of mesmeric or epileptic state, superinduced in part by fastings and other severities. In consequence of the dreamy and epileptic states from which the prophet may be said to have suffered from an early age, it is not surprising that he gave out as revelation the result of his own reflection, or what his inward conviction held to be true. He was not necessarily a conscious deceiver or self-deluded visionary on that account. We believe that in the early part of his career he was a sincere zealot, having the impression deeply graven on his mind that he was a divinely-commissioned reformer of the faith. All his conduct at that time shows the earnest, determined, humble religionist, who braved persecution and death with unshaken courage. His precepts, too, were tolerant, mild, and philanthropic, breathing much of the spirit of that sacred volume whence they were partly though indirectly drawn. In the latter part of his life, however, and from the time of unsheathing the sword to propagate the faith, the man presents a different aspect. The love of conquest and power took possession of his soul. Baser passions got the mastery over him; and revelations were announced at convenient times to extricate him from a difficulty or justify a darling sin. Success had its usual effect on his disposition. No longer self-deluded, he became politic, cautious, exacting, imperious. The prophet ceases to command our esteem when he becomes the powerful head of numerous and devoted tribes, carrying on a war of extermination against all who refuse to submit to his creed. Though his habits were plain, simple, and unostentatious, and he assumed no outward pomp or splendour as a sovereign; though he was generous to his friends, warm in his attachments, frugal in his diet, easy of access—we cannot respect the polygamist and voluptuary. Doubtless his abilities were great. The founder and master of an influence which has swayed so many millions was no ordinary man. Yet he does not appear to have had a comprehensive or far-reaching intellect: but he could adapt himself to circumstances, and rise to the height of an emergency with surprising tact and flexibility. His speculative ability was small, his practical ability great. Infusing wondrous devotion into his followers, he was carried forward on the wings of success; and though his mind expanded with his triumphs, his soul refused to rise to that purer atmosphere whence it could not sink to the debasing pleasures of the animal nature. Mahomet was neither the gross impostor painted by Prideaux, nor the hero glorified by Carlyle. He wanted the moral qualities essential to the latter. The first part of his life, the hardest and most harassing, refutes the assumption of the former.—(See Weil's Mohammed der Prophet, 1843, 8vo; Sprenger's das Leben und die Lehre des Mohammed, u.s.w. vol. 1, 8vo; and Muir's Life of Mohammed, London.)—S. D.
MAHOMET: four Turkish emperors bore this name:—
Mahomet I., was born in 1387, and reigned from 1413 to 1421. He was the youngest son of Bajazct, at whose death the empire was divided into three portions, each governed by one of his sons. Soliman was placed at Adrianople, Ica at Broussa, and Mahomet at Amasia. With this arrangement Mahomet was not satisfied, and he made war on Ica, who was either killed or disappeared in a manner not known to history. He next engaged Soliman, who also fell in a military expedition. As soon as the throne was secured, he proclaimed peace to all parties and performed an act of grace exceedingly rare in Turkish history; he pardoned the insurgent chiefs of Asia Minor, and did not bowstring them according to custom. His next war was with the Venetians in which he was unsuccessful, and afterwards he had to encounter the followers of Bedreddin, a fanatic who attempted to introduce new doctrines. He died at Adrianople of apoplexy.
Mahomet II., surnamed the Conqueror, Ottoman Sultan and first sultan of Turkey in Europe, was born in 1430, and died on the 3rd May, 1481. He was the son of Amurath II., and was only thirteen years of age, when the abdication of his father called him to the throne. The wars with the Hungarians, however, called Amurath back from his retirement, and twice he reassumed the supreme power. At his death in 1451 Mahomet hastened to Adrianople, and according to custom put his brother to death to obviate all chance of rivalry. Early in his reign he conceived the project of destroying the Greek empire of Constantinople, and he soon set about the siege of that city. On the 6th April, 1453, Mahomet appeared before Constantinople with an immense army reputed to consist of two hundred and fifty thousand men, while three hundred galleys and two hundred smaller vessels co-operated on the Bosphorus with the land forces. The Genoese mariners attacked these vessels, and discomfited one of the divisions. Mahomet then conceived the bold expedient of conveying his vessels over land into the harbour of Constantinople. The operation was successfully carried out in the night, and the Greeks to their amazement saw their harbour occupied by the Turks, although no entrance had been possible by water. Fifty days the siege was continued, the batteries of the assailants breaking down the walls so as to make a way for the assault. On the 29th of May at daybreak the assault commenced. For several hours little progress was made; but gradually the numerical superiority of the Turks began to tell, and the Venetians, Genoese, Spaniards, Germans, and other christians who defended the walls, began to be overpowered. Constantine Palæologus, the last christian emperor of the East, had announced his intention of seeking a grave in the ruins of his capital. Nor was he backward in performance. The gate called Circo Porta having been carried, the fate of the city was decided, and Constantine fell dead in the breach. Mahomet entered, repaired to the church of St. Sophia, consecrated or desecrated it to Islamism; and when he went to the palace, he quoted a Persian poem, "The spider has spun his web in the palace of the Cæsars." The city was pillaged, and its defenders massacred. For three days all was given to disorder. Mahomet saw the necessity of putting an end to this confusion, and also of preserving the industrious population. He recalled the Greeks, allowed them the exercise of their religion, gave them several churches, and allowed them to elect a patriarch. The Turks were not a nation, but an army; and they required a settled population to carry on the ordinary avocations of life. This motive, and not liberality, appears to have prevailed with Mahomet, when he conquered Constantinople and founded the modern empire of Turkey. After the fall of Constantinople Mahomet extended his conquests, but not without meeting vigorous and often successful resistance. He made an attempt on Belgrade in 1456, but was obliged to retire with a loss of upwards of twenty thousand men and three hundred cannon. In 1459 Pius II. preached a crusade against him without effect, and the Venetians and Genoese, with Scanderbeg in Albania, were the only parties that continued the struggle with the warlike Ottomans, who had thus seized one of the first positions in Europe. In 1465 Mahomet captured Belgrade, and in 1467 the death of Scanderbeg allowed Albania to fall into his hands He also took Negropont from the Venetians. From 1470 to 1474 the Ottomans devastated Croatia, Styria, Carniola, and Carinthia; but on the side of Hungary they met with severe defeat. In July, 1480, an attempt was made on the island of Rhodes, which was repulsed by Pierre d'Aubusson, grand master of the knights. While engaged in vast preparations to avenge this defeat, Mahomet died suddenly at the age of fifty-two. He had reigned thirty years without including the period of his nominal sovereignty during the lifetime of his father, and it has been said that during that time he conquered twelve kingdoms and two hundred towns—a form of expression perhaps not literally exact, but which gives an idea of the intense activity of conquest displayed by the Moslems of the fifteenth century. The character of Mahomet has been differently estimated. There can scarcely be a doubt that at the period the moral condition of both christian and moslem was far from satisfactory. Dreadful cruelties prevailed in war, and frightful license was allowed when war was over. That the conqueror of Constantinople partook of the character of his age is a question scarcely open to dispute; but that he was immensely superior to the generality of Ottoman monarchs is also tolerably certain. He founded public institutions, built mosques and schools, encouraged learning, and was himself a scholar, so far as the then modern languages could make him so. That he was a great warrior, is sufficiently testified by his deeds. He was the healthy or strong man of the Ottoman dynasty, which by repose and indolence has come to be called "the sick man," and which, we must hope, will soon disappear from the soil of Europe, or become christian.
Mahomet III., was born in 1566, and died 22nd December, 1603. According to the barbarous custom of the sultans, he commenced his reign by strangling his nineteen brothers. His reign was characterized by foreign wars which were disastrous, and by domestic troubles and insurrections that greatly weakened the Ottoman power. Moldavia, Wallachia, and Transylvania separated from Turkey in this reign.
Mahomet IV., was born in 1642, and died in prison in 1691. His father Ibrahim had been deposed and put to death by the
