Page:The Archko Volume (1896).djvu/185

Rh trodden by the foot of the Gentiles; ruin has driven her ploughshare through the crumbling walls, and we are scattered to mix and mingle among all nations."

Third Letter.

"As all the nations of the earth lacked the knowledge of the true God except us Jews, it devolved on us as a nation to extend this knowledge to all the world, which was brought about by the following plan: First, by the universal diffusion of the Greek language, and, secondly, by the conquest of the world by the Romans. Another cause almost as essential was the scattering of our nation among all nations of the earth, for narrowness and bigotry had almost made us a barren tree as to any general good for the world. So ancient were our habits and fixed our customs that spiritual life was almost extinct; therefore it was necessary for us even to learn a new language, that the knowledge of the true God might be infused into a new medium, and thus be spread from land to land. It was necessary that the true medicine of life should be dissolved in an element which flowed on every shore and in every stream that all men might taste thereof and be saved. It was necessary, too, that a foreign language should be forced upon us; for nothing but conquest and constraint, nothing but this, could overcome our bitter prejudices. It will be the object of this letter to show how this was brought about.

"The great designs of God were advanced by our