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of Somyah for this! I should have been well pleased without the death of Hossein. Had he been with me I would have pardoned him. God loved Hossein, but did not suffer him to reach the dignity to which he aspired." So also, when the head of Hossein was brought to him, his compassion was much excited, and he cried out, "O Hossein, had it been in my power to save thee, thy life had not been lost!" We have no right to distrust the sincerity of the feeling thus expressed on the part of Yezid, to whom the Persians will not yield the credit of any capacity for generous emotions or compassionate sentiments. We the rather believe him sincere, from the fact that Hossein was a man whose high and noble qualities won the respect and esteem of many whose interests were adverse to his own. Innumerable anecdotes are current respecting him, in illustration of his character, and of his views and sentiments. Of these, we have room for only one, related by Yezdi in his treatise on Divine Love. Hossein one day asked his father, Ali, if he loved him and when Ali answered that he loved him most tenderly, his son again demanded, if he loved God: and on his reply in the affirmative, Hossein said to him, "Surely

two loves can never meet in the same breast." Ali was so much moved at this, that he could not forbear shedding tears; when Hossein, touched by the impression his words had made, hastened to comfort him. He asked, "O my father, which would in my eyes be the sorest evil, my death, or the sin of infidelity ?" And when Ali unhesitatingly replied, "Much as I love thee, my son, I would sooner yield thee up to death than abandon my faith in God;" Hossein promptly rejoined, "By this sign, then, it is clear that the love you bear to me is only a natural tenderness, but that your true love is given to God."

This brief historical statement will explain the ground which the Persians take in their distinctive system of faith. They are the successors of that party by which, ever after the abdication of Hassan, and the martyrdom (as they regard it) of Hossein, the claims of Ali to have succeeded Mohammed in the caliphat, and to have transmitted that honour through his children, the sole descendants of "the prophet," were constantly upheld. Believing this, they execrate the memory of the caliphs who preceded Ali, whom other Moslems regard with the highest respect; and they consequently

refuse any credit to the traditions that come through him.

Ali's claims, they assert, rested on his nearness of kindred to Mohammed, of whom he was the cousin, and on his having married Fatimah, the only offspring of "the prophet." They also affirm that he was expressly nominated by Mohammed as his successor, and that those by whose intrigues he was deprived of his inheritance, acted in direct contradiction to the will of God, as signified through his servant; and that hence the three caliphs who preceded Ali, instead of being worthy of the honour in which they are held by the orthodox, could only be regarded with abhorrence and indignation, and the traditions coming through sources so polluted could not be received as of any authority or value. As this invalidates a great portion of the expository law which the orthodox held in equal regard with the Koran itself, a very serious and radical ground of separation arises out of what appears to be, at the first glance, no insuperable matter. The difference is something, in this respect, like that between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, though there are no such doctrinal differences as subsisted between these two sects; and the Sheahs do

not, like the Sadducees, reject all traditions, but only such as come through what they regard as a corrupt source. Traditions which can be traced to Ali and his friends they receive.

We have related in some detail the circumstances of Hossein's death, on account of the great prominence which, second only to that of Ali, the Sheahs assign to him among their twelve imaums. This is difficult to account for, unless, as Mt. Southgate remarks, "it has arisen from the tragical representation of his death, which itself may have been contrived in the first place merely for a temporary purpose, and to have gradually extended to an annual and universal observance. The effect of this frequent and touching commemoration, (which we shall have occasion to describe,) would naturally be to excite a spirit of enthusiastic reverence for the martyr who died by the hands of his enemies. And so it is. His sepulchre at Kerbelah is the principal object of religious pilgrimage. His name is heard as often from the lips of a Persian as that of Ali. There is no excellence which he is not supposed to have possessed-no virtue which he did not exemplify. This enthusiasm,

if it does not arise from, is preserved and quickened by, the yearly celebration of his martyrdom, in like manner as the simple act of commemorating our Saviour's death is the most efficient means of strengthening the fidelity and love of his disciples."

At the first view it might seem that the succession of Ali to the caliphat would have satisfied the expectations of his adherents, and would have extinguished the feelings which had been generated by his undeserved exclusion. But this was not the case. It was considered that the children of Ali were the sole descendants of Mohammed, and his adherents contended that the same high temporal and spiritual power which should immediately have descended to Ali, ought to have been the heritage of those who sprang from him. His death, and the tragical end of his sons, with the misfortunes of descendants, (who, although admitted to the rank of imaum, or chief priest, were excluded from all temporal power,) led many to cherish in secret the principles of this sect, and to mourn over the hard lot of those whom, as the direct descendants of Mohammed, they regarded as the first of men.

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