The effects of an English settlement in Syria on the general interests of mankind presented a more serious question. Syria and the adjacent countries were in a worse state than they had been 2000 years ago. While the deserts of America and Australasia had been regained for the use of man, while India had been brought to peace and unity and its worst superstitions had been modified, if not altogether extirpated, by the influence of European civilization, man had given place to the savage creatures of the wilderness in those countries from which all that he knows of good, was originally derived. An English settlement in Syria would begin the work of regeneration in the most venerable and interesting country in the world. England would be to Syria and to the adjacent countries all that she had been to India――the protector of the weak, the common arbiter, the universal peacemaker. Her laws and her liberties enable her to fulfil that function, her commercial interests fit her to undertake it, while her wealth, her naval supremacy and her colonial power furnish her with the means required for the purpose. Why should any other power oppose her acquiring that region? That its acquisition would add to her commercial resources and to her defensive strength had to be conceded. But had no nation ever before sought to increase her commercial resources and add to her defensive strength by means in themselves legitimate, which would not in any way infringe upon the rights or interests of others? The advancement of the world in civilization and happiness must remain for ever at a standstill, if each nation is to be held in check by the jealousy of the others. This was the attitude of public opinion on this question from the point of view of human progress and of British interests. CHAPTER XX. THE SYRIAN PROBLEM The conflicting interests of the Powers――Was the conflict irreconcilable?――Public opinion――A new principle――The independence of Syria――A neutral position――The Zionist idea as the only solution――A practical proposition. PUBLIC opinion had for a long time laboured under the impression that the intricacy of the Eastern question was due much more to the conflicting interests of the Powers engaged in its solution than to any insurmountable barrier between them and the _Sultans_ Mahmud II., Abdul Medjid and Mehemet Ali. With France and Mehemet Ali on the one side and the four European Powers on the other, it was evident that war would have the most disastrous effect on the contending parties. The question arose whether the interests of the parties were irreconcilable, and whether it was not possible to devise an arrangement acceptable to both sides and thus to avert war. Some political leaders thought that they could settle the question, and that it would be possible to adopt a policy sufficiently far-reaching and just to satisfy the expectations of the five Powers.