cursed the Jews and Christians because they worshipped the shrines of their prophets.  Almost every Moslim village has its patron saint; every country has its national saints; every province of human life has its own human rulers, who are intermediate between the Creator and common mortals.  In no other particular has Islam more fully accommodated itself to the religions it supplanted.  The popular practice, which is in many cases hardly to be distinguished from polytheism, was, to a great extent, favoured by the theory of the intercession of the pious dead, of whose friendly assistance people might assure themselves by doing good deeds in their names and to their eternal advantage.

The ordinary Moslim visitor of the graves of saints does not trouble himself with this ingenious compromise between the severe monotheism of his prophet and the polytheism of his ancestors.  He is firmly convinced, that the best way to obtain the satisfaction of his desire after earthly or heavenly goods is to give the saint whose special care these are what he likes best; and he confidently leaves it to the venerated one to settle the matter with Allah, who is far too high above the ordinary mortal to allow of direct contact.

In support even of this startling deviation from the original, traditions have been devised.  Moreover, the veneration of human beings was favoured by some forms of mysticism; for, like many saints, many mystics had their eccentricities, and it was much to the advantage of mystic theologians if the vulgar could be persuaded to accept their aberrations from normal rules of life as peculiarities of holy men.  But Ijma’ did more even than tradition and mysticism to make the veneration of legions of saints possible in the temples of the very men who were obliged by their ritual law to say to Allah several time daily:  “Thee only do we worship and to Thee alone do we cry for help.”

In the tenth century of our era Islam’s process of accommodation was finished in all its essentials.  From this time forward, if circumstances were favourable, it could continue the execution of its world conquering plans without being compelled to assimilate any more foreign elements.  Against each spiritual asset that another universal religion could boast, it could now put forward something of a similar nature, but which still showed characteristics of its own, and the superiority of which it could sustain by arguments perfectly satisfactory to its followers.  From that time on, Islam strove to distinguish itself ever more sharply from its most important rivals.  There was no absolute stagnation, the evolution was not entirely stopped; but it moved at a much quieter pace, and its direction was governed by internal motives, not by influences from outside.  Moslim catholicism had attained its full growth.