Nor were they less true to their nasal development in their success and skill in commercial pursuits. The commerce of Arabia, for several centuries, encircled the whole known world. From the frigid shores of Scandinavia, from the torrid sands of Africa, from silken Cathay, from jewelled Ceylon, from vine-clad Europe, from spicy Araby, flowed the rich streams of produce. The amber of the north was exchanged for the gold of the south; the wines of Spain for the silks of China; the pearls of Ceylon for the slaves and gold-dust of Africa; and a commerce now excelled only by that of England, carried arts and literature from one end of the Old World to the other, and was mainly instrumental in raising the more highly-organized nations of Europe from barbarism to a physical and intellectual splendour hitherto unknown. But from this glorious reality, the Arab has sunk into a wretched, irretrievable lethargy. Like the Jew, he has been weighed in the balance and found wanting; the cup of promise has been held to his lips, and he has refused, or polluted the blessed draught. They have been called, but would not come, they would have been gathered together as tender chickens under the wings of the hen, but they would not; and “behold, their house is left unto them desolate.” Neither Arab nor Jew shall ever again revive, till they join with the whole earth in one universal cry, “Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord!” It has been said that Christian intolerance has driven the Jew into the mart, and sunk his soul in barter. But this is not true—Commerce and money-getting are the psychonomic features of both the Hebrew races. The Israelitish branch is vehemently charged with its usury and extortion, by all its prophets. The severe laws which Moses made against usury shew the character of the people for whom they were necessary; yet those laws were ineffectual to check this inherent vice. Ezekiel (ch. xxii. 12) exclaims, “Thou hast taken usury and increase, and thou hast greedily gained of thy neighbours by extortion, and hast forgotten me, saith the Lord God;” so all the prophets. The Arab and the Jew are both now equally sunk in the same degradation, (_Heu! quantum mutati!_) and both exhibit, through this degradation, their love of gold, though in a different manner. The Arab still haunting his native soil, from which legitimate commerce is almost excluded, betrays his ruling passion in extortion from travellers, in skilful chicanery in horse-dealing—the only commerce left to him—or in impudent incessant demands on strangers for _bacsheesh_.