18

the world, in sixty-four thousand years,l on condi-
tions exterior and interior, manifest and hidden,
shall have been completed, then an entire period
shall have received the seal.

SECTION IV. ON CERTAIN CUSTOMS, FORMS OF SPEECH,
AND TRADITIONS OF THIS SECT.—Mahmiid has treatises
and rules conformable to the law of the prophet;
but he interpreted the Koran according to his own
creed. Of his established customs are the following:
One living in solitude is called vdhed, tc recluse."2

1 The period of rudhnental units, vegetables, and

reptiles.............16,000 years.

The period of mankind...........16,000 —

Both periods..............32,000 —

Multiplied by............... 2 —•

Total........64,000 years.

2 It is not clear whether above is meant a hermit, or a monk of a
distinct order. Monachism is not sanctioned by the strict rule of Islam,
but it appears to be the natural spontaneous growth of Asia. In the
first year of the Hejira (A. D. 622) forty-five citizens of Mecca asso-
ciated with forty-five inhabitants of Medina in a sort of confraternity, and
pledged themselves to community of property, and to a regular daily
performance of religious practices in a spirit of penitence and mortifica-
tion : they were called Sufis, of whom hereafter. Abu bekr and Ali formed
and presided over similar congregations. The latter conferred the presi-
dency of it, under the mysterious name of Khilafet, upon Hassan Basn
(mentioned in vol. II. p. 389, note 1). Some of their successors deviated
from the rules of this first establishment, and, in the course of time, a
multitude of monastic orders were founded, each headed by a chief called