of Pericles and the popularity of Cleon, and puzzle the poor
Waywode with perpetual differences, agreed in the utter condemnation,
"nulla virtute redemptum" (Juvenal, lib. i. _Sat._ iv. line 2), of the
Greeks in general, and of the Athenians in particular. For my own humble
opinion, I am loth to hazard it, knowing as I do, that there be now in
MS. no less than five tours of the first magnitude, and of the most
threatening aspect, all in typographical array, by persons of wit and
honour, and regular common-place books: but, if I may say this, without
offence, it seems to me rather hard to declare so positively and
pertinaciously, as almost everybody has declared, that the Greeks,
because they are very bad, will never be better.

Eton and Sonnini[234] have led us astray by their panegyrics and
projects; but, on the other hand, De Pauw and Thornton[235] have debased
the Greeks beyond their demerits.

The Greeks will never be independent; they will never be sovereigns as
heretofore, and God forbid they ever should! but they may be subjects
without being slaves. Our colonies are not independent, but they are
free and industrious, and such may Greece be hereafter.

At present, like the Catholics of Ireland and the Jews throughout the
world, and such other cudgelled and heterodox people, they suffer all
the moral and physical ills that can afflict humanity. Their life is a
struggle against truth; they are vicious in their own defence. They are
so unused to kindness, that when they occasionally meet with it they
look upon it with suspicion, as a dog often beaten snaps at your fingers
if you attempt to caress him. "They are ungrateful, notoriously,
abominably ungrateful!"--this is the general cry. Now, in the name of
Nemesis! for what are they to be grateful? Where is the human being that
ever conferred a benefit on Greek or Greeks? They are to be grateful to
the Turks for their fetters, and to the Franks for their broken promises
and lying counsels. They are to be grateful to the artist who engraves
their ruins, and to the antiquary who carries them away; to the
traveller whose janissary flogs them, and to the scribbler whose journal
abuses them. This is the amount of their obligations to foreigners.

II.

Franciscan Convent, Athens, _January_ 23, 1811.[236]

Amongst the remnants of the barbarous policy of the earlier ages, are
the traces of bondage which yet exist in different co