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It is surprising that there is so much misapprehension in Western lands about the real character of the Turkish people. During the present difficulty with Italy many most exaggerated charges have been made against the Turks, which those who know them best deny with indignation. A writer in The Boston Transcript has just published an article which is unusually fair and which is marked with a due appreciation of the weakness of our frenzied manner of life which we call civilization. A few quotations will be of interest to all who are not prejudiced against the "heathen." Mr. Cobb, the writer, says:
No people in the world are more likeable than the Turks. They are kindly, honest, and generous-hearted.... The English and Americans who live among the Turks like them—come to feel a real affection for them.
To the charge that they are cruel, he assents, but he says that the reason is that they possess to a marked degree the Oriental indifference to physical pain, and that, above all, they are still in the condition we were during the later middle ages.
It is only a few centuries ago that we too held life and suffering in little value.... We burnt men at the stake in order to save their souls.... Even within two or three centuries we could have found in England the prototype of the modern Turk—the cultured English gentleman, the kindly, dignified merchant, who could witness with calmness, torture, execution, burning at the stake.
Already there has been a great refining process in the Near East during the last half century; and within the lifetime of this generation we shall see the East purged of its cruelty and physical roughness.
Speaking of the new movement in Turkey towards a better interpretation of the Korân, Mr. Cobb says:
A protestant wave is sweeping over Islâm; quietly and cautiously a translation of the Korân into modern Turkish is being prepared. The grip of the clergy is waning in proportion as the people are becoming educated.
It must be said in justice to Islâm, that it has never been as fanatical and intolerant of heresy as the Christian Church. There has never been any Inquisition in Islâm, and persecutions for religious differences have been far rarer than in Christianity. The Turks are the broadest and most tolerant of all Mohammedans.
While both Turkey and Persia are yet mostly in the middle ages as regards education,
In both countries there are a number of leaders who have received a European education and are thoroughly in sympathy with its ideas. Their influence is radiating throughout the country and in the end it must pervade the masses.