heavens, and they shall give their account at the Last Judgement!

Can it be said about a man who with a speech induced eight mutinying regiments to obey their officers, and with a single article persuaded thousands of people to support him, and was not frightened before the three above-mentioned formidable commanders, and did not fawn to them, and in courts of law declared: “If I had heads to the number of hairs on my head and every day one was cut off, I would not surrender to atheism and misguidance and betray my country and nation and Islam; I would not bow this head, which has been dedicated to the Qur’an, before tyrants,” and was concerned with no one in Emirdag apart from five or ten brothers of the hereafter and three or four servants — could it be said about such a man, as it does in the indictment: “This Said was working secretly in Emirdag; he poisoned the minds of some of the people giving them the idea of disturbing the peace; twenty men gathered round him and wrote private letters praising him, which shows that he was hatching a revolt and was involved in covert politics against the government”? I refer it to your consciences to understand just how far from right, justice, and fairness those who torment him have deviated by, with unprecedented animosity and hatred, throwing him into prison for two years, in solitary confinement, and by not allowing him to speak in court.

Is it at all possible that someone who has received public attention a hundred times greater than is his due, and brought thousands of men to obedience with one speech, and induced thousands of people to join the Ittihad-i Muhammedî Society with one newspaper article, and made fifty thousand people listen admiringly to his address in Aya Sophia Mosque41 — that such a man should work at it for three years in Emirdag and deceive only five or ten people, and fill his grave, which he is approaching, with unnecessary darkness rather than with light? Is it at all possible that he should do this? Satan himself could not make anyone accept it!

The Fourth is their citing my not wearing the brimmed hat as an important reason for my conviction.42 They did not allow me to