174 THE REV. W. ST. CLAIR TISDALL, M.A., ON ISLAM: 
faithfully obeyed, there is no true family hfe. The wife 
never eats with her husband. She either waits upon him at 
his meals, if the household is a poor one, or takes her food in 
the seclusion of the Aavam, while her husband is attended 
upon by his slaves in his own part of the house. Hach 
believer may have four* wives at a time, and may divoreet 
them at will and marry others in their stead. In Persia, 
temporary marriages for a month, a week, or even shorter 
periods, are sanctioned by the religious authorities. Although 
the Sunnis regard such marriagest as illegal, they are said to 
be of frequent occurrence at Mecca itself durmg the pilgrim- 
age. It is impossible and undesirable to detail all the evils 
to which the Religion of Muhammad thus gives rise—to tell 
of the divisions in families, the jealousy and hatred between 
half-brothers, between two legal wives of the same husband, 
the slanders, the crimes thus brought about. Nor does such 
a very “liberal” moral code prevent worse evils, for the 
most unnatural vices and nameless crimes are of frequent 
occurrence. It is painful to refer to these things. Suffice it 
to say that, throughout a large portion of the world, Islam 
has rendered the very conception of a high and pure family 
life impossible. A faith that thus degrades the gentler sex, 
and fails altogether to revere or evenacknowledge the innate 
nobleness of feminine humanity and the dignity of wifehood 
and motherhood, is its own condemnation among all 
enlightened men of whatever class or creed they may be. 
4, After what has been said above it 1s hardly necessary to 
say that it is impossible for anyone who has carefully studied 
the subject to affirm that Islam has any claim to be con- 
sidered to have come from Gop. Islam does not and cannot 
satisfy the deepest longings of the human heart. It does not 
reveal Gop in His Divine Fatherhood, in His Love, His 
Justice, or His Holiness. It does not show Man his true 
position in Gop’s sight, nor does it teach him what sin is and 
how to gain release from its power. Islam is opposed to all 
freedom of thought, to all true progress, whether moral or 
intellectual, political or religious. It is only in Muslim lands 
at the present day that the profession of Christianity means 
the convert’s death at the executioner’s hands. Such being 
* Sftrah IV, 3. 
+ Vide Mishkat, “ Babu ’l khul wa’ttilag,” pp. 285, sgq. 
S79 
t Mishkat, p. 264. Such a marriage is called dexic in Arabic. 
