Daybreak in Turkey: Second EditionBarton, James L. (James Levi)
History
Daybreak in Turkey: Second Edition
Barton, James L. (James Levi)
Turkey
In the Mohammedan dominions of Turkey missionary
institutions have graduated men who have in many
instances occupied government positions on account of
their superior capabilities, in spite of the fact that
Christian officials are greatly handicapped by Moslem
prejudices. In the case of the Bulgarian graduates of
Robert College, it was said in 1902, by a missionary of
the American Board then residing at Sofia, that “since the
beginning of the national administration of Bulgaria, in
1878, there has been no government ministry without one
at least, and often two or three, Robert College members.
The present Secretary of the Cabinet, whose ability has
preserved his position for him during ten years, and under
eight successive ministries, is one of these men.” The
judge of the supreme court, besides the mayor of Sofia,
and many others in diplomatic, judicial, or clerical
posts, are all Robert College men. The Syrian Protestant
College at Beirut has graduated men who, as government
appointees, occupy positions of responsibility, and exert
no little influence in the administration of political and
judicial affairs in Syria, especially in the Mount Lebanon
government. Its medical graduates, moreover, are to be
found in the military and civil service in almost all
sections of Asiatic Turkey, and notably under the Egyptian
administration.
—JAMES S. DENNIS in
“Christian Missions and Social Progress.”
Many causes have combined, many factors are present,
many influences have turned the hearts of men through
that empire [Turkey]; but if we ask ourselves what the
governing and final factor is which has brought about
the first of the world’s bloodless revolutions, which
has seen a people divided and dissevered by creed, by
race, by language, by every conceivable difference which
can separate the sons and daughters of men, suddenly act
together—we do ill if we forget that for eighty years the
American missionaries have been laying the foundations
and preaching the doctrine which makes free government
possible.
—TALCOTT WILLIAMS, LL. D.,
editor Philadelphia Press, in an address
at Brooklyn, N. Y., Oct. 15, 1908.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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