the Jews. We are told in the nineteenth century that
God has the Jews persecuted simply for the purpose of establishing the
authenticity of the scriptures, and every Jewish home burned in Russia
throws light on the gospel, and every violated Jewish maiden is another
evidence that God still takes an interest in the holy scriptures. That
is their doctrine. They are "fulfilling prophecy." The Christian
grasps the Jew, strips him, robs him, makes him an outcast, and then
points to him as a fulfillment of prophecy; and we are today laying the
foundation of future persecution--we are teaching our children the
monstrous falsehood that Jews crucified God, and the nation consented.
They crucified a good man. What nation has not? What race has not?
Think of the number killed by the Presbyterians; by the Catholics.
Every sect, with maybe two or three exceptions, have crucified their
fellows, and every race has burned its greatest and its best. And yet
we are filling the minds of children with hatred of the Jewish people.
It is a poor business. "Ah?" but they say, "these people are cursed by
God." I say they never had any good fortune until the Jehovah of the
bible deserted them. Whenever they have had a reasonable chance they
have been the most prosperous people in the world. I never saw one
begging. I never saw one in the criminal dock. For hundreds of years
they were not allowed to own any land, for hundreds of years they were
not allowed to work at any trade; they were driven simply to dealing in
money, and in precious stones, and things of that character, and, by a
kind of poetic justice, they have today the control of the money of the
world. I am glad to see that kings and emperors go to the offices of
the Jews, with their hats in their hands, to have their notes
discounted. And yet I am told by clergymen that all this infamy has
been kept up simply to establish the truth of the gospel. I despise
such doctrine. As long as the liberty of one Jew is unsafe, my liberty
is not secure. Liberty for all, and not until then will the liberty of
any be assured. "Ah"; but says this man, "nobody ever died cheerfully
for a lie. The Jewish people have suffered persecution for 1,600
years, and they have suffered it cheerfully." If this doctrine is true,
then Judaism must be true and Christianity must be false. But
martyrdom doesn't prove the truth if the martyr knows it. It simply
proves the barbarity of his persecutors, an