as they are, an aristocracy among the others. As the soldiers whom Agricola led in Scotland were conscious of the might of Rome behind them, as they looked to the Imperial City on the Tiber as the centre of their allegiance, and despised the barbarians who had no share in Rome, so do the Uniates look across the Mediterranean to the Patriarchal throne by the Tiber, so do they realize themselves as citizens of no mean kingdom, and rather despise the isolated schismatics who have no share in the great Church.
Lastly, anyone who knows those lands at all will admit that the Uniates are, morally and intellectually, the best of Eastern Christians. The Catholic will not be surprised at this. But even apart from supernatural considerations, the fact can easily be explained. The Uniates are the only Easterns who enjoy what, in this case, is the real advantage of Western ideas. No one will deny that for many centuries the Christian East (except to some extent Russia) has been stagnant. This is not the fault of the Christians. Crushed under the horrible weight of Islam, they could not be expected to live a very active intellectual life; surrounded by the contempt of their barbarous conquerors, with Moslem morals all round them, it is not wonderful that they have not reached very high ethical standards. They learned to cringe, to deceive, to sacrifice principle for money, after the manner of the bribe-taking Turkish Pasha. Who shall blame them if subjection under the Turk has in some points Turkified their manners? It is enough that, in spite of all, they have kept their faith in Christ, Uniates and schismatics alike. For that they deserve all honour from us. But the fact remains that intellectually those poor persecuted Christians have not risen to any great height, and that morally they have become slack in some points.
The lack of education among the schismatical Eastern clergy is the invariable reproach of Western travellers; and the schismatical bishop has too often learned to take bribes, to sell honours and offices, nowhere more scandalously than in the case of the Church of Constantinople. To-day no one would cite a Jacobite parish-priest, a Coptic monk, as a shining example of learning, or as the exponent of a high moral ideal; though often he is sincerely pious. But in these matters the Uniates have the advantage of Western education. There are no theological works produced by modern schismatical Copts or Jacobites; generally, their clergy can hardly read, and do not understand their own liturgical language. Nor is much in this way produced by the Armenians or the Orthodox.
