LIFE OF MOHAMMED. 221 



Into the fifth heaven, which was composed of 

 adamant, they were admitted by a gate of pure 

 silver inscribed with the Mohammedan creed. 

 Aaron gratulated them on their arrival. This sphere 

 was the great storehouse of God's wrath ;— a black 

 and horrid pit, vomiting forth a thick smoke the 

 stench of which was insupportable. The presiding 

 angel of this infernal treasury was hideously de- 

 formed, his withering look being enough to blast the 

 material universe. His eyes were of roUing flame ; 

 his face like copperas, disfigured with wens and ex- 

 crescences ; and around him lay darts and chains ot 

 fire, the terrible instruments of divine vengeance, 

 which were kept in constant preparation for rebel- 

 lious sinners,— especially for the unbelieving Arabs. 

 Quitting these dreary mansions they advanced to 

 the sixth heaven, which was of carbuncle. At some 

 distance they perceived an aged man, with shaggy 

 hair, clothed in a woollen garment, and leaning on 

 a staff. It was Moses who saluted his brother pro- 

 phet ; but immediately burst into tears at the thought 

 that this "Arabian boy" would be instrumental in 

 bringing more of the race of Ishmael into paradise 

 than he and all the prophets had done of the Jewish 

 nation. Here they met with another prodigy m 

 pneumatology,— an angel, one half of whose body 

 was snow and the other fire ; yet these discordant 

 elements were neither melted nor extinguished. 



But the most marvellous of all created beings was 

 the tutelar angel of the seventh heaven. He had 



man's eyes is in proportion to his height as 1 to 72, he calculates 

 that this angel mu«t have been km times the length of all the 

 seven heavens, and therefore could not stand m one of _them 

 " Here " savs he, " Mahomet was out in his mathematics. «ut 

 a captious Mussulman might argue with the dean that the angel 



was not intended to stand, h»l \o sit ; for he told Mohammed 

 he had not permission to quit his desk from the creation ot man 

 till the final judgment.— Pnrf. i'/>, p. 61. See also Biuctorf t- 

 S^nag. Jud. cap. 50, and Purcha?' Pilgrims, lib. 11. cap. 20. 



