34 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
creed and kingdom, first by subjugating the Koreish of Mecca. The Arabs were both merchants and robbers in one, and the disciple of Muhamed at Medina began to harrass the trade of the Koreish passing through Medina. The Koreish, being exasperated at this, began warring against Medina. Muhamed, for a while, was on the defensive but he soon got on the offensive and subjugated the city of his birth. Thus he augmented both his forces and resources. “The fair option of friendship, or submission, or battle, was proposed to the enemies of Mahomet. If they professed the creed of Islam, they were admitted to all the temporal and spiritual benefits of his primitive disciples, and marched under the same banner to extend the religion which they had embraced.” [2] Having thus equipped his followers for a career of conquest, Mohamed left his mission to his successors, the Califs. “The heroic courage of Ali, the consumate prudence of Moawiyah, excited the emulation of their subjects, and the talents which had been exercised in the schools of civil discord were more usefully applied to propagate the faith and dominion of the Prophet. In the sloth and vanity of the palace of Damascus, the succeeding princes of the house of Ommiyah were alike, destitute of the qualifications of statesmen and of saints. Yet the spoils of the unknown nations were continually laid at the foot of their throne, and the uniform ascent of the Arabian greatness must be ascribed to the spirit of the nation rather than the abilities of their chiefs. A large deduction must be allowed for the weakness of their enemies. The birth of Mahomet was fortunately placed in the most degenerate and disorderly period of the Persians, the Romans, and the barbarians of Europe. The empire of Trojan, or even of Constantine or Charlemagne, would have repelled the attack of the naked Saracens, and the torrent of fanaticism might have been obscurely lost in the sands of Arabia.” [3] “With the same vigour and success they invaded the successors of Augustus and those of Artaxerxtus : and the rival monarchies at the same instant became. The prey of an enemy whom they had been so long accustomed to despise. In the ten years of the administration of Omar, the Saracens reduced to his obedience thirty-six thousand
1 Gibbon’s “Decline and fall of the Roman Empire,” Vol. V, p. 359.
2 Ibid, Vol. V, p. 400-1.