Then, after agriculture, the art of kings, take the next head of human arts—­weaving; the art of queens, honoured of all noble Heathen women, in the person of their virgin goddess[242]—­honoured of all Hebrew women, by the word of their wisest king—­“She layeth her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff; she stretcheth out her hand to the poor.  She is not afraid of the snow for her household, for all her household are clothed with scarlet.  She maketh herself covering of tapestry; her clothing is silk and purple.  She maketh fine linen, and selleth it, and delivereth girdles unto the merchant."[243] What have we done in all these thousands of years with this bright art of Greek maid and Christian matron?  Six thousand years of weaving, and have we learned to weave?  Might not every naked wall have been purple with tapestry, and every feeble breast fenced with sweet colours from the cold?  What have we done?  Our fingers are too few, it seems, to twist together some poor covering for our bodies.  We set our streams to work for us, and choke the air with fire, to turn our pinning-wheels—­and,—­are we yet clothed?  Are not the streets of the capitals of Europe foul with the sale of cast clouts and rotten rags?[244] Is not the beauty of your sweet children left in wretchedness of disgrace, while, with better honour, nature clothes the brood of the bird in its nest, and the suckling of the wolf in her den?  And does not every winter’s snow robe what you have not robed, and shroud what you have not shrouded; and every winter’s wind bear up to heaven its wasted souls, to witness against you hereafter, by the voice of their Christ,—­“I was naked, and ye clothed me not"?[245]

Lastly—­take the Art of Building—­the strongest—­proudest—­most orderly—­most enduring of the arts of man; that of which the produce is in the surest manner accumulative, and need not perish, or be replaced; but if once well done, will stand more strongly than the unbalanced rocks—­more prevalently than the crumbling hills.  The art which is associated with all civic pride and sacred principle; with which men record their power—­satisfy their enthusiasm—­make sure their defence—­define and make dear their habitation.  And in six thousand years of building, what have we done?  Of the greater part of all that skill and strength, no vestige is left, but fallen stones, that encumber the fields and impede the streams.  But, from this waste of disorder, and of time, and of rage, what is left to us?  Constructive and progressive creatures that we are, with ruling brains, and forming hands, capable of fellowship, and thirsting for fame, can we not contend, in comfort, with the insects of the forest, or, in achievement, with the worm of the sea?  The white surf rages in vain against the ramparts built by poor atoms of scarcely nascent life; but only ridges of formless ruin mark the places where once dwelt our noblest multitudes.  The ant and the moth have cells for each of their young, but our little ones lie in festering heaps, in homes that consume them like graves; and night by night, from the corners of our streets, rises up the cry of the homeless—­“I was a stranger, and ye took me not in."[246]