The existence of this library, at the time of the Conquest, convicts of hypocrisy the sixth grand-master, Jelaleddin Nev Musulman; since he could not have committed to the flames, in the presence of the deputies of Kaswin, the archives and doctrinal works of the order which remain preserved, for the inquisitorial zeal of Atamelik Jowaini. This fanatical zeal has, at all periods, but particularly in the middle ages, converted millions of books into ashes. If the west does, not unjustly[260] (as Gibbon believes), accuse the Khalif Omar of the conflagration of the Alexandrian library, the east returns the charge with the accusation of the burning of the books at Tripoli, where an immense library of Arabic works was consumed by the Crusaders.[261] The assertion that, in the former place, the baths were heated for a space of six months with the wisdom of the Greeks, is as extravagant as that in Tripoli alone, three millions of Arabic manuscripts fed the flames: but that both conflagrations were lighted up by the torch of fanaticism, is not, on that account, the less an historical fact, clearly attested and confirmed by the first historians of the east.[262] The library of Alexandria was burnt by the Moslimin, because, according to the instructions of Omar, the Koran only was the book of books, and all knowledge not contained in it was vain and useless. The library at Tripoli was consumed by the Christians, because it contained, for the most part, nothing but the Koran, and the works written on it. At Alamut the Koran was preserved by Jowaini, and the philosophical works written against it, doomed to destruction; and at Fas, a century before, an _auto da fe_ of theological books was held by Sultan Yakub.[263] Had these two alone been lost, there would not be so much reason to complain; but with them, the conflagrations of Alexandria and Alamut swept away treasures of Grecian, Egyptian, Persian, and Indian philosophy. END OF BOOK VI. BOOK VII. _Conquest of Bagdad—Fall of the Assassins—Remnant of them._