in amount and suffering,
cannot compare with that which has been endured by the children of
Israel. This peculiarity, however, attends the Jews under the most
unfavourable circumstances; the other degraded races wear out and
disappear; the Jew remains, as determined, as expert, as persevering,
as full of resource and resolution as ever. Viewed in this light, the
degradation of the Jewish race is alone a striking evidence of its
excellence, for none but one of the great races could have survived the
trials which it has endured.

But, though a material organization of the highest class may account for
so strange a consequence, the persecuted Hebrew is supported by other
means. He is sustained by a sublime religion. Obdurate, malignant,
odious, and revolting as the lowest Jew appears to us, he is rarely
demoralized. Beneath his own roof his heart opens to the influence of
his beautiful Arabian traditions. All his ceremonies, his customs, and
his festivals are still to celebrate the bounty of nature and the favour
of Jehovah. The patriarchal feeling lingers about his hearth. A man,
however fallen, who loves his home is not wholly lost. The trumpet of
Sinai still sounds in the Hebrew ear, and a Jew is never seen upon the
scaffold, unless it be at an _auto da fe_.

But, having made this full admission of the partial degradation of the
Jewish race, we are not prepared to agree that this limited degeneracy
is any justification of the prejudices and persecution which originated
in barbarous or mediaeval superstitions. On the contrary, viewing the
influence of the Jewish race upon the modern communities, without
any reference to the past history or the future promises of Israel;
dismissing from our minds and memories, if indeed that be possible, all
that the Hebrews have done in the olden time for man and all which it
may be their destiny yet to fulfil, we hold that instead of being an
object of aversion, they should receive all that honour and favour from
the northern and western races, which, in civilized and refined nations,
should be the lot of those who charm the public taste and elevate the
public feeling. We hesitate not to say that there is no race at this
present, and following in this only the example of a long period, that
so much delights, and fascinates, and elevates, and ennobles Europe, as
the Jewish.

We dwell not on the fact, that the most admirable artists of the drama
have been and still are of the Hebrew r