“August 1st, 1838.――Dined with Palmerston. After dinner left alone with him. Propounded my scheme, which seemed to strike his fancy; he asked some questions, and readily promised to consider it. How singular is the order of Providence! Singular, that is if estimated by man’s ways! Palmerston had already been chosen by God to be an instrument of good to His ancient people, to do homage, as it were, to their inheritance, and to recognise their rights without believing their destiny. And it seems he will yet do more. But though the motive be kind, it is not sound. I am forced to argue politically, financially, commercially; these considerations strike him home; he weeps not like his Master over _Jerusalem_, nor prays that now, at last, she may put on her beautiful garments....” (_Ibid._, _pp._ 310‒11). In these few lines we see the Zionist problem in its two aspects: Lord Shaftesbury dealing with it _sub specie æternitatis_, so thoroughly infused with the sense of its dignity that the reader’s imagination is constantly stirred to the same feeling, and Lord Palmerston, the diplomatist, though of opinion that the scheme, constructed in a mist of hazy ideas, aspirations and emotions, required more clearness, yet agreeing in the main and demanding more details regarding the economic and statistical side of the subject. The difference between the two men was this: Lord Palmerston was a great political leader, Lord Shaftesbury was a great Christian. _The Quarterly Review_ for January, 1839, published a masterly article by Lord Shaftesbury. It is a review and an appreciation of “Letters on Egypt, Edom, and the Holy Land, by Lord Lindsay, 1838.” He writes: “We have alluded, in the commencement of this article, to the growing interest manifested in behalf of the Holy Land. This interest is not confined to the Christians――it is shared and avowed by the whole body of Jews,... Doubtless, this is no new sentiment among the children of the dispersion. The novelty of the present day does not lie in the indulgence of such a hope ... but in their fearless confession of the hope; and in the approximation of spirit between Christians and _Hebrews_, to entertain the same belief of the future glories of _Israel_,... In most former periods a development of religious feeling has been followed by a persecution of the ancient people of God;... But a mighty change has come over the hearts of the Gentiles; they seek now the ... peace of the _Hebrew_ people. One of them ... went a journey into Poland ... informs us that several thousand Jews in that country and of Russia have recently bound themselves by an oath, that, as soon as the way is open for them to go up to _Jerusalem_, they will immediately go thither,... Dr. [Joseph] Wolff (1795‒1862) (_Journal_, 1833)¹ (_sic_) heard these sentiments from their lips in the remotest countries of Asia; and Buchanan asserts that wherever he went among the Jews of India, he found memorials of their expulsion from Judæa,