"[79]
[Sidenote: Is Islam suitable for any nation?]
Writers have indeed been found who, dwelling upon the benefits conferred
by Islam on idolatrous and savage nations, have gone so far as to hold
that the religion of Mohammed may in consequence be suited to certain
portions of mankind--as if the faith of Jesus might peaceably divide
with it the world. But surely to acquiesce in a system which reduces the
people to a dead level of social depression, despotism, and
semi-barbarism would be abhorrent from the first principles of
philanthropy. With the believer, who holds the Gospel to be "good
tidings of great joy, _which shall be to all people_,"[o] such a notion is
on higher grounds untenable; but even in view of purely secular
considerations it is not only untenable, but altogether unintelligible.
As I have said elsewhere:
The eclipse in the East, which still sheds its blight on the
ancient seats of Jerome and Chrysostom, and shrouds in darkness the
once bright and famous sees of Cyprian and Augustine, has been
disastrous every-where to liberty and progress, equally as it has
been to Christianity. And it is only as that eclipse shall pass
away and the Sun of righteousness again shine forth that we can
look to the nations now dominated by Islam sharing with us those
secondary but precious fruits of divine teaching.
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