the same
consistent attitude through long years of adverse fortune, alike in the
day of victory and in the hour of defeat, in the plenitude of his power
and at the moment of death."--Islam and its Founder, by J.W.H. Stobart,
M.A., page 23.

"Of the sincerity of his belief in his own mission there can be no
doubt. The great merit is his that among a people given up to idolatry
he rose to a vivid perception of the Unity of God, and preached this
great doctrine with firmness and constancy, amid ridicule and
persecution. But there it seems to me that the eulogy of the Prophet
ought to cease."--Islam under the Arabs by R.D. Osborn. London 1876, p.
90.]

[Sidenote: Striking effects of Mohammad's reforms.]

35. Although his mission was only to convey the message and preach
publicly what was revealed to him, and he was not responsible for the
conversion of the ungodly polytheists to the purer theology and higher
morality, or in other words, to the faith of Islam, yet whatever success
and beneficial results in the sphere of theology, morality, and reforms
in social matters he achieved was a strong evidence of his Divine
mission. In the name of God and in the character of His Apostle, he
wrought a great reform according to his light in his own country. "Every
good tree bringeth forth good fruit."--(Matt. VII, 17). Facts are
stubborn things, and facts are conclusive in these points.

The effects produced by his preaching, and the changes wrought by them
in the religious, social, and political sphere of the polytheists, the
idolatrous and grossly superstitious Arabs within a comparatively short
period, mostly consisting of persecutions at Mecca, and struggles at
Medina, were very striking. From an indiscriminate mass of polytheism
and gross superstitious belief in gods, genii, the sons and daughters of
God, he gave them a pure monotheistic belief, recognizing no other
superior power but the Almighty. He raised the moral standard of his
countrymen, ameliorated the condition of women, curtailed and mitigated
polygamy and slavery, and virtually abolished them as well as
infanticide. He most sternly denounced and absolutely forbade many
heinous evils of the Arab society. He united a number of wild and
independent tribes into a nation and abolished their internecine wars.

Sir W. Muir says:--

"Few and simple as the positive precepts of Mahomet up to this time
appear, they had wrought a marvellous and a mighty work.