But this is all that can be objected to him. It is, I believe, admitted, that he is in no common degree faithful to his original; and his numerous notes, and Preliminary Discourse, manifest such a perfect knowledge of Eastern habits, manners, traditions, and laws, as could have been acquired only by an acute mind, capable of submitting to years of patient toil. But, though his work passed safely through the ordeal of criticism, it has been made the pretext for a calumny against him. It has been declared, that he puts the Christian religion on the same footing with the Muhammedan; and some charitable persons have even supposed him to have been a disguised professor of the latter. The origin of this slander we may trace back to the strange obliquity of principles, and the blind merciless rage which are characteristic of bigotry. Sale was not one of those who imagine that the end sanctifies the means, and that the best interests of mankind can be advanced by violence, by railing, or by deviating form the laws of truth, in order to blacken an adversary. He enters into the consideration of the character of Mohammed with a calm philosophic spirit; repeatedly censuring his imposture, touching upon his subterfuges and inventions, but doing justice to him on those points on which the pretended prophet is really worthy of praise. The rules which, in his address to the reader, he lays down for the conversion of Mohammedans, are dictated by sound sense and amiable feelings. They are, however, not calculated to satisfy those who think the sword and the fagot to be the only proper instruments for the extirpation of heresy. That he places Islamism on an equality with Christianity is a gross falsehood. "As Mohammed," says he, "gave his Arabs the best religion he could, preferable, at least, to those of the ancient pagan lawgivers, I confess I cannot see why he deserves not equal respect, though not with Moses or Jesus Christ, whose laws came really from heaven, yet with Minos or Numa, notwithstanding the distinction of a learned writer, who seems to think it a greater crime to make use of an imposture to set up a new religion, founded on the acknowledgment of one true God, and to destroy idolatry, than to use the same means to gain reception to rules and regulations for the more orderly practice of heathenism already established." This, and no more, is "the very head and front of his offending;" and from this it would, I think, be difficult to extract any proof of his belief in the divine mission of Mohammed. If the charge brought against him be not groundless, he must have added to his other sins that of being a consummate hypocrite, and that, too, without any obvious necessity; he having been, till the period of his decease, a member of the Society for the Promoting of Christian Knowledge. In 1736 a society was established for the encouragement of learning. It comprehended many noblemen, and some of the most eminent literary men of that