Turkey: The Approaching Doom of the Ottoman Empire
THERE seems to be a settled conviction in all quarters that the doom of Turkey is now rapidly approaching beyond the possibility of aversion. The following is what The Christian at Work says upon the subject:— “England has done a sensible thing in securing the contract of the Suez Canal, thus keeping her way open through Egypt to India. And now the Ottoman Empire is going to pieces; in fact, that Turkish barque ought to have foundered a long while ago. That empire will not be enlightened and cannot be preserved, and no human agency can avert its doom. As the London Times has it, ‘She is perishing partly of the corruptions inseparable from her creed and her form of government, and partly from contact with a higher civilization than her own.’ If Turkey could only be embalmed and buried in one of the pyramids, or in one of the numerous tombs at Thebes or Memphis, it would be well. But as this cannot be, the sum in division had better be done as soon as possible, Russia getting the Dardanelles and the Sea of Marmora, Austria getting a slice, and Germany its share. The Ottoman Empire is only a mass of effete Oriental corruption, and the sooner the sick man is quietly chloroformed to death the better for the surviving relatives and friends.”