he solemn appeal to the books of the Koran which Moawiyah exposed on
the foremost lances; and Ali was compelled to yield to a disgraceful
truce and an insidious compromise. He retreated with sorrow and
indignation to Cufa; his party was discouraged; the distant provinces
of Persia, of Yemen, and of Egypt, were subdued or seduced by his crafty
rival; and the stroke of fanaticism, which was aimed against the three
chiefs of the nation, was fatal only to the cousin of Mahomet. In the
temple of Mecca, three Charegites or enthusiasts discoursed of the
disorders of the church and state: they soon agreed, that the deaths of
Ali, of Moawiyah, and of his friend Amrou, the viceroy of Egypt, would
restore the peace and unity of religion. Each of the assassins chose his
victim, poisoned his dagger, devoted his life, and secretly repaired
to the scene of action. Their resolution was equally desperate: but the
first mistook the person of Amrou, and stabbed the deputy who occupied
his seat; the prince of Damascus was dangerously hurt by the second; the
lawful caliph, in the mosch of Cufa, received a mortal wound from the
hand of the third. He expired in the sixty-third year of his age, and
mercifully recommended to his children, that they would despatch the
murderer by a single stroke. The sepulchre of Ali was concealed
from the tyrants of the house of Ommiyah; but in the fourth age of the
Hegira, a tomb, a temple, a city, arose near the ruins of Cufa. Many
thousands of the Shiites repose in holy ground at the feet of the vicar
of God; and the desert is vivified by the numerous and annual visits of
the Persians, who esteem their devotion not less meritorious than the
pilgrimage of Mecca.

The persecutors of Mahomet usurped the inheritance of his children; and
the champions of idolatry became the supreme heads of his religion and
empire. The opposition of Abu Sophian had been fierce and obstinate;
his conversion was tardy and reluctant; his new faith was fortified by
necessity and interest; he served, he fought, perhaps he believed; and
the sins of the time of ignorance were expiated by the recent merits
of the family of Ommiyah. Moawiyah, the son of Abu Sophian, and of the
cruel Henda, was dignified, in his early youth, with the office or title
of secretary of the prophet: the judgment of Omar intrusted him with the
government of Syria; and he administered that important province above
forty years, either in a subordinate or supreme ra