“I am not going to interfere in a religious discussion where men of the same faith take a different view. I know of Mohammedans—sincere, earnest, zealous Mussulmans—who take a very different view of the temporal power from the one which is taken by M. Mohammed Ali to-day, just as I know of Catholics who take one view and other Catholics who take a very different view of the temporal power of the Pope. That is a controversy into which I do not propose to enter.” And as if M. Mohammed Ali’s remarks had quite escaped him, he added: “All I know is this. The Turk will exercise temporal power in Turkish lands. We do not propose to deprive him of Turkish lands. Neither do we propose that he should retain power over lands which are not Turkish. Why? Because that is the principle we are applying to the Christian communities of Europe. The same principles must be applied to the Turk.” Finally, without thoroughly investigating the question of the massacres, he concluded that the responsibility lay with the Ottoman Government, which “cannot, as it is now constituted, protect its own subjects”; that Turkey is a “misgoverned country”—a reproach that might be applied to many other countries, though nobody would think of declaring they must be suppressed on that account; and that as the Turks “have been intolerant and have proved bad and unworthy rulers,” the solutions proposed by the Allies are the only remedy and therefore are justified. And so the old argument that Turkey must be chastised was recapitulated once more, and, through the mouth of her Prime Minister, England resorted to threats again, whereas she did not mean to compel Germany to carry out her engagements fully. This attitude seems to be accounted for by the fact that Turkey was weak, and was not such a good customer as Germany. England, while pretending to do justice and to settle accounts, merely meant to take hold of the Straits. Islam has instituted a social polity and culture which, though widely different from British and American civilisations, and leading to different methods of life, is not necessarily inferior to them; and all religious sects, whether Protestant or Catholic, are wrong when they look upon their own moral conception as superior, and endeavour to substitute it for that of Islam. If we refer to the letter which was written to Damad Ferid Pasha, president of the Ottoman delegation, in answer to the memorandum handed on June 17, 1919, to the Peace Conference, and which lacks M. Clémenceau’s wit and style though his signature is appended to it, we plainly feel a Puritan inspiration in it, together with the above-mentioned state of mind. One cannot help being sorry to find in so important a document such a complete ignorance or total lack of comprehension of the Muslim mind, and of the difference existing between our modern civilisation and what constitutes a culture. For instance, we read in it the following: