George Sale, The Koran, commonly called the Alcoran of Mohammed, translated into English immediately from the original Arabic; with Explanatory Notes, taken from the most approved Commentators. To which is prefixed A Preliminary Discource (1734)

women are, but of pure musk; being, as their prophet often affirms in his Korân, free from all natural impurities, defects, and inconveniences incident to the sex, of the strictest modesty, and secluded from public view in pavilions of hollow pearls, fo large, that, as some traditions have it, one of them will be no less than four parasangs (or, as others say, sixty miles) long, and as many broad.

The name which the Mohammedans usually give to this happy mansion, is al Jannat, or the garden; and sometimes they call it, with an addition, Jannat al Ferdaws, the garden of paradise, Jannat Aden, the garden of Eden, (tho’ they generally interpret the word Eden, not according to its acceptation in Hebrew, but according to its meaning in their own tongue, wherein it signifies a settled or perpetual habitation) Jannat al Máwa, the garden of abode, Jannat al Naïm, the garden of pleasure, and the like; by which several appellations some understand so many different gardens, or at least places of different degrees of felicity, (for they reckon no less than an hundred such in all) the very meanest whereof will afford its inhabitants so many pleasures and delights, that one would conclude they must even sink under them, had not Mobammed declared, that in order to qualify the blessed for a full enjoyment of them, God will give to every one the abilities of an hundred men.

We have already described Mohammed’s pond, whereof the righteous are to drink before their admission into this delicious seat; besides which some authors ¹ mention two fountains, springing from under a certain tree near the gate of paradise, and say, that the blessed will also drink of one of them, to purge their bodies and carry off all excrementitious dregs, and will wash themselves in the other. When they are arrived at the gate itself, each person will there be met and faluted by the beautiful youths appointed to serve and wait upon him, one of them running before, to carry the news of his arrival to the wives destined for him; and also by two angels, bearing the presents sent him by God, one of whom will invest him with a garment of paradise, and the other will put a ring on each of his fingers, with inscriptions on them alluding to the happiness of his condition. By which of the eight gates (for so many they suppose paradise to have) they are respectively to enter, is not worth enquiry; but it must be observed that Mohammed has declared that no person’s good works will gain him admittance, and that even himself shall be saved, not by his merits, but merely by the mercy of God. It is, however the