The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-10-26 00:00:00

DR. NE WMAN'S LECTURE.

The fourth lecture of the series was delivered last night,
the attendance being quite as numerous as on any of the
previous occasions. The rev. gentleman commenced the
lecture by pointing out the great facilities which the Turks
had to penetrate into India, and likened their attempt to do
so to our not far' distant incursion into Affghanistan. He
observed that climate and country did not always civilise a
people, and instanced the vast difference existing between the
Turks and Turkomans in illustration and evidence of this.
This, however, might be accounted for by the fact, that
while the Turkomans never took hold of the country, but
continued to wander about, the Turks, on the other hand,
settled down in the lands of which they became possessed,
and remained there as conquerors and conquered. After
being conquerors in their new lands for ninety years, they
were subjugated by the Saracens, who came up with the
enthusiasm of a new and false religion from Arabia, and im-
pelled by it, conquered wherever they went. This, however,.
did not stop the descent of the tribes of the Turks from the
North, though they had not then, as in the earlier times,
the same motives of inducement ; for they came no- longer
as conquerors. ' If they found they could not get employ-
ment in Sogdiana, they went on to Batavia, offering them-
selves as mercenaries, and so extending, until they pene-
trated to Bagdad, where. the Caliphs, having removed from
Damascus, then were.. • The lecturer then proceeded to say
that he had stated that the Tartars had changed very much
in person and manners since the period of their first incur
sions. He had -described the Tartars as some of the ugliest
of the human race,- but though the Turks were Tartar in
their origin, yet hi the space 'of 90 years, during which they
held their new possessions, they have become a very.differ-
ent sort of people. .Sa much so that they were recommended
by their masters, the Saracens, for their shape and personal
beauty, both for the purposes. of regal show and of- war.
And so remarkable, still further, was this change in their
persons, that Timour reproached them for it, observing that
their " minds were as narrow as their eyes," meaning that•
they were not so far distant from each other in the head as
those of the Tartars—a circumstance which he considered a
very great disfigurement. The Turks still continued to re-
commend theniselves to their masters by these qualities, un-
til at length Haroun Al Raschid, whose fame is not unwor-
thily preserved in that favorite of our youth, " The Arabian
Nights' Entertainments," took 50,000 of them into hispay and
then into his body guard. It was not difficult to prophecy
what the result of this thoughtless step would be—that it'
.would be disastrous to the Caliphs, and glorious to the
Turks • for though the Saracen empire was not then declin-
ing, the Turks were young and daily growing into might.
A modern writer compared the Turks to the Romans. Such
Comparisons were often fanciful, but if they might take it
as.a sort of impression of their character, he would complete
the picture, by saying if the Turks were to be compared to
the Romans, the Saracens and the Persians were to be com-
pared to lithe Greeks. The Persians were poets, and the
Saracens were philosophers, excelling in astronomy, mathe-
matics, and botany, and being in addition, the creators of
the science of chemistry. The Turks on the other hand,
though having a literature to some extent, still looking at
them in the whole, they were not an intellectual people—
but they were men of business. They had something of
that talent which the Romans had, in conquering and govern-
ing the world. In that way they might be likened to the
English ; for they had the perseverance, the practical tact, and
resolution that made a great-empire, in a way very few races
had been able to make an empire. Another point of re-
semblance between the Turks and the Romans compared
with the Saracens as contrasted with the Greeks, was this :
under Alexander, the Greek empire rose in a brief
space
.of time, but it lasted not many years. In like manner
the Saracens, who came with a brilliant and unchequered
success from Arabia, founded a great empire in a short time,
but lost it again in a few hundred years. On the other hand
the Romans grew slowly, century by century, until they
compassed thd known world : and in the same way the
Turks rose by a series of reverses ; frequently were they lost
or. whelmecl in the great ocean of nations, but they came as
often to the surface, until they obtained their power. The
Rev.
.gentleman then narrated how the Turkish guards
mutinied in Bagdad,' and having deposed and murdered three
caliphs, were risen against by the enraged people, and in
their turn for a time subdued. But the plan adopted to
crush their power served but to strengthen and
perpetuate it. They were dispersed in the provinces, and
thus were laid the seed of future and greater revolutions.
The tenth century had now arrived, and• though very little
was heard of the Turks during it, they were, nevertheless,
slowly growing into that, however, which was eventually
to obtain for them mastership over their race. The lecturer
then gave a brief outline of the growth of the Turks in the
quarters whither they had been for the time forced, and
then an ecually brief, but highly interesting sketch of the
life of Mairaoud, the greatest of his dynasty. To him was
first applied the peculiar title, " Sultan," and having
crossed the Indus, to add to his vast territories Hindoostan,
he was called " Ghazan.," or the conqueror. He then de-
scribed his wealth, increased to an almost'incredible amount
.on the taking of the temple of Ghuzzarat, for the safety of
which ten millions of money was offered by the priests—a
circumstance not to be wondered at, for the wealth of the
temple, famous through- India, not less for its profligacy
than its riches, was hid in the truly precious image. It
was not remarkable, then, that avarice should have been
Mahmoud's greatest vice, but his last moments were
scarcelyby
ythe growing
less imbitpteer,e,der baynagrpierfespfoertithisy
t,ywehailsth,than
merce-
naries, the Turks on the confines of his dominions.
They had now arrived at the turning point of Turkish his- •
tory. The Turks had got into 'Persia, then spread into
Hindostan, and formed a large empire there, but not con-
tent with that they came down and formed an empire in
Sogdiana, after having cut off the Sultan Mahmoud in
Hindostan. He had commenced their history that night at
the beginning of the seventh century, and they were now
at the beginning of the eleventh. It was the turning point
of their history, because when they got there they might
have turned either to the east or to the west. Many years
ago, the reverend lecturer said, he had heard a celebrated
professor of geology observe, in speaking of the river
Thames, that if a portion of it had been blocked up it
would have run out into the Wash, in Lincolnshire, and
the whole history of En land would have been changed. In
a similar manner the whole history, not only of Europe,
but of the world, might have been changed if the Turks had
turned to the east instead of the west. Had they turned to
the east they would never have been heard of in Constair.
tinople, and might have been found now perhaps upon the
throne of Delhi. • But they turned to the west, because
their kindred, the Turks of Sultan Mahmoud, had got
possession of the east.- In another respect also their west-
ward move might be called, emphatically and most seriously,
the turning point of their history. It was their moral turn- •
ing point. The Mahomodan religion stood between
Paganism and Christianity. Any one imbued with the doc-
trines of Mahomet held a far higher station, than the Pagan,
although far below the Christian. A Turk at that moment
stood between the Pagans in the east, and the Christians in
west. Had they gone to theeast they would have fallen in
with Pagan superstitions, and might have been regarded
in some degree as the champions of truth. As they went to
the east, they came into collision, with Christianity, and of
course became forthwith the prosecutors of great truths.
More happy was the poor Sultan Mahmoud, whose mission
it was to destroy idols, and upon whose tomb the sandal
gates remained for 800 years, representing him in a certain
sense as the champion of truth, and seeming. to plead
for him. • But those most unhappy Turks, owing to the
face of circumstances, turned • to- the west, and hence
became • known in history, as the greatest persecuting race
which the church had ever known, the persecutors of Christi-
anity for 800 years. The year 1048 , was marked by
chronologists, :as the year in which'the Turks set off for the
west—the year in which they bletv as it were the trumpet of
the woe 'coming' to Christendom. A great band of the
Turks were famOus in history as the Seljukian Turks, from
Seljuk, Who was!the founder of the' dynasty. Seljuk having
become a convert to Mahumedanism, had to leave his country
and crossed into Sogdiana, were he shewed his zeal for the
creed, he had adopted by turning a furious enemy to Pagans,
and died in battle at the wonderful age of 107. His son also
died in battle, but at an early age, and they were called
martyrs, because in Mahomedanism where the soldier is the
missionary, the soldier is also the martyr. It was one
of this family who made the promises of soldiers to the
Sultan Mahmond which he had related, and it was this
family which descended upon Christendom, having first con-
quered Sogdiana, and then turned upon Persia, which was
the first act of their turning to the west. When they once
did so, they had the materialkfor the most rapid and brilliant
successes, for they had the aids of their kindred, who were
for centuries scattered throughout Persia and the other
Saracenic dominions; they had the Turcomans, and an in-
definite reserve of the wild Turks at their back, coming down
to their support from Turkestan In the short space of forty
years, they had conquered the whole of the west of Asia, had
had taken Jerusalem and threatened Constantinople. They
had three 'monarchs; the first of whom succeeded in obtaining
the power of the Caliph, by whom he was sent a deputy into
many countries to put dowh the Caliph's foes, and he began
the fearful war against Christianity. The second monarch
reigned bid a short time, although he:extended his success
in conquest which his predecessor had begun. He came into
conflict with the Greek emperor of that day, having been
attracted by the fame the shrine of the great St. Basil!, in
Cappadocia, which he adorned with jewels and precious
stones. The third and last of the sovereigns, as fre-
quently happens in dynasties, was the greatest, and with
him ended the power of the Seljukian Turks. Twenty
theyears
P apfet eorf the first
th
eo
great
r thesee at
St. Sultans
Gregory started e
Seventh,
that almost miraculous prescience which he possessed, saw
westward,
with
and denounced the coming evil. None who contemplated
the deeds of that illustrious saint. even those who had no
sort of inclination towards Catholicism, could help being
overcome by the gigantic force of his mind. At that time,
although he had to contend against the Sings of the world
and 'even with :his own people,althou,.,ol engaged in the
most arduous and perilous contest the church had ever seen,
although surrounded by bad bishops, bad priests, and bad-
laymen, 'although he had to smite, to tear up, to pull
down and to root up, and to do such work as never had
been done from the beginning of Christianity up to the pre-
sent day, although in the', midst of that dreadful conflict,
enveloped by evils, surrounded by foes, although he was
driven out From Rome, and died an exile in Avignon, yet
he still found time to look over Persia and Syria, great as was
the &tang() from Italy, and to prepare an army of 60,000

men to march against the enemies of Christ.
This he noticed to show how solicitous the fEw
been for all her children. This great war
all the church, If any member of the whole
he suffered, and although engaged in that
had been described, he still could feel for the
who had been massacred and mar'

heard and wept to hear it, how the
Jerusalem and how the Patriarch had been

altar andthrown into a dungeon—how,
and
a peaceful jourerneablye from to the H
the l
effects of Land we

injuries they had sustained to reachthe eL
their effects. He saw that the Turks were
upon Constantinople, and likely to overwhelm
he therefore gave that signal: which was
out by that series of holy wars called the
plause.) The crusades had been called a,
these savages, coming downlipon Europe
of forty years done such acts, had taken
stantinople : and if their course had been •
300 years, he would put aside the question a I
the object of the Crusades for the present,
broader view of the subject say, that when present
word, collected that immense force, threw
of the barbarians, crushed them, and broke
alone was an object worthy the efforts 9f
(Applause.)
.The rev. lecturer at this pant
lecture amid prolonged acclamation.
The Rev. Mr. Nugent announced that Dr,
deliver his fifth lecture on Thursday e‘
kindly consented to deliver it ui a large ra°'
lecture would therefore take place in the Cal
Nelson-street, where a much larger number
modated, and an opportunity of hearing
would be afforded to the poorer Roman Cat
pool, who felt as high' an anxiety, and as
as any other class, to listen to the discourse
(Loud applause.) '

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