This Charming Man

I said to my­self, “My civ­iliza­tion must not die. It need not die. My na­tion­al faith is valid, as the Ot­toman faith was not. I know that the En­glish are as un­healthy as lep­ers com­pared with per­fect health. But they are on the side of life, they love jus­tice, they hate vi­olence, and they re­spect the truth. It is not al­ways so when they deal with In­dia or Bur­ma; but that is not their fault, it is the fault of Em­pire, which makes a man own things out­side his pow­er to con­trol. But among them­selves, in deal­ing with things with­in their reach, they have learned some part of the Chris­tian les­son that it is our dis­po­si­tion to cru­ci­fy what is good, and that we must there­fore cir­cum­vent our bar­bar­ity. This mea­sure of wis­dom makes it right that my civ­iliza­tion should not per­ish.”

Rebecca West