Note 879 — Chapter VI
Reading edition
The greatest Mohammedan writers have always expressed ideas regarding the Deity more lofty than those possessed by the majority of Christians. The Koran contains noble passages on the oneness of God; and for the views of their ordinary theologians, I may refer to an interesting Mohammedan sermon, in Transactions of the Bombay Society, vol. i. pp. 146–158. See also, in vol. iii. pp. 398–448, an Essay by Vans Kennedy; and compare a remarkable passage, considering the quarter from which it comes, in Autobiography of the Emperor Jehangueir, p. 44. Those who are so thoughtless as to believe that Mohammed was a hypocrite, had better study the admirable remarks of M. Comte (Philos. Pos. vol. v. pp. 76, 77), who truly says, ‘qu'un homme vraiment supérieur n'a jamais pu exercer aucune grande action sur ses semblables sans être d'abord lui-même intimement convaincu.’