We must not, however, impute to the people alone the 

 continued degradation of the Ottoman empire; there is 

 something in the character of Turkish genius which unfits 

 it for the task of reformation ; and under the Turkish govern- 

 ment there is so frequent a delegation of absolute power 

 that the enlightenment of the prince can only operate within 

 a very narrow sphere. In Turkey all may rise to power 

 who manifest abilities ; that is to say, who are at once wily 

 and audacious. There is no country so fertile in genius of 

 this kind, or which produces so many Napoleons on a small 

 scale; but the natural energies of barbarians, bred in a 

 school of corruption, are not of a humanising kind. 

 Bairactar Vizir, who effected the revolution of 1808, was 

 originally a labourer, and fell the victim of his own arro- 

 gance; Gazi Hassan and Kutchuk Hussein, the chief sup- 

 porters of the declining empire, had both been slaves, were 

 both quite ignorant, cruel, and avaricious. Little need be 

 said of Achmet, Pasha of Acre, originally a Bosnian slave, 

 who gloried in the appellation of Djezzar, or the Butcher, 

 or of Ali, of Janina, who, with a little mercy towards his 

 subjects, might have fixed his independence on a solid 

 basis; their atrocities are too well known. Czerni George, 

 the Servian rebel, was a Turk in habits, and so ignorant 

 that he could not even read. He shot his father, hanged 

 his brother for a supposed affront, and had recourse to 

 every means to increase his wealth ; he resolved to rule as 

 a despot, and, refusing to listen to the Servian chiefs, who 

 spontaneously met in council, he sacrificed the opportunity 

 of firmly establishing his country's freedom. Mehemet Ali, 

 the Viceroy of Egypt, has stained his history by the 

 massacre of the Mamelukes ; he, also, is ignorant and of 

 humble origin ; and his system of ruling Egypt by troops 

 of negroes and Albanians, together with his monopoly of 

 the commerce, raise such a wall between himself and his 

 subjects, that his power deserves at least to perish. But 

 the Pasha of Widdin, Paswan Oglou, was one of the most 

 extraordinary men the world ever saw : his name signifies 

 the son of the sweep, but though of low origin he was not 

 without some education : struggling from >an obscure 

 beginning and through numerous vicissitudes, he at length 



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