrangement it may be urged, that the materials from which the account is drawn are not so numerous as to cause confusion, that an exposition of Muselman principles can be given without this formality, and that the Roman mode of clas sification is unknown to the Moslems. On the other hand, it may be replied, that the very circumstance of any defectiveness of arrangement in the Mishcat or Hedaya, should have induced the present writer to attempt the pen of a Tribonian, and methodize the rude mass that it is much more pleasant to read every thing that relates to a subject, the subject of slaves, for example, under one head, than to be told in a note, which many people may pass over, that slaves can have only two wives, and in another note under the statement of the law on infanticide," that "the children of a man born of a "female slave are free." It is true, it may be continued, that the facts are the same; but a student would not look for them under the present general division of civil and criminal law. But to proceed-Mr. Mills notices some interesting circumstances respecting the administrators of the law, and the mode of dispensing it. The regulations respecting evidence are likewise stated. The non-admissibility of the testimony of slaves, if not a strange circumstance, is pregnant with evil, as from their situation and acquaintance with domestic affairs, they must often be the only people who can prove a fact. It may be in the recollection of our readers, that not many weeks since, a Moslem was examined in the Insolvent Debtors Court in London. We very much doubt whether a disciple of Muhammed ever appeared in an English court of justice before.* At least, of this circumstance we are assured, that it had not happened before the time of Lord Chancellor Hardwicke. In the great cause of Omychund and Barker, reported in the first of Atkyns, his lordship decided that the evidence of an Hindu, if sworn according to the ceremonies of his religion, was admis *The circumstance is we believe not infre quent, at least in criminal cases; so little so, provided with a Koran for the express purpose that we understand the Recorder of London is of swearing in Muhammedan witnesses.--Ed, sible in an English court. One of the judges who assisted the Chancellor in laying down that important rule, said, that, many years antecedent to that time, a Muselman had been examined before the Privy Council; no mention was made of the appearance of such a person in Westminster Hall. On a former occasion we presented our readers with Mr. Mills' general reflections on the Koran. We request them to reperuse those observations (Asiatic Journal, Vol. IV., p. 34, 35), and then to consider the following remarks on the value of Muhammedanism, which in the new edition are substituted for them. To our minds these remarks are judicious, profound, and evince a mind possessed of a more than ordinary share of oriental and general knowledge. We have now completed our general view of the fabric of credence and morals which triumphed over the established religions of Asia and Africa; and however deep may be our regret that it was reared by means abhorrent to human nature, yet as its grand principle is more pure and sublime than any which the uninspired reason of man had ever devised, it must be confessed that Islamism is, in respect of its theology, more entitled to praise than the other false religions which have guided the passions of mankind. The popular systems of ancient times-the creeds, too, of Brahma and Zoroasterwere disgraced by the number of their gods. Some, indeed, of their followers may have concluded, that the prevailing polytheism was a corrupt, and not an original doctrine; but the Supreme Being whom their enlarged understandings imagined, was only a metaphysical abstraction, or an impulse of fate; not like the God of the Musselmans, omniscient, independent, energetic. A rabble of flagitious, licentious deities, or personifications of the powers of nature, or principles of good and evil, were adored by the multitude. In the worship of these gods, priestcraft exercised a tremendous sway. It is a creditable part of Muhammed's religion, that although there are ministers for the decorous performance of religious rites, yet it is not oppressed by the crowd of men, who, under the names of Brah. mins and Magi, directed the consciences of the superstitious to the gratification of their own vicious ambition and sensual passions. As the rational enthusiasm of Muhammed confessed and adored the Asiatic Journ.-No. 25. unity of God, it is wonderful that there is such a large portion of folly in the other angels and genii, he presumed to trace the parts of his theology. By his system of course of Providence, the problem justly said by Bacon to be inexplicable, with respect to the " opus quod operatur Deus a "principio usque ad finem." His voluptuous paradise, borrowed from the Persian and Indian schools, is offensive to the philosopher and the Christian; but their censure should be somewhat mitigated, on reflecting that it could not be reached without the previous practice of morality: and as it includes the awful idea of the responsibility of man, we must confess, that its conduciveness to virtue is far superior to that of the philosophical theories of the ancients.* If we view only the theology and morality of the Muhammedan system, it may be thought that Islamism is more conducive to happiness than any other false religion to which mankind have ever submitted; but if we look deeper into the subject, a different conclusion will be drawn. Intolerance of other systems is a great stain on the religion of Arabia. Confucius and Brahma respected the superstitions of their fellow-creatures : Zoroaster and Muhammed were inexorable The sentiments of the Peripatetics on the soul's iminortality are totally unintelligible. Cudworth, i. 66, 500, ii. 1171, and no wonder, for their founder, Aristotle, asserts, in one place of his Nicomachian Ethics, the doctrine of annihilation; and in another, seems to deny it. The Stoics-diu mansuros aiunt animos, semper negant-an absurd opinion, as Cicero well argues. for they admit the soul's existence independently of the body, which is the only difficulty in the question. Tusc. Quæst. i. 32. As it might be expected, in the writings of the Academies there are various opinions. Cicero, the most illustrious of this sect, seems every where in his serious works and in his orations, anxiously to desire to believe that the soal is eternal, yet is confused by the uncertain deductions from reason. The Pagan future state he every where ridicules. Pro Cluent, 61, 62. In his Epistles he appears to doubt. Most of these Epistles were, however, of a consolatory nature, and addressed to Romans, who thought that the soul was mortal-the general opinion in Cicero's time, In these Epistles, Cicero does not deliver his sentiments more freely than in his philosophica works; for if M. P. Cato and Cæsar did (as Sallust narrates) declare in open Senate, that there was no state after death, Cicero could, without offence, deliver the same doctrine in works intended for the learned. Pythagoras, Plato, and Socrates, taught the eter-. nity of the soul. Tus. Quæst. i. 17. 30. But what did this doctrine amount to ?-ideas of the responsibility of man, and a future state of rewards and punishments? No. Cicero tells us that the wisest philosophers maintained the soul was a part of the divine essence, De Divin, 1. 49. Tusc. Quæst. v. 13. Pythagoras, Plato, Empedocles, and most of the Italic philosophers, thought that the souls of gods, of men, and of brutes, are of the same nature; and there is one spirit which pervades the universe (whether the Deity or an emanation from him) into which they all resolve, and with which they are united. Sex tus Empiricus, ix. 127. Tim. and Phæd. M. Antoninus de seipso. ii. 10. Seneca. Epist. xcii. 31, 32. This revolving of the human soul into the soul of the world, destroys all personality, as much as all individuality is lost by the dissolution of the body, and its consequent junction with the material world. VOL.V. G |