Without our help you would still be tattooed and inarticulate barbarians. But you have been getting out of hand, and are sinking back into the old slough of ignorance and crass intolerance. And so perhaps some day, after we Mohammedans have finished converting Asia and Africa to the Faith of Islam (and we are doing steady work in that direction), we may send another Tamerlane into Europe, reinforced by an army of a few million Asians who laugh in the face of death, and finish the job. IV You speak of Oriental mystery, of Oriental romance. Are we Asians then like Molière’s bourgeois who spoke prose all his life without knowing it? Is there really a veil of mystery about us? No, no. The Most High God did not take the trouble to create two different types of human beings, one to work on the banks of the Seine, and the other to sing His praises on the shore of the Ganges. There is no veil, no mystery, no romance … except the veil of Christian ignorance, the romance of Christian imagination, the mystery of Christian want of desire to know. There is perhaps a latent search after knowledge and truth in your hearts’ souls. But your inborn selfishness forces you to believe that a healthy portion of ignorance is the best medicine against the ravages of the dangerous malady which is called Tolerance. Just a little effort would teach you that there is no mystery about us, no abyss which separates you from us. But your ignorance is your bliss and provides you with a sort of righteous bias. It also sheds a holy and therefore eminently Christian halo around your attitude of meddlesome interference in the affairs of Asia and North Africa. Of course you only interfere because of your laudable intention to show us the true path to civilization and salvation. And if accidentally you increase your own power and wealth, if you impoverish the native whom you attempt to “save,” if you incite strife where no strife existed before you imported soldiers and bibles and missionaries and whisky and some special brands of “white” diseases … well … Allah is Great…. The mystery which is supposed to shroud the Orient is a lying invention of Christendom destined to give a semblance of justice to your selfish, harmful meddlings in the affairs, religions, politics and customs of other countries. If you wish to conquer with the right of fire and the might of sword, go ahead and do so, or at least say so. It would be a motive which we Muslim, being warriors, could understand and appreciate. But do not clothe your greed for riches and dominion in the hypocritical, nasal, sing-song of a heaven-decreed Mission to enlighten the poor native, a Pharisee call of duty to spread the word of your Saviour, your lying intention to uplift the ignorant Pagan.