登陆注册
4619900000025

第25章

And now if the wild idolatrous men did believe this, and with their fiery hearts lay hold of it to do it, in what form soever it came to them, I say it was well worthy of being believed. In one form or the other, I say it is still the one thing worthy of being believed by all men. Man does hereby become the high-priest of this Temple of a World. He is in harmony with the Decrees of the Author of this World; cooperating with them, not vainly withstanding them: I know, to this day, no better definition of Duty than that same. All that is _right_ includes itself in this of co-operating with the real Tendency of the World: you succeed by this (the World's Tendency will succeed), you are good, and in the right course there. _Homoiousion_, _Homoousion_, vain logical jangle, then or before or at any time, may jangle itself out, and go whither and how it likes: this is the _thing_ it all struggles to mean, if it would mean anything. If it do not succeed in meaning this, it means nothing. Not that Abstractions, logical Propositions, be correctly worded or incorrectly; but that living concrete Sons of Adam do lay this to heart: that is the important point.

Islam devoured all these vain jangling Sects; and I think had right to do so. It was a Reality, direct from the great Heart of Nature once more.

Arab idolatries, Syrian formulas, whatsoever was not equally real, had to go up in flame,--mere dead _fuel_, in various senses, for this which was _fire_.

It was during these wild warfarings and strugglings, especially after the Flight to Mecca, that Mahomet dictated at intervals his Sacred Book, which they name _Koran_, or _Reading_, "Thing to be read." This is the Work he and his disciples made so much of, asking all the world, Is not that a miracle? The Mahometans regard their Koran with a reverence which few Christians pay even to their Bible. It is admitted every where as the standard of all law and all practice; the thing to be gone upon in speculation and life; the message sent direct out of Heaven, which this Earth has to conform to, and walk by; the thing to be read. Their Judges decide by it; all Moslem are bound to study it, seek in it for the light of their life. They have mosques where it is all read daily; thirty relays of priests take it up in succession, get through the whole each day. There, for twelve hundred years, has the voice of this Book, at all moments, kept sounding through the ears and the hearts of so many men. We hear of Mahometan Doctors that had read it seventy thousand times!

Very curious: if one sought for "discrepancies of national taste," here surely were the most eminent instance of that! We also can read the Koran;our Translation of it, by Sale, is known to be a very fair one. I must say, it is as toilsome reading as I ever undertook. A wearisome confused jumble, crude, incondite; endless iterations, long-windedness, entanglement; most crude, incondite;--insupportable stupidity, in short!

Nothing but a sense of duty could carry any European through the Koran. We read in it, as we might in the State-Paper Office, unreadable masses of lumber, that perhaps we may get some glimpses of a remarkable man. It is true we have it under disadvantages: the Arabs see more method in it than we. Mahomet's followers found the Koran lying all in fractions, as it had been written down at first promulgation; much of it, they say, on shoulder-blades of mutton, flung pell-mell into a chest: and they published it, without any discoverable order as to time or otherwise;--merely trying, as would seem, and this not very strictly, to put the longest chapters first. The real beginning of it, in that way, lies almost at the end: for the earliest portions were the shortest. Read in its historical sequence it perhaps would not be so bad. Much of it, too, they say, is rhythmic; a kind of wild chanting song, in the original.

This may be a great point; much perhaps has been lost in the Translation here. Yet with every allowance, one feels it difficult to see how any mortal ever could consider this Koran as a Book written in Heaven, too good for the Earth; as a well-written book, or indeed as a _book_ at all; and not a bewildered rhapsody; _written_, so far as writing goes, as badly as almost any book ever was! So much for national discrepancies, and the standard of taste.

Yet I should say, it was not unintelligible how the Arabs might so love it.

When once you get this confused coil of a Koran fairly off your hands, and have it behind you at a distance, the essential type of it begins to disclose itself; and in this there is a merit quite other than the literary one. If a book come from the heart, it will contrive to reach other hearts; all art and author-craft are of small amount to that. One would say the primary character of the Koran is this of its _genuineness_, of its being a _bona-fide_ book. Prideaux, I know, and others have represented it as a mere bundle of juggleries; chapter after chapter got up to excuse and varnish the author's successive sins, forward his ambitions and quackeries:

but really it is time to dismiss all that. I do not assert Mahomet's continual sincerity: who is continually sincere? But I confess I can make nothing of the critic, in these times, who would accuse him of deceit _prepense_; of conscious deceit generally, or perhaps at all;--still more, of living in a mere element of conscious deceit, and writing this Koran as a forger and juggler would have done! Every candid eye, I think, will read the Koran far otherwise than so. It is the confused ferment of a great rude human soul; rude, untutored, that cannot even read; but fervent, earnest, struggling vehemently to utter itself in words. With a kind of breathless intensity he strives to utter himself; the thoughts crowd on him pell-mell: for very multitude of things to say, he can get nothing said.

同类推荐
  • 郘亭知见传本书目

    郘亭知见传本书目

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 重刊汾阳和尚语录

    重刊汾阳和尚语录

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 还源篇

    还源篇

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 栖岩寺隋文帝马脑盏

    栖岩寺隋文帝马脑盏

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 东明闻见录

    东明闻见录

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 快穿撩男神,女配逆袭手册

    快穿撩男神,女配逆袭手册

    苏酒酒惊呆了,穿越成炮灰女配就算了,还和反派大boss春风一度,这是什么节奏?而且面对白莲花,黑莲花,绿茶婊以及极品前任时,反派大boss邪肆一笑秒虐渣,磕了碰了大boss亲自揉腿上药,面对觊觎苏酒酒的人,则是直接让之销声匿迹……苏酒酒:反派好口怕!太凶残!更重要的是在每个任务世界里都有这么一个横行霸道不离不弃的存在。面对恶毒女刁难,苏酒酒淡定举起手里高射炮:来一个轰一个,来两个,轰成灰……系统:女主有金手指。苏酒酒:金手指就是用来碾压的!苏酒酒:女配要逆袭,你有金手指,我有大反派,看谁笑到最后!
  • 无上尊临

    无上尊临

    破虚成道可见我,见我便如见真神。我是谁?曾经的战神之尊,日后的万族之主。当然,现在的封渊,要从灵族的一个小卒子开始。
  • 告白芭蕾:米斯蒂·科普兰传

    告白芭蕾:米斯蒂·科普兰传

    本书是是美国著名非裔芭蕾舞蹈家米斯蒂·科普兰的自传。在书中,她仔细讲述了自己如何在基本被白人所占据的芭蕾舞圈内取得惊人的成就,以及自己对于生命与芭蕾的感悟。新线影业已经获得了这部自传的电影版权。
  • 你好,久违的爱

    你好,久违的爱

    被深爱的夺走了一切,你还会相信爱情吗?如果上帝再给你一次机会,你会选择再爱一次,还是狠狠报复来讥笑上帝的安排呢?三年前,简常睿初遇甘霖,以为邂逅了世上最美好的初恋,却不过是命运的捉弄。背叛、谎言、抛弃、消失……被深爱的人狠心伤害,他以为这辈子都不会再爱了。三年后,一场“蓄意”为之的交通事故,让简常睿遇见了商凝,本是两个毫不相干的人,却因为商凝与甘霖长得一模一样,命运从此纠缠不清。为抵债,她不得不答应做他的替身女友,只为了帮他查明真相,却没想到一步步沦陷,身不由己。难道我只能是她的影子?难道你始终爱的人还是她?如何才是我爱你,是三年前残留的记忆,还是三年后甘愿被你利用?
  • 明雩篇

    明雩篇

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 总裁先生,太太闹离婚

    总裁先生,太太闹离婚

    四年前,她为他生下女儿,成了他名义上的妻子。她痴心一片,却换来他的冷言相击,“夏梦曼,我不可能爱你,带着你的野种,滚!”她伤心欲绝,本以为,从此以后,两个人再无交集。四年后,女儿生病,巨额的手术费,逼的她不得不再次找上他。“靳修哲,想离婚是吗?签下这份协议,和我再生一个儿子,我们从此……一刀两断,再无关联。”这一次,他却不肯了,“夏梦曼,你以为这场婚姻,你想不要就不要了?做梦!”--情节虚构,请勿模仿
  • 李白全传

    李白全传

    本书包括:习书练剑、辞亲远游、安陆十载、三诏进京、长安岁月、赐金放还、梁园情深、东行南游、虎穴历险、战乱前后、从军获罪、救月升天。作品讲述了一个绝对的诗歌天才;纵横瓷肆,想像瑰丽,如仙人所作;兴酣落笔摇五岳诗成笔傲凌沧州。后人称之诗仙。我辈凯是蓬蒿人,仰天大笑出门去,绝对是人中豪杰。
  • 淋湿的翅膀

    淋湿的翅膀

    艾叶出了村庄,想找个地方静一会儿。她不想回家,家里到处是赵美红的影子,到处是赵美红的气息。可眼睛还没揉干,那个巨大的白色建筑便如一柄利剑刺在艾叶心上。那是去年才建成的造纸厂,离村也就二里左右。黄村周围是平坦的原野,站在村外任何地方都能看见醒目的造纸厂。艾叶想把它挤出眼眶,可不管她站着坐着,始终在那儿晃。后来,她索性找个地方躺下去。黄村土地碱性大,高大的树木种不活,只长一丛一丛的枸杞。枸杞掩映着,艾叶眼前只剩下一片湛蓝的天空。偶有风吹过,耳边奏出沙沙的声响。艾叶脑子依然乱着,一边是杜智,一边是赵美红。
  • 旧梦如烟

    旧梦如烟

    他是英俊潇洒又权倾一方的北平督军总司令的公子,她是卑微低下的京剧名伶,一次偶然的相遇,两人互生情愫,彼此爱慕。只是两人间悬殊的背景,注定了情路坎坷。家人的百般阻挠,身边人设的重重陷阱,终使两人渐行渐远。只是,他终是放不下她,血洗她的婚礼,强行将她抢过来。未婚夫的惨死,师傅的发疯,他的无情,终使她万念俱灰。等他幡然醒悟,她却已然遁入空门,常伴青灯古佛。
  • 吃货偶像

    吃货偶像

    来自异世的吃货,穿越成了投湖自尽的落魄小艺人。伤心,吃!高兴,吃!没工作,吃,聊以自慰!有工作,吃,以示激励!吃着吃着,咦!那个路痴你总是跟着我干嘛?!