THE WAR OF GREEK INDEPENDENCE 1821 TO 1833 BY W.ALISON PHILLIPS 1897

398 THE WAR OF GREEK INDEPENDENCE
Levantine question.
Yet Metternich alone, of all the
statesmen of the Concert, realised it clearly at the time,
and was, from the very outset, opposed to any form of
compromise. As long as he had any hope of carrying
the Cabinets of Europe with him, he insisted on the
absolute right of the Ottoman Government to crush a
rebellion of its own subjects;
yet in the end, though
he could not be suspected of possessing a shred of Philhellenic
sentiment, it was he who first proposed the
establishment of a strong and independent Hellenic
State. In this change of attitude there was no inconsistency.
It was merely the objection of a keen and
far-seeing statesman to those half measures which are
the expedients of weakness and timidity. The peace
of Europe he saw could be best maintained by adopting
one of two alternatives: by crushing or by conciliating
Hellenic sentiment. He believed that the policy
of crushing was safer than that of conciliation ;
but as
soon as he saw that the conditions of the problem rendered
the former impossible, he recognised the latter
as the only alternative.
a fleet is
Just, however, as the speed of
that of its slowest vessel, so the policy of a
Concert is that of its most short-sighted member; and,
in the settlement of the Greek question, it was England
that acted as a drag upon the counsels of Europe.
Had Canning lived, it is possible that, utterly antagon-