I am about, if God permit, to speak now of, by far, the most remarkable people in the world.  In the last chapter we studied the Races, and found that through the labours of scientific men the three patriarchs of 4,000 years ago reappear in this nineteenth century as most important “witnesses to truth.”  We put, as it were, Shem, Ham, and Japheth into the witness-box, and the result of their testimony was that Noah was inspired, and the Bible true.  Such a subject as that has a tendency to lose power through the vastness of its extent.  Our reading is not sufficiently wide, nor our minds sufficiently large, to enable us to take in the whole.  We are dependent, moreover, on scientific men; and it is a strange thing, but a fact, that those who talk most of science are generally the least disposed to receive the conclusions of scientific men, when those conclusions differ from their own.  But now I am about to call witnesses, in the examination of whom we do not want the help of science; for in their case there are no scientific difficulties.  Their evidence is within reach of us all, and if we choose we may test it for ourselves.  I am not about to speak of what happened 4,000 years ago; but of what is going on now, of what p. 34took place last year, and what any one may see for himself, if he will take the trouble to go to Houndsditch or Petticoat Lane.  There he will find a most remarkable people, eager, quick, and intelligent, exceedingly different from the rest of the inhabitants of London, and separated from their fellow-townsmen by a social barrier, which is very seldom overstepped.  These remarkable people are the Jews.

Now there are five undoubted and indisputable facts respecting the Jews that I propose, if God permit, to bring before you, and may He be pleased to help our study to the confirmation of our faith, and to the increase of our interest in His own ancient people!

(1.)  Their Expatriation, or their expulsion as a nation from their country.

Now it is a curious fact, that there is no other nation in the world which has such a right to its own country as the Jews.  Other nations claim their country simply through the right of occupation.  We live in England, and our fathers lived there before us, so we consider it ours, and are ready to lay down our lives for its safety.  But we have no title-deeds, and we have no documents to prove that it is ours.  But it is very different with the Jews.  They have the clearest possible documentary evidence of their covenant right to Palestine.  There is not a person in any town who has a better title to his house than the Jews have to their country.  It was distinctly given to them by God Himself, as we read in Gen. xv. 18.  And yet after having occupied it for fifteen p. 35centuries, and after having shown the utmost courage and determination in its defence, they were driven from their homes by their Roman conquerors.  Their city was sacked, their temple burnt with fire, their country laid desolate, and they themselves scattered homeless through the world.  The result is that at this present time there are many more Jews in London than there are in the whole of Palestine.  Now these are plain, well-known facts, and facts so well established that they are beyond the reach of contradiction.

(2.)  Dispersion.  When their home was broken up in Jerusalem they were not carried elsewhere as they were when they entered it, like a hive of bees moved from one garden to another, but they were dispersed in all directions.  From that day they have had no resting-place anywhere, and they have never since had what we may term a central home.  They have had no head-quarters, and, although they cluster more thickly in some places than in others, they have on the whole gone forth as lone wanderers on the face of the earth.  The result is that, go where you will, you are sure to meet with Jews.  They are sometimes driven about by persecution, and sometimes attracted by trade; but we need not study the cause of their movements.  They are found in all the continents—Europe, Asia, Africa, America, and Australia; in new settlements and old countries, in all climates and amongst all races; and as the seed is scattered over the field, so the Jewish people are dispersed through the world.

p. 36(3.)  Distinction, or Distinctiveness.

It appears to be the general law of human nature, that when different races live together they become, before long, fused with each other.  There may be exceptions, as there are in certain cases; but there is always some cause to account for it.  In India, for example, there is very little fusion between the English and the Hindoo; but then it must be remembered that no English ever settle in India as their permanent home.  So in America there is not much fusion between the European races and the negroes; but there again we must remember that there is the almost impassable barrier of the difference of colour as well as the slave curse on Canaan.  But in ordinary cases there is always fusion, and when there is no such barrier the races soon amalgamate.  In our own country, for example, there are Britons, Romans, Saxons, Danes, and Normans; but who can distinguish them?  We are all merged into one race, and the distinction of our nationality is totally lost.  Who could pick out from any congregation the Roman, the Dane, or the Norman?  But the Jew remains distinct.  There is nothing to keep him separate, but separate he remains.  He is rich, and enterprising, and talented, and often exceedingly handsome; but he does not amalgamate, and he remains to this day as distinct from us all as he was when he first landed on our shores.

(4.)  Reproach and persecution.

Notwithstanding the wealth and great ability of the p. 37Jewish nation, they have always been a people under reproach.  In trade, if people wish to describe any one as covetous, grasping, and avaricious, it is not an uncommon thing for people to say that he is “a regular Jew,” and thus, whatever a person may be in himself, the name “Jew” is a term of opprobrium throughout the world.

But reproach is not all, nor nearly all; for they have had to endure the most terrible persecutions.  They have been treated most barbarously by the nations amongst whom they have been scattered.  It has mattered little whether they have been living amongst Pagans, Mahommedans, or spurious Christians, though I fear it must be admitted that the treatment by spurious Christians has been the worst.  But I need not dwell on these horrible atrocities; for they are fresh in our own memories.  We have only to go back to the newspapers of last year to learn what the poor Jews endured in Southern Russia.  Their property was plundered, their homes burnt, their daughters—oh, I cannot tell you the horrors!—and their whole families cast out on a pitiless world to perish from cold, hunger, and nakedness; and all this in the face of the whole of Europe in this enlightened nineteenth century.

(5.)  Preservation.

But in the midst of all this they have been preserved.  Kindness has not fused them, reproach has not shamed them, and persecution has not destroyed them; so that after eighteen centuries they are in the midst p. 38of us still—still scattered through the world, still remaining a separate people, still under reproach and persecution, but still moving amongst us as an active, intelligent body of men; in the midst of us, but not of us; living in England, but not Englishmen; the subjects of another dynasty, the proprietors of another land, and the scions of another home.

Now I wish to put it to all thinking and observing men, Can they refer me to any other people in the world in which these five facts are found to meet?  Do they know of any other people that was ever so completely removed from its home, that was ever so effectually dispersed amongst the nations, that has been kept so distinct, that has endured such reproach and persecution, and that, notwithstanding all, has been so long preserved?  There have been amongst other races conquests, massacres, and migrations; but I venture to affirm, without the slightest hesitation, that you may search history from one end to the other, may ransack its pages for all that you can find respecting the nations, and I venture to affirm, without the slightest fear of contradiction, that you will not find one in which any of those facts have taken place as they have with the Jews, and still less one in whom in this most extraordinary manner they have all been found to meet.

But now comes the question, How is all this to be explained?  What is it that has made the Jews such an exceptional people?  What is it that has made their experience so entirely different to that of all the other p. 39peoples upon the earth?  I ask the infidel to tell me if he can, but I know he cannot; I ask the man of science to explain it on scientific principles, but I know he cannot.  But I ask the believer to explain it, and he can do so in a moment by the simple answer, “It is the ............