Page:The Fall of Constantinople.djvu/431

 CONCLUSION. 413 the literary class, a scarcely cliaiigod language, had been put out. The crime of the Fourth Crusade handed over Oonstim- tinoplc and the Balkan peninsula to six centuries of barbar- ism, and rendered futile the attempts of Innocent and sul)se- quent statesmen to recover Syria and Asia Minor to Christen- dom and civilization. If we would understand the full sig- nificance of the Latin conquest of Constantinople, we must try to realize what might now be the civilization of Western Europe if the Komania of six centuries ago had not been de- stroyed. One may picture not only the Black Sea, the Bos- phorus, and the Marmora surrounded by progressive and civ- ilized nations, but even the eastern and southern shores of the Mediterranean given back again to good government and a religion which is not a barrier to civilization.