From this time the career of Mohammed was wholly changed.  He was now an ambitious conqueror, and here as before, the question how far he may have sincerely interpreted his remarkable fortune as a call of God to subdue the idolatrous nations, must remain for the present unsettled.  Possibly further light may be thrown upon it as we proceed.  Let us consider some of the changes which appear in the development of this man’s character.  If we set out with that high ideal which would seem to be demanded as a characteristic of a great religious teacher, and certainly of one claiming to be a prophet of God, we ought to expect that his character would steadily improve in all purity, humanity, truthfulness, charity, and godlikeness.  The test of character lies in its trend.  If the founder of a religion has not grown nobler and better under the operation of his own system, that fact is the strongest possible condemnation of the system.  A good man generally feels that he can afford to be magnanimous and pitiful in proportion to his victories and his success.  But Mohammed became relentless as his power increased.  He had at first endeavored to win the Arabian Jews to his standard.  He had adopted their prophets and much of the Old Testament teachings; he had insisted upon the virtual identity of the two religions.  But having failed in his overtures, and meanwhile having gained superior power, he waged against them the most savage persecution.  On one occasion he ordered the massacre of a surrendered garrison of six hundred Jewish soldiers.  At another time he put to the most inhuman torture a leader who had opposed his cause; in repeated instances he instigated the crime of assassination.[103] In early life he had been engaged in a peaceful caravan trade, and all his influence had been cast in favor of universal security as against the predatory habits of the heathen Arabs; but on coming to power he himself resorted to robbery to enrich his exchequer.  Sales mentions twenty-seven of these predatory expeditions against caravans, in which Mohammed was personally present.[104]

The biographers of his early life represent him as a man of a natural kindness of disposition, and a sensitive temperament almost bordering on timidity.  Though not particularly genial, he was fond of children, and had at first, as his recorded utterances show, frequent impulses of pity and magnanimity.  But he became hardened as success crowned his career.  The temperateness which characterized his early pleadings and remonstrances with those who differed from him, gave place to bitter anathemas; and there was rooted in his personal character that relentless bigotry which has been the key-note of the most intolerant system known upon the earth.

A still more marked change occurred in the increasing sensuality of Mohammed.  Such lenient apologists as E. Bosworth Smith and Canon Taylor have applied their most skilful upholstery to the defects of his scandalous morals.  Mr. Smith has even undertaken to palliate his appropriation of another man’s wife, and the blasphemy of his pretended revelation in which he made God justify his passion.[105] These authors base their chief apologies upon comparisons between Mohammed and the worse depravity of the heathen Arabs, or they balance accounts with some of his acknowledged virtues.