umble over a mummy, the mummy of a
dead cat, a dead dog, or a dead and shrivelled Pharaoh. Its greatest
asset is its departed glory, and every grain of sand blown from the
mighty desert, and every wave of reflected light flung back from the
Lybian hills, proclaims the terrific fulfilment of the prophet's
words.

The prophets foretold the final siege and destruction of Jerusalem.
It should be trodden down of the Gentiles. The people should be
carried away captive and sold into all lands. They should be
scattered from one end of the earth to the other. All nations should
despise them. They should become a by-word, a hissing and a scorn.
They should be hunted, hounded and persecuted. Their sufferings
should be unparalleled, horrible, unspeakable. The sound of a shaken
leaf should startle them. They were to become the people of the
trembling heart and the wandering foot.

The prophecies have been singularly fulfilled.

Jerusalem was besieged by the Romans. The city was taken. The city
and temple were destroyed. Hundreds of thousands perished by famine,
by fever, by fire and by sword. Titus, the Roman conqueror, drove a
ploughshare over its smoking ruins. The people who remained alive
after the general slaughter were carried away captive. They were
scattered from one end of the earth to the other. They have found
their dwelling place among all nations. They dwell everywhere and
are at home nowhere. They have been a by-word, a hissing and a
scorn. Every hand has been turned against them. They have been
hunted on the mountains. They have been chased through the valleys.
They have been walled up in the narrow and filthy ghettos of cities.
Their goods have been stolen. Their wives and daughters have been
ravished. They have been whipped and racked and tortured. They have
been broken on the wheel, burned at the stake, buried alive, and
sent to sea, thousands of them, in sinking ships. Every cruelty that
the ingenuity of man and the inspiration of fiends could suggest has
been practised upon them, until the heart revolts and the soul
sickens at the mere recital of their blood and woe; and to this
hour, through twenty long centuries, Jerusalem, as announced, has
been trodden down of the Gentiles; all nations have tramped through
her streets, overridden her people and torn down her walls.

The prophets said God would make a full end of the nation which
persecuted them; but he would not make a full end of them, he would
preserv