Specimen of a Poetical Summary of History,. 115 



as the medium which most readily interests the imagination, and most 

 permanently impresses the memory. Poetry, indeed, at its first origin, in 

 almost every nation, appears to have been principally employed for these 

 memorial purposes. The first histories are very frequently only the strains 

 of the minstrels, and even the first laws were invested in a metrical dress. 

 In modern times, indeed, we have occasionally rhyming lists of names and 

 dates ; but this surely cannot be called poetry, nor does such a system at 

 all avail itself of the great principle, which gives to poetry its most power- 

 ful grasp over the faculty of memory : this will be found to depend on the 

 pregnant brevity which always belongs to the true language of poetry, and 

 by which a single allusion, especially when it presents any thing like a 

 picture to the mind, instantly calls up an extended train of associations. 

 With these views it has been my object to trace out what may be called 

 the leading pictures of history, and to exhibit them, as well as I was able, 

 in a poetical form. I have found the practice answer in my own private 

 experience. I do not mean that history can be originally learnt by read- 

 ing a few lines of such verses as the following ; but I think that it may be 

 thus most engagingly and most effectually impressed on the memory, when- 

 ever it has been once read in the ordinary method. 



I send you, as a sufiicient specimen of my proposed method, my poetical 

 view of that most important period, the first century of Mahometan con- 

 quest, which, if you think it at all applicable to the purposes of your Journal, 

 is much at your service. From yours sincerely, 



Pater Familias. 

 Makch, 1833. 



FIRST CENTURY OF MAHOMETAN CONQUEST, 



From Hegira, 622, to Defeat of the Saracens by Charles Martel, 732. 



In Hera's cave what mingled visions roll. 

 Son of Abdailah, o'er thy youtliful soul ! 

 Enthusiast' half, thou deem'st some angel voice 

 Bids thee in purer views of truth rejoice ; 

 Yet more ambition draws thy mind away. 

 To bend those visions to thy lust of sway. 

 Vain dreams at first — thy fond Kadijah's care 

 Gives thee in vain her ample wealth to share ; 

 Few are thy converts, hostile is thy race. 

 And kindred Koreish^ drive thee from thy place. 



• Mahomet seems in early youth, before ambition led him to become an impostor, 

 to have been rather an enthusiast, and sincerely to have believed himself employed 

 to overthrow the idolatry of Arabia, by proclaiming the great truth of the divine 

 Unity. It was his habit to retire for meditation to the solitary cave of Hera, where 

 he professed, and perhaps himself believed, that he received Divine communications. 



2 Mahomet was of the illustrious Arabian tribe of Koreish, his wife Kadijab a 

 wealthy widow ; she became the first of his converts. Their number was long 



