the Fundgruben des Orients, and M. Kasimirski, have been collated throughout;
and above all, the great work of Father Maracci, to whose accuracy and
research search Sale's work mainly owes its merits. Sale has, however,
followed Maracci too closely, especially by introducing his paraphrastic
comments into the body of the text, as well as by his constant use of
Latinised instead of Saxon words. But to Sale's "Preliminary Discourse" the
reader is referred, as to a storehouse of valuable information; as well as to
the works of Geiger, Gerock, and Freytag, and to the lives of Muhammad by Dr.
Weil, Mr. Muir, and that of Dr. Sprenger now issuing from the press, in
German. The more brief and poetical verses of the earlier Suras are
translated with a freedom from which I have altogether abstained in the
historical and prosaic portions; but I have endeavoured nowhere to use a
greater amount of paraphrase than is necessary to convey the sense of the
original. "Vel verbum e verbo," says S. Jerome (Præf. in Jobum) of versions,
"vel sensum e sensu, vel ex utroque commixtum, et medie temperatum genus
translationis." The proper names are usually given as in our Scriptures: the
English reader would not easily recognise Noah as Nûh, Lot as Lût, Moses as
Musa, Abraham as Ibrahym, Pharaoh as Firaun, Aaron as Harun, Jesus as Isa,
John as Yahia, etc.; and it has been thought best to give different
renderings of the same constantly recurring words and phrases, in order more
fully to convey their meaning. For instance, the Arabic words which mean
Companions of the fire, are also rendered inmates of, etc., given up to,
etc.; the People of the Book, i.e. Jews, Christians and Sabeites, is
sometimes retained, sometimes paraphrased. This remark applies to such words
as tanzyl, lit. downsending or Revelation; zikr, the remembrance or constant
repetition or mention of God's name as an act of devotion; saha, the Hour of
present or final judgment; and various epithets of Allah.

I have nowhere attempted to represent the rhymes of the original. The
"Proben" of H. v. Purgstall, in the Fundgruben des Orients, excellent as they