It is not proposed in this chapter to add another to the already numerous biographies of Muḥammad, but rather to make a study of his life in one of its aspects only, viz. that in which the Prophet is presented to us as a preacher, as the apostle unto men of a new religion. The life of the founder of Islam and the inaugurator of its propaganda may naturally be expected to exhibit to us the true character of the missionary activity of this religion. If the life of the Prophet serves as the standard of conduct for the ordinary believer, it must do the same for the Muslim missionary. From the pattern, therefore, we may hope to learn something of the spirit that would animate those who sought to copy it, and of the methods they might be expected to adopt. For the missionary spirit of Islam is no after-thought in its history; it interpenetrates the religion from its very commencement, and in the following sketch it is desired to show how this is so, how Muḥammad the Prophet is the type of the missionary of Islam. It is therefore beside the purpose to describe his early history, or the influences under which he grew up to manhood, or to consider him in the light either of a statesman or a general: it is as the preacher alone that he will demand our attention. When, after long internal conflict and disquietude, Muḥammad was at length convinced of his divine mission, his earliest efforts were directed towards persuading his own family of the truth of the new doctrine. The unity of God, the abomination of idolatry, the duty laid upon man of submission to the will of his Creator,—these were the simple truths to which he claimed their allegiance. The first convert was his faithful and loving wife, Khadījah,—she who fifteen years before had offered her hand in marriage to the poor kinsman that had so successfully traded with her merchandise as a hired agent,—with the words, “I love thee, my cousin, for thy kinship with me, for the respect with which thy people regard thee, for thy honesty, for the beauty of thy character and for the truthfulness of thy speech.” [16] She had lifted him out of poverty, and enabled him to live up to the social position to which he was entitled by right of birth; but this was as nothing to the fidelity and loving devotion with which she shared his mental anxieties, and helped him with tenderest sympathy and encouragement in the hour of his despondency.