784 
SITUATION OF THE HOSPODARS. 
and well-thinking mind will incline him, in every respect, to 
acquit himself of his charge, to the best that such untoward 
circumstances will permit. But the harassing and ruinous system 
still maintained in these principalities, from the oppression 
and neglect of their Supreme Master, and the various in¬ 
fluences of his minister, hardly leaves power in the hands of a 
viceroy to fasten the affections of a people to him, who cannot 
but meet him with the natural aversion due to a stranger thrust 
upon them. And then again, that viceroy, being little better 
than a slave of the Porte, is always in dread of its arbitrary 
will, whether he act well or ill; consequently the Sultan has 
often witnessed the effects of the dread in which the Greeks in 
his service, hold his probably excited suspicion, cupidity, or 
caprice; also how assuredly the short-sighted policies of his 
equally avaricious ministers tend to alienate the spirit of allegi¬ 
ance in the provinces attached to his empire. In proof of this, 
he has found many occasions of seeing the readiness with which 
they embrace every opportunity of loosening their yoke, and 
throwing: themselves into the arms of the first nation which 
approaches Turkey with hostility by the way of their countries. 
It may seem something of exaggeration, to a perfectly European 
mind, this constant insisting on the almost universal avarice 
amongst Mussulmen, and its as certain ruinous effects; but 
ignorance is certainly the ground of all,—ignorance from the 
throne to the hovel; and gold being alike the temptation to 
destroy a man or a people, or to buy them forbearance and 
protection for a while, it is hardly to be wondered at, that 
during the existence of so blind a state of things, gold should 
be the universal god. Rome never would have been mistress 
of the world, if contempt of riches had not been deemed 
honourable amongst its greatest citizens. 
