by his own priests. This the orthodox patriarch considered to be highly offensive, and even dangerous, since the ignorant and credulous public were but too likely to be enticed by this similarity into the belief, that the doctrines of the two Churches were identical.
The matter was referred to Constantinople; was discussed by the contending parties before the head patriarch of the Orthodox Eastern Church, and finally submitted to the decision of the Turkish authorities. After both parties had wasted much time, great patience, and no inconsiderable sums of money, the authorities either found the gold of the Orthodox Eastern Church to be both brighter and heavier, or else the influence of the Czar was too powerful for them, for they at last decided that Maximius and his priests should wear a peculiar hat (kalloosee) with many corners to distinguish them from those of the Orthodox Church.
It is not only in trifles, however, that the Turkish authorities are called upon to decide between these two Churches—the Mahommedan laymen to arbitrate between Christian ministers! Unhappily their interference is sometimes demanded in matters of far higher importance.
The mutual jealousies of the Christian sects, their envy and hatred, have reached such a pitch, that, on the most sacred festival in the Christian year, when devout pilgrims from all parts of the earth, who have wandered to Jerusalem for the purpose, are in the holiest of all localities within the Holy City, Turkish soldiers are required to keep the peace between them. At the very tomb of our Saviour, Christianity is disgraced by the quarrels of its believers, and Mahommedans are called in to prevent them from shedding the blood or taking the lives of each other.
Political animosity has perhaps more to do with this melancholy exhibition than simple religious discord. Hasty and ill-judged have been the measures of protection which the great powers of Europe, at different times, and from motives dwelt upon elsewhere, have accorded to one or the other of the religious bodies in the East. Great Britain, France, Russia, and Austria, have all, without due cause, interfered to protect, as they say, their protégés from undue oppression; but the result of their protection has not only brought them into unpleasant and dangerous contact with each other, excited and nourished envy and hatred among the protected, but has still further shaken the foundations of “our ancient ally,” as the Porte is called in England, whose existence is said to be so intimately bound up with the maintenance of that unintelligible paradox, “the balance of power in Europe.”
At the moment of writing these lines, the diplomatic representatives of the great powers resident in Constantinople, the ministers of the great powers themselves, are in the agonies of negotiation, as their peculiar proceedings are diplomatically termed; and the noble representative of Great Britain has been hastily ordered to return to the seat of his mission, in order that the British influence may not suffer from a partial or one-sided decision of the case. It is to be hoped that the result of all these diplomatic efforts, or even that of the still more terrible instrumentality of war, may ultimately tend to the benefit and improvement of the unhappy people whose country is to become the field of contention.
CHAPTER XVII.
CHRISTIAN INHABITANTS.
Among the Christian inhabitants of Syria, the Maronites, in point of numbers, if not in the simplicity of their faith, certainly take rank next to the devout followers of the Orthodox Eastern Church, and the brief review I propose to take of their history and position will, I think, sufficiently establish for them a claim to be placed among the most interesting Christian races or nations which can be found in any part of the globe.
To the present hour they continue to inhabit the mountains of Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon, in which twelve centuries since they sought and found refuge from the decided measures to which the general Council of Constantinople had recourse, in order to punish them for their adherence to the Monothelite heresy. Driven from their homes in the plains and cities of the land, they established themselves in perfect security in the mountain fastnesses, which have enabled them on more than one occasion to set the power of the Egyptian and Turkish Governments at defiance, and to afford to others, no matter what their faith or origin, an impenetrable asylum against the persecutions of their enemies. Europeans or Easterns, Christians or infidels, flying
before the persecutions of political or religious bigots, are still received with open arms and untiring hospitality by the Maronites, whose forefathers always practised the virtues learned in adversity—virtues which they have most successfully inculcated on the minds of their descendants. No greater proof than this can be brought forward of the excellence of their principles, their courage and integrity of heart, since even from that early period they made Lebanon what Hebron and other ancient cities were among the children of Israel. The extraordinary liberality and hospitality displayed by the original inhabitants can alone account for the striking amalgamation of Christian and unbelieving races, and for their having inhabited the mountains, for so long a period, in perfect amity and good-will towards each other, except when bad feelings have been excited by the intrigues or intermeddling of the foreign powers, whose interference has at all times been ruinous to the country.