It must, however, be remembered that the name Shiah is not properly confined to this one sect, and also that this sect itself, like other nonconformist bodies, has always shown a great tendency to subdivide. In Persia besides Shiahs, that is the more orthodox Shiahs, there has always been one other smaller sect of Mohammedans attracting general attention. At present the dissenting doctrine most widely taught is that of the Behāīs, who have laid hold of the popular imagination, partly because of their great steadfastness under the most terrible persecutions, partly because of the somewhat popular nature of their teaching, but chiefly because Persia is now being brought into rather closer touch with Europe, and the people as a whole feel that the teaching of the Shiah mullas needs to be modified if Islam is to be preserved. I think one may go further, and say that there is at present in Persia a period of enquiry and spiritual awakening, which gives a special opportunity, not only to Mohammedan sectaries, but also to Christian missionaries. Later on further allusion will be made to these Behāīs, but we must not forget that our first task is not so much the study of the complex religious systems of Persia, as the analysis of those religious influences to which the Yezdi has been subjected. The ordinary Yezdi Mussulman is descended partly from the original Aryan inhabitants of Persia, and partly from their Arabian conquerors: but the enormous difference in character that exists between him and the purely Aryan Parsi is certainly due less to race and more to religion, for the _jadīds_, or converts from Parsiism, often develop all the Mussulman characteristics in a few generations, without the slightest admixture of race. So before attempting to describe the character of the people, it will be necessary to pay as much attention to the religious ideas that have been brought to bear upon them as we have already paid to the nature of their country and the seclusion of their town life. Some aspects of the Yezdi’s religion will be left to a future chapter, and we must at present content ourselves with trying to understand the essential nature of Islam, particularly dwelling on those points of Mohammed’s teaching and example which seem to have produced most impression on the Persian mind. To do this we must divest ourselves of all pre-judgments of the prophet’s life and doctrine, and simply study the facts of history, remembering that the conception of Islam which is to be found amongst the Sunnis of India and Turkey cannot be allowed to pass unchallenged, for the Mohammedan world is by no means unanimous about it; and also that the well-known European theory, that there was a difference in Mohammed’s aims and objects in Mecca and Medina, and that the Meccan period rather than the Medinan indicates the essential idea of Mohammedanism, is one which no educated Mussulman would for a moment tolerate. As for the still