his household. Of this, there are evidences down to the time of Mahomet. Kahtan, the founder of the Arab race— —the Joktan of the scripture, is regarded as the first sovereign of Arabia Felix or Yemen. He was succeeded by his son Yarab, from whom some derive the name of the territory, and during a long period of 2,020 years, according to Pococke, this dynasty continued; twenty-nine kings having successively reigned about seventy years each. He gives the names, which are here omitted, as nothing more is known concerning them. The natives of this province were more easily governed than those of other provinces. Mecca and Medina exhibit the form, and something of the substance also of a commonwealth. The grandfather of Mahomet, and his lineal ancestors reigned among their fellow citizens, as Pericles did at Athens, by the opinion held of their wisdom and integrity; their patrimony and their power went together. From the uncles of the prophet, the sceptre descended to a younger branch of the family, so that by the law of succession no power pertained to Mahomet; it belonged to his relatives. Lists of monarchs of other districts, and pertaining to different dynasties, are also preserved by various historians, which for the same reason are passed over. The little that can be ascertained concerning these early times, is emphatically implied in the denomination of "times of ignorance," by which they are known among Arab writers; still it is evident that the wanderers of the desert have always maintained their freedom from foreign power. Their necks never bent to a yoke. The reason for this, when all other nations were subdued, is to be found partly in the character of the Arab, partly in the nature of their country. "Surrounded with inhospitable deserts, they could easily elude the vigilance of their enemies, by retiring within those natural barriers of rocks and sands which bade defiance to their persecutors." The historian of the Decline and Fall of the Roman empire, questions this historical fact, just as he does every thing else out of which arguments have been drawn in support of revealed religion. Yet it is remarkable, that even his own pages contain evidence of the truth of what he would fain deny.* He says of the tribes, whose independence he nevertheless questions, "When they advance to battle, the hope of victory is in the front; in the rear, the assurance of a retreat. Their horses and camels, who in eight or ten days can perform a march of four or five hundred miles, disappear before the conqueror; the secret waters of the desert elude his search, and his victorious troops are consumed with thirst, hunger, and fatigue, in the pursuit of an invisible foe, who scorns his efforts, and safely reposes in the heart of a burning solitude. Their friendship," he adds, “. 'was venal, their faith inconstant, their enmity capricious: it was an easier task to excite than to disarm these roving barbarians; and in the familiar intercourse of war they learned to see and to despise the splendid weakness both of Rome and Persia." With both these powers, whole tribes of Arabia were occasionally in alliance; they were hired to aid in their wars; but this is widely different from being in subjection and independence, as Gibbon, on that account, would have us believe. * See note in chap. 50., Vol. 9. p. 232., Edition 1819, in 12 Vols. All uncivilized nations divide themselves into clans or tribes, and it is by no means uncommon for these tribes to pride themselves respectively on the simplicity and purity of their descent. A similar division occurs also among nations, to which pre-eminent religious distinctions and privileges pertain. Every one has read of the castes of India; and who is ignorant of the pride with which a Jew styled himself a Hebrew of the Hebrews. Thus the Arabs are classified and divided. There are the old extinct Arabs-the genuine or pure Arabs-and the Most-Arabi, or the mixed and naturalized Arabs. Of the first class we have nothing but tradition and fable, seldom worth recording, except that among them are numbered the very tribes, concerning which inspired prophecy declares that their names should be blotted out for ever.* The pure Arabs trace their origin to Joktan, and divide into families or tribes called after the names of their respective ancestors; the sons of that patriarch or of his immediate descendants, just as the family of Jacob divides into tribes after the names of his sons and two grandsons Ephraim and Manasseh. Such a division was adverse to the consolidation of their power and influence; it contributed however in no small degree to some of those remarkable peculiarities which distinguish the people, Gagnier, and after him, Sale, have enumerated nearly three score tribes of genuine Arabs; the chief and most honoured of whom were the Koreish descendants of Fehr the courageous. Mahomet sprung from the third class, for which reason we defer saying any thing of them till the next chapter. * Exod. xvii. 14, C pro The We cannot approach the history of such an individual as the prophet of Arabia was, without one reflection on the perfect facility with which the Most High raises up instruments to punish the idolatry of mankind: for if He rules, as unquestionably he does, over all the nations of the earth, and men are but his instruments, we can have no more doubt that Mahomet was guided by his vidence, than that Moses and Joshua were. guidance they respectively enjoy widely differs; their courses are dissimilar; they are men altogether differing from each other; but they are all instruments in the hand of God of fulfilling his purposes. Moses and Joshua, in remote ages, and in furtherance of true religion, are commissioned to draw the sword against the enemies of God; Mahomet, in comparatively modern times, without any such commission, and in furtherance of a system but little better than those he opposed, employs the same weapon against persons of a similar description. We are wont to refer to the justice and wisdom of the Most High the operations of the former, can we regard those of the latter in an opposite light? Who can read the overthrow of the nations of Canaan by the leaders of Israel, or the victorious progress of the armed prophet and his legions against Arabian idolaters, without feeling that verily there is a God that judgeth in the earth; and that though as yet delusion, error, and vice greatly prevail in our world, they will eventually, by one means or other, be uprooted. If for a system that was merely preparatory, as was the Jewish, and if for a system which, false as was one part of it, contained nevertheless the great essential truth of the divine unity, God with such facility raised up his instruments, and secured to them prosperity, what shall stay his hand when he ariseth to shake terribly the kingdoms of the earth, and to render them the empire of his Son? CHAPTER II. The descent of the Arabs from Ishmael.-Obscurity of their early history, and their care as to genealogical record.—Gibbon's scepticism on their origin.-Argument from their practice of circumcision-from scripture reference to Arab tribes-and from the coincidence of their character and habits with those prophetically attributed to Ishmael.-Mahomet's descent from Arab princes.-Idolatry of the early tribes. THE tribes inhabiting Arabia, and who are known by the general name of Arabs, trace their descent from Ishmael, the son of the venerable patriarch Abraham. From the same parent in the line of Isaac descended, the yet more wonderful people, whose history is chiefly recorded in the Old Testament scriptures. The Israelites and the Arabs, alike in many particulars, are thus nearly related to each other. Every reader of the Bible will remember the story of Hagar and her son. Sarai, the wife of the patriarch, was barren; and to prevent his being childless, an evil which was then considered the greatest that could occur, especially to a man of wealth and power, Hagar, according to the manners of the times, also becomes his wife. From this marriage Ishmael sprung; but such was the envy and jealousy with which Hagar was regarded, that she was at length compelled to leave the patriarch's house. The birth of Isaac, when Ishmael was about fourteen years of age, led to |