498 MOHAMMEDISM 



been taught to apply to the literary witnesses to ancient Christianity 

 and rabbinical Judaism. 



Second, the science of comparative religion, which has only 

 risen in these last decades, has established ethno-psychological 

 laws of universal value for the understanding of the origin and growth 

 of the religious ideas of men; of it, too, we have made use in com- 

 prehending the complicated phenomena of the historical Islam. 



We have, then, applied the results of these two methods, the 

 historical-critical and the comparative-religious, to our consideration 

 of Islam. You cannot fail to observe on these premises the total 

 change which has taken place, leaving aside special monographs, 

 when you compare the manuals of our day treating universal ques- 

 tions with those of older literary periods. How much rubbish has 

 been cleared away, from what different points of view the seeds, 

 bloom, and fruit of Islam are considered! How the dead letter has 

 been brought into life and placed in living connection with his- 

 torical reality! The great Hadrian Reland, to whom we owe the 

 first scientific treatises on Islamic institutions, when introducing 

 his subject, believed he could not better recommend his inquiries 

 than to present them " uti docetur in templis et scholis Mohammedids " ; 

 that is to say, "as they are taught in Muhammadan temples and 

 schools." We modify this principle, or rather enrich it and repre- 

 sent Islam as it appears in its development, in its living formation, 

 and in its effects on society and in history. 



If, after these introductory remarks, I had to indicate in short 

 the results themselves which this new scientific view of Islamic 

 matters has brought to light, I could on this American soil deliver 

 myself of that task with the greatest ease. Read the book appearing 

 scarcely a year ago in New York by my learned friend, Duncan 

 B. Macdonald, 1 Professor in Hartford, whom I am particularly happy 

 to see among my hearers to-day, and I feel sure the volume will afford 

 enjoyable reading for you all. You will find there united in inter- 

 esting literary form, and with exact scientific touch, the results 

 to which the modern scientific views lead, and a solid conclusive 

 summing-up of conscientious and minute researches about Islamic 

 development, as it appears in a literature embracing thirteen cen- 

 turies. It is a contribution offered by America to this department 

 of knowledge, calling forth our thanks. 



But what are the paths modern science had to follow to come 

 to such results? This shall form the subject of my reflections to- 

 day. 



1 Development of Muslim The.ology, Jurisprudence and Constitutional Theory, 

 by Duncan B. Macdonald. New York (Charles Scribner's Sons), 1903. (Scries of 

 Hand-Books in Semitics, edited by J. A. Craig, no. ix.) 



