Murders, Cruelties, and Assassinations

The character of Mahomet is of a savage, military, and
tyrannical cast; but he speaks in the name of heaven, and, like
Moses, pretends, that his murders, cruelties, and assassinations have
been sanctioned by the divinity which he adores. He frequently begins
his chapters in the name of the most merciful God; but, in the course
of the chapter, is sure to consign to damnation those who do not
accede to the system of revelation which he has received from God.
"The chosen people of the Most High", under the Jewish dispensation,
took the liberty of exercising a principle of indiscriminate
extirpation toward all heathen nations; the Mahometans pursued a
similar course in the destructive wars wherever they have been
engaged, and to which they have been conducted by their fanatic
leaders. The Christian world is not a whit behind either of these two
grand divisions in the exercise of a censorious and military spirit.
The crusades and the domestic quarrels of the Christian church will
furnish an abundant verification of this remark.

 --Elihu Palmer (1764-1806), Principles of Nature; or, A Development of the Moral Causes of Happiness and Misery Among the Human Species

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