A Rejoinder to Pope's Allegations Against Islam — Page 56
which had been taught some three centuries before. It had become largely de spiritualised, ritualised, materialised. . . How, in a few years, all this was changed, how, by 6so AD a great part of this world became a different world from what it had been before, is one of the most remarkable chapters in human history This wonderful change followed, if it was not mainly caused by, the life of one man, the Prophet of Mecca. . . Whatever the opinion one may have of this extraordinary man, whether it be that of the devout Muslim who considers him the last and greatest herald of God's word, or of the fanatical Christian of former days, who considered him an emissary of the Evil One, or of certain modern Orientalists, who look on him rather as a politician than a saint, as an organiser of Asia in general and Arabia in particular, against Europe, rather than as a religious reformer; there can be no difference as to the immensity of the effect which his life has had on the history of the world. " (Pringle Kennedy 'Arabian Society at the Time of M"uhammad. Pages; 8, 10, 18, 21. ) S. P. Scott wrote: If the object of religion be the inculcation of morals, the diminution of evil, the promotion of human happiness, the expansion of the human intellect, if the performance of good works will avail in the great day when mankind shall be summoned to its final reckoning it is neither irreverent nor unreasonable to admit that Muhammad was indeed an Apostle of God. " (S. P. Scott 'History of the Moorish Empire in Europe'. Page 126 ) 56