over
these: the characteristic of noblemindedness, of genius. The wild
Bedouin welcomes the stranger to his tent, as one having right to all
that is there; were it his worst enemy, he will slay his foal to treat
him, will serve him with sacred hospitality for three days, will set him
fairly on his way;--and then, by another law as sacred, kill him if he
can. In words too, as in action. They are not a loquacious people,
taciturn rather; but eloquent, gifted when they do speak. An earnest,
truthful kind of men. They are, as we know, of Jewish kindred: but with
that deadly terrible earnestness of the Jews they seem to combine
something graceful, brilliant, which is not Jewish. They had "poetic
contests" among them before the time of Mohammed. Sale says, at Ocadh,
in the South of Arabia, there were yearly fairs, and there, when the
merchandising was done, Poets sang for prizes:--the wild people gathered
to hear that.

One Jewish quality these Arabs manifest; the outcome of many or of all
high qualities: what we may call religiosity. From of old they had been
zealous worshippers, according to their light. They worshipped the
stars, as Sabeans; worshipped many natural objects--recognized them as
symbols, immediate manifestations, of the Maker of Nature. It was wrong;
and yet not wholly wrong. All God's works are still in a sense symbols
of God. Do we not, as I urged, still account it a merit to recognize a
certain inexhaustible significance, "poetic beauty" as we name it, in
all natural objects whatsoever? A man is a poet, and honored, for doing
that, and speaking or singing it--a kind of diluted worship. They had
many Prophets, these Arabs; Teachers each to his tribe, each according
to the light he had. But indeed, have we not from of old the noblest of
proofs, still palpable to every one of us, of what devoutness and
noblemindedness had dwelt in these rustic thoughtful peoples? Biblical
critics seem agreed that our own _Book of Job_ was written in that
region of the world. I call that, apart from all theories about it, one
of the grandest things ever written with pen. One feels, indeed, as if
it were not Hebrew; such a noble universality, different from noble
patriotism or sectarianism, reigns in it. A noble Book; all men's Book!
It is our first, oldest statement of the never-ending Problem,--man's
destiny, and God's ways with him here in this earth. And all in such
free flowing outlines; grand in its sincerity, in its simp