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plundering caravans or ships that fall into their hands, 
and the difficulties they may oppose to the pilgrimage 
to Mecca. 
But time will teach this people that Arabia cannot 
exist without the commercial relations of the caravans 
and the pilgrimage. Necessity may make them relax 
from this intolerance towards other nations; and the 
commerce of strangers may gradually convince them of 
the vice of an austerity that is almost against nature. 
By degrees their zeal will cool. Superstitious customs, 
which are the support, the consolation, and the hope of 
the weak, ignorant, and unhappy, will resume their 
empire; and from that time the reform of Wehhabitism 
will disappear, before its influence is consolidated, after 
having shed the blood of so many millions of the vic- 
tims of religious fanaticism. Such is the melancholy 
vicissitude of human things! 
On the other hand, I believe that the Wehhabites, in 
the middle of their deserts, will always be invincible, 
not by their military strength, but by the nature of their 
country, which is uninhabitable by any other nation, 
and by the facility they have of hiding themselves in it, 
to withstand the attacks of their enemies. The latter 
may momentarily conquer * Mecca, Medina, and the 
maritime towns; but simple isolated garrisons, in the 
midst of frightful deserts, could not hold out long. 
When a powerful enemy presented himself, the Weh- 
habites would hide themselves, with a view to fall sud- 
denly upon, and to destroy him, at the moment when 
his troops were divided in search of food. This makes 
me imagine that they will never be subjected, for a 
* As the Pacha of Egypt, Mehemed Ali, did last year. — Note 
<©f the Editor. 
