"These are but the conclusions and fallible discourses of man upon the Word of God, for such I do believe the Holy Scriptures; yet, were it of man, I could not choose but say, it was the singularest and superlative piece that hath been extant since the creation. Were I a pagan, I should not refrain the lecture of it; and cannot but commend the judgment of Ptolemy, that thought not his library complete without it. The Alcoran, of the Turks, (I speak without prejudice,) is an ill-composed piece, containing in it vain and ridiculous errors in philosophy, impossibilities, fictions, and vanities beyond laughter, maintained by evident and open sophisms, the policy of ignorance, deposition of universities, and banishment of learning that hath gotten foot by arms and violence: this, without a blow, hath disseminated itself through the whole earth. It is not unremarkable, what Philo first observed, that the law of Moses continued two thousand years without the least alteration; whereas, we see the laws of other commonweals do alter with occasions; and even those, that pretend their original from some divinity, to have vanished without trace or memory. Men's works have an age like themselves, and, though they outlive their authors, yet have they a stint and a period to their duration. THIS ONLY IS A WORK TOO HARD FOR THE TEETH OF TIME, AND CANNOT PERISH BUT IN THE GENERAL FLAMES, WHEN ALL THINGS SHALL CONFESS THEIR ASHES."