Let us be reasonable and practical. Why longer exact or accept from the Sultan promises which he cannot make without doing violence to his own conscience and to his office, and which he cannot execute without imperilling his throne? You might as well ask the Pope to abandon the doctrines of temporal sovereignty and of infallibility, which to him are fundamental. If the situation in Turkey demands that anything be done, and if the rest of humanity and civilization have any responsibility in the matter, let practical statesmen proceed to business. All hope of reform from within depends on the distrustful, distracted, hoodwinked Sultan, who is clearly, in the circumstances, a helpless and pitiable object. But he should no more be allowed to stand in the way of the emancipation of Turkey, than the Pope was allowed to impede the making of Italy. “The Prisoner of the Vatican” has still abundant scope for his great and beneficent spiritual projects; and the Captive at Yildiz Palace—for such he has for years constituted himself—may also be allowed a sphere in which his personal virtues and ability shall shine forth, unobscured by the clouds and darkness that surround him now. He certainly would be better off, and his subjects also—Moslem no less than Christian. The shrieks of ten thousand slaughtered Armenians pierce for the moment above the groans of others. But it should not be forgotten that all the races in Turkey are under the same curse, and that the present is a chance to help them as well as the Armenians. According to the Koran, which is the basis and ultimate authority of Mohammedan law—Code Napoleon, treaty stipulations, and Imperial _Iradés_ notwithstanding,—the whole non-Moslem population of Turkey are outlaws. The millions of ancient, hereditary inhabitants, whether Greek, Armenian, Nestorian, Jacobite, Jew, or Syrian, are considered aliens. Their legal status is that of prisoners of war, with corresponding rights and responsibilities.[32] Not one of them is expected or even allowed to serve in the army. Non-Moslems, whose services are indispensable to the government, are, in rare cases, put in civil offices, especially financial, for which no Mohammedan of sufficient integrity or ability can be found. It cannot be denied that the above is true in theory, and it is equally true that the theory is carried out so far as fear of intervention by Christian nations permits.