xistence. Before the
Christian era arrived, the Roman Republic had absorbed the four kingdoms
left by Alexander, and when the Roman Empire came into being (31
B.C.) there were Greeks, but no longer any Greece, except as a
geographical name.

The Roman Empire, after centuries of splendor, also expired. And in about
the year 600 A.D. another great empire was being created by the
Mahometan Saracens, who absorbed all the Greek provinces in the East. This
empire also was to be superseded by another Asiatic race.

I have told you how the Ottoman Empire, starting from a grain of
mustard-seed in the year 1250 A.D., spread with marvellous energy
and rapidity. The Saracen dominions now became Turkish dominions, and the
unhappy Greeks had changed masters for the last time. That proud and
gifted race was doomed to spend years of servitude to the cruel Turk.

You have seen that the Turkish Empire went the way of other great empires.
It reached a climax of power in 1500 A.D., and then swiftly and
surely declined. But, although perishing, its fingers never relaxed their
hold upon the Greek colonies, now no longer pagan, but Christian.

The old Greek love of freedom still burned in the breasts of this unhappy
race. They still cherished the sacred memories of Hellas, still spoke her
language, and gloried in her name.

In 1826 the spell of long captivity was broken, when the Greeks on the
Peninsula--the very heart and shrine of the classic memories--freed
themselves from Turkey and joined the kingdoms of Europe.

Seventy-three years have passed since then, and little has been
accomplished toward the liberating of the race.

You are reading the last thrilling chapter in the history of Greece every
day in the newspapers, while modern Greece, like a brave knight of old, is
risking her very existence in defence of her kinsmen.

Even the names in the despatches seem like a voice from antiquity;
Macedonia, where the Turkish forces are gathering; and Larissa, where
Prince Constantine is intrenched. Larissa is a name older than Rome, older
than the Olympic games, or even than Homer. It is the Pelasgian name for a
fortified city!

Now I hope you will remember that the sufferings of the Armenians and of
the Cretans should deeply move us, not alone because they are Christians,
but because they are Greeks. The world owes a debt to Greece which nothing
can ever repay. She has given us our civilization.

Rome was barbarian until Greece civi