Note 49 — Chapter V · THE SPREAD OF ISLAM AMONG THE CHRISTIANS OF SPAIN.

The Turks considered that the greatest kindness they could show a man was to bring him into the salvation of the faith of Islam,49 and to this end they left no method of persuasion untried: a Dutch traveller of the sixteenth century, tells us that while he was admiring the great mosque of Santa Sophia, some Turks even tried to work upon his religious feelings through his æsthetic sense, saying to him, “If you become a Musalman, you will be able to come here every day of your life.” About a century later, an English traveller50 had a similar experience: “Sometimes, out of an excess of zeal, they will ask a Christian civilly enough, as I have been asked myself in the Portico of Sancta Sophia, why will you not turn Musalman, and be as one of us?” The public rejoicings that hailed the accession of a new convert to the faith, testify to the ardent love for souls which made these men such zealous proselytisers. The new Muslim was set upon a horse and led in triumph through the streets of the city. If he was known to be genuinely honest in his change of faith and had voluntarily entered the pale of Islam, or if he was a person of good position, he was received with high honour and some provision made for his support.51 There was certainly abundant evidence for saying that “The Turks are preposterously zealous in praying for the conversion, or perversion rather, of Christians to their irreligious religion: they pray heartily, and every day in their Temples, that Christians may imbrace the Alcoran, and become their Proselytes, in effecting of which they leave no means unassaied by fear and flattery, by punishments and rewards.”52