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pf ived them of the first germ of good taste, made them 
look upon the resources and combinations of human 
wisdom as useless, and misled them from the advan- 
tages of an intimate communication with the Eu- 
ropeans, who alone were able to instruct them. These 
causes, united to the extreme difference between the 
two languages of the East and the West, the effemi- 
nacy that they adopted as soon as they were in posses- 
sion of capitals sufficient to satisfy their sensuality; 
and lastly, the want of education in their princes, who 
always passed from the solitude of the Haram to the 
Ottoman throne, have paraiized their progress towards 
civilization. 
Therefore, although a Mussulman myself, I must 
own that the Turks are still barbarians. 1 ask pardon 
of those who think differently; but when I see a nation 
which has not the slightest idea of public right, or of 
the rights of man; a nation in which hardly one indi- 
vidual in a thousand who knows how to read and 
write; a nation with whom there is no guarantee for 
private property, and where the blood of man is ever 
liable to be shed for the least cause, and upon the 
slightest pretext, without any form of trial; in short, a 
nation resolved to shut its eyes to the lights of reason, 
and to repel far from it the torch of civilization which 
is presented to it in all its brilliancy, will always be to 
me a nation of barbarians. Let the individuals who 
compose it wear garments of silk, or rich pelisses; es- 
tablish their own ceremonials; eat, drink, and smoke 
a hundred different mixtures daily; wash and purify 
themselves every hour; still I shall repeat they are 
barbarians. There are, indeed, some few persons about 
the court, who, having learnt the languages of Europe, 
have secretly adopted its civilization, at least in part, 
