rs of the consecutive civilizations of the
East; the ancient richness and fertility of the whole of the Asiatic
continent; the genius for empire and for commerce; the creative power
which seemed to pour itself forth, unchecked by wars and conquests;
the great dynasties which rose and fell, leaving behind them gigantic
works, and the records of fabulous luxury in the empires of China,
Assyria, India, and Persia, of which the remains have been of late
years excavated, deciphered, and confronted with the historical texts
which we have inherited, and had only partly believed. And studying
these new aspects of history, we are saddened, thinking that the
sunrise comes to us from shining over desert sands or the mounds of
empty cities, where the lion and the jackal "reassert their primeval
possession," or where the European and the Tartar, from the West and
from the East, dispute their rights to suzerainty. We are dazzled and
confused when we look back to those great days when the over-peopled
kingdoms sent forth whole tribes, eastward to the confines of Asia,
southward over India, and westward over Europe; and we bow reverently
before the mighty Power that led the Jews, by a promise and a hope,
across the seething nationalities, through the long passage of time
from Abraham to Solomon; and which is again giving into the hands of
those Oriental-looking men, so much power in shaping the destiny of
mankind through their great riches.

Moses commanded the Hebrew people to lend and never to borrow. They
have obeyed his precept, except in art; to that they have lent or
given nothing. There is no national Jewish art. For music only do they
show artistic genius, and that is European and not Oriental. As
illustrating their lack of intuitive decorative art, one need only
refer to the architecture of the first, second, and third Temple
buildings, which apparently reflected Babylonian and Semitic
influences on an early Chaldean type. The embroideries mentioned by
different writers, from Moses to Josephus, appear to have had always a
Babylonian, or later a Persian inspiration.

This absence of artistic genius is very remarkable in a people that
had its origin in the Eastern centre from whence all art has radiated.

The reason that so little survives of ancient embroidery is evident.
Woollen stuffs and threads decay quickly--the moth and rust do corrupt
them--and the very few ancient bits that remain, have been preserved
by the embalmin