Famous Men of Ancient Times

Samuel Goodrich

S.В G. Goodrich

Famous Men of Ancient Times

PREFACE

The reader of these pages will perhaps remark, that the length of the following sketches is hardly proportioned to the relative importance of the several subjects, regarded in a merely historical point of view. In explanation of this fact, the author begs leave to say, that, while he intended to present a series of the great beacon lights that shine along the shores of the past, and thus throw a continuous gleam over the dusky sea of ancient history, – he had still other views. His chief aim is moral culture; and the several articles have been abridged or extended, as this controlling purpose might be subserved.

It may be proper to make one observation more. If the author has been somewhat more chary of his eulogies upon the great men that figure in the pages of Grecian and Roman story, than is the established custom, he has only to plead in his vindication, that he has viewed them in the same light – weighed them in the same balance – measured them by the same standard, as he should have done the more familiar characters of our own day, making due allowance for the times and circumstances in which they acted. He has stated the results of such a mode of appreciation; yet if the master spirits of antiquity are thus shorn of some portion of their glory, the writer still believes that the interest they excite is not lessened, and that the instruction they afford is not diminished. On the contrary, it seems to him that the study of ancient biography, if it be impartial and discriminating, is one of the most entertaining and useful to which the mind can be applied.

MOHAMMED

This individual, who has exercised a greater influence upon the opinions of mankind than any other human being, save, perhaps, the Chinese philosopher Confucius, was born at Mecca, in Arabia, A. D. 570. He was the only son of Abdallah, of the noble line of Hashem and tribe of Koreish – descendants of Ishmael the reputed progenitor of the Arabian race.

The Koreishites were not only a commercial people, and rich by virtue of their operations in trade, but they were the hereditary guardians of the Caaba, or Kaaba, a heathen temple at Mecca. The custody of this sacred place, together with all the priestly offices, belonged to the ancestors of Mohammed.

The Mohammedan authors have embellished the birth of the prophet with a great variety of wonderful events, which are said to have attended his introduction into the world. One of these is, that the Persian sacred fire, kept in their temples, was at once extinguished over all Arabia, accompanied by the diffusion of an unwonted and beautiful light. But this and other marvels, we leave to the credulity of the prophet's followers.

Mohammed's father died early, and his son came under the guardianship of his uncle, Abu Taleb. He was a rich merchant, who was accustomed to visit the fairs of Damascus, Bagdad, and Bassora – three great and splendid cities, and Mohammed often accompanied him to these places. In his twelfth year, Mohammed took part in an expedition against the wandering tribes that molested the trading caravans. Thus, by travelling from place to place, he acquired extensive knowledge, and, by being engaged in warlike enterprise, his imagination became inflamed with a love of adventure and military achievements. If we add to this, that he had naturally a love of solitude, with a constitutional tendency to religious abstraction; and if, moreover, we consider that in his childhood he had been accustomed to behold the wild exercises, the dark ceremonies, and hideous rites of the temple of Caaba – we shall at once see the elements of character, and the educational circumstances, which shaped out the extraordinary career of the founder of Islamism.

It appears that Mohammed was remarkable for mental endowments, even in his youth, for, in a religious conversation with a Nestorian monk, at Basra, he showed such knowledge and talent, that the monk rema