stand in connection with the more salient features of Muhammad's life, it is
a much more arduous, and often impracticable task, to point out the precise
events to which individual verses refer, and out of which they sprung. It is
quite possible that Muhammad himself, in a later period of his career,
designedly mixed up later with earlier revelations in the same Suras not for
the sake of producing that mysterious style which seems so pleasing to the
mind of those who value truth least when it is most clear and obvious but for
the purpose of softening down some of the earlier statements which represent
the last hour and awful judgment as imminent; and thus leading his followers
to continue still in the attitude of expectation, and to see in his later
successes the truth of his earlier predictions. If after-thoughts of this
kind are to be traced, and they will often strike the attentive reader, it
then follows that the perplexed state of the text in individual Suras is to
be considered as due to Muhammad himself, and we are furnished with a series
of constant hints for attaining to chronological accuracy. And it may be
remarked in passing, that a belief that the end of all things was at hand,
may have tended to promote the earlier successes of Islam at Mecca, as it
unquestionably was an argument with the Apostles, to flee from "the wrath to
come." It must be borne in mind that the allusions to contemporary minor
events, and to the local efforts made by the new religion to gain the
ascendant are very few, and often couched in terms so vague and general, that
we are forced to interpret the Koran solely by the Koran itself. And for
this, the frequent repetitions of the same histories and the same sentiments,
afford much facility: and the peculiar manner in which the details of each
history are increased by fresh traits at each recurrence, enables us to trace
their growth in the author's mind, and to ascertain the manner in which a
part of the Koran was composed. The absence of the historical element from
the Koran as regards the details of Muhammad's daily life, may be judged of
by the fact, that only two of his contemporaries are mentioned in the entire
volume, and that Muhammad's name occurs but five times, although he is all