THE " CLEAN-FIGHTING ' TURK 



YESTERDAY, TO-DAY 



AND TO-MORROW. 



I. 

 YESTERDAY. a. 90 Tears ago. 



Reprinted from " The Foreign Quarterly Review" 

 London , 1828. 



HISTORY presents to our view no object more imposing than 

 the transient greatness of the Turks ; nor does it anywhere 

 furnish a more instructive lesson than that which is incul- 

 cated by the rapidity of their decline. A horde of martial 

 devotees, with energetic habits, and peculiar usages, veil- 

 ing beneath a grave demeanour the fiercest passions and 

 unquenchable enthusiasm, burst upon Europe, when the 

 West was just awakening to a bright career of civilisation, 

 and usurped the place of the greatest empire of antiquity. 

 Their numerous armies, their haughty carriage, their 

 unbounded ambition, and their unsparing mode of warfare, 

 were formidable enough at first to daunt all Christendom ; 

 but in the space of four centuries we have seen their empire 

 pass through all the stages of political existence, from the 

 fresh vigour of youth to the weakness and decrepitude of 

 age ; and, without any apparent degeneracy of the people, 

 wasting away, as soon as the inactivity of the Sultans, or 

 the strength of the neighbouring nations obliged it to 

 remain in a state of peace. 



