in sentiment, in habit, in physiology ; a people in banishment, 
in suffering, in oppression ; cosmopolitan in presence, though 
not in citizenship ; a people without a realm ; whose religion 
two thousand years of exile has not availed to crush ; whose 
aspirations and expectations are unquenched, and would seem 
unquenchable. Is there any parallel for this — any approxima- 
tion to it ? Egypt and Assyria, Babylon and Persia, Greece 
and Rome have been: some still enjoy “ a local habitation,” 
all “ a name.” But where are the peoples ? What their 
histories ? Are any “ scattered ” everywhere — “ peeled,” 
“ trodden down,” “ a byword ” and “ a reproach,” and yet a 
people? Strange diversity, and yet more strange resemblance ! 
The antecedents, the courses, the issues all have one source — - 
the Divine will. The Jews have been, and are, what the 
Sacred Books predicted, and our experience to this day verifies. 
The nations have been, are or are not, what, accomplished or 
as yet unaccomplished, the same books foretell. The nations, 
more or less ephemeral, supply a passing witness ; the Jews, 
a continuous evidence of nigh four thousand years — and, what 
is more to our purpose, a standing witness of to-day. The 
Jew stands before the world this day the living attestation 
to the truth of the Bible, friends or foes being the judges. 
History furnishes no second example, save perhaps the case of 
the Arab — kindred, yet diverse. And this, if alleged, is but 
an additional witness ; for the annals of both accord. Con- 
temporary in origin, they have run a contemporary course ; 
and each, this day, verifies its particular destiny. The pre- 
diction of three thousand years, therefore, has in both cases 
its accomplishment before our eyes ; and since none can 
predict but Deity, we have clearly the word of Deity in our 
hands, and, as such, emphatically a fitting basis of scientific 
truth. 
My last example is the visible embodiment of Theology — ■ 
the Christian Church. In the year 28 of the Christian era, 
the historian relates that amid the mountain ranges of Upper 
Galilee a little group of peasants stood round their leader, and 
that from that leader’s lips fell words, either of high mysterious 
import, or of almost inconceivable vaunt and impotence : — 
“ On this rock will I build my church, and the gates of hell 
shall not prevail against it.” One brief year only elapses, 
and all seems marvellously changed. The leader has died a 
felon’s death and found an early grave, and his adherents, 
cowed and scattered, cease to be a band. And yet more 
marvellous issues succeed. The dispirited and dispersed re- 
appear as heroes. A company is consolidated. It grows, 
grows on — on, till not only, phoenix-like, it rises into new life, 
