JEWS AS THEY ARE.

I.

THE manifold changes which have taken place during the past half century in the civil, political, and social status of the Jews of Europe would alone have sufficed to attract towards the ancient and illustrious Hebrew race a more than ordinary amount of public attention and curiosity. But when to this has been recently added an unexpected and uncalled-for persecution of the Jews of Germany and Russia, mildly designated The anti-Semitic agitation, and a still later onslaught upon the Jewish people in an important English magazine, a more extended public interest has been aroused which has already had the effect of elevating the Jews of modern times to a higher and exceptional importance.

To exhibit Jews as they really are is the design of the following pages.

Strange, most unaccountable, and almost incredible as it may appear to those who have not hitherto reflected upon the subject, very little of a reliable nature is known of the daily avocations, the social condition and customs, the domestic economy, the religious and political opinions, the home and inner life of the Jews of modern times. There is nothing dark or mysterious in the social life of the Jews, nor

about their religious creed, nor in respect to their religious observances. Nothing is easier than to become acquainted with them. Jews are naturally genial and social companions, and are famed for their hospitality. They cultivate the fine arts, literature, and all the refinements and amenities of social life with assiduity, and with more than ordinary liberality. It is surprising how absolutely ignorant are Christians of every country and class, with rare exceptions, concerning the Jews. The consequences of such want of knowledge, and even of the meagre, imperfect and uncertain acquaintance with the Jews of modern times, which, in some chance manner, some strangers may have acquired, have been to spread broadcast a considerable amount of misunderstanding, misconception, misconstruction and misrepresentation with respect to them personally, to their revered religion, and to their habits of life, which, in these days of active research and enquiry upon all subjects, of easy intercourse, and rapid communication with regions far remote, should not be suffered to remain without some attempt at elucidation.

Many Christians have doubtless passed their entire lives without having made the intimate acquaintance of any Jews of their own social rank. Others who have interchanged friendships with Jews on the footing of perfect equality have, perhaps, had no other thought or design than to attempt their conversion to Christianity. While other Christians, gifted with a larger intelligence and more liberal spirit, have been content to enjoy the esteem and confidence of their Jewish friends, without any ulterior

hope, or wish to interfere with their sacred inheritance, the full and free exercise of their religious convictions. So long as these are untampered with, Jews entertain towards Christians none but friendly sentiments. They would court their society: they would covet their friendship: they would meet them on terms of strict equality. That Jews entertain any dislike, or have any prejudices against those from whom they differ in religious faith is a popular fallacy. Jews are not monopolists in salvation! They believe with the late Rev. Sydney Smith, the liberalminded canon of St. Paul's, that "A great deal of mischief is done by not attending to the limits of interference with each other's religious opinions; by our not leaving to the power and wisdom of God that which belongs to God alone." How much happier and more peaceful would the world have been-how much happier and peaceful would the world now be, if men had earlier recognised that fact, and would even now cease to intervene arrogantly between man and his Maker! "You have a right, they say, to believe what you please, but you have no right to believe what is wrong. Their own faith, they say, is so manifestly the right one, and yours so plainly wrong, that it is impossible any man can be sincere in his belief of it." "This," said the late Lord Chancellor Brougham, “is the fundamental doctrine of the code of persecution, stripped from the disguise of phraseology with which it is generally covered." If men would but consider the differences that prevail in the shape and character of God's creatures; the limitless variety in His works; the infinite dissimilitude in man's bodily formation

and features; the endless variety in his mental capacity; the multifariousness in human thought, opinion, disposition, genius, belief, action, and inclination, he would not fail to recognise the Divine Wisdom in this marvellous variety. For any man, or body of men to endeavour to force all human creatures to hold identical opinions upon any subject whatever is clearly a presumptuous attempt to interfere with the natural liberty of thought. It is noticeable that many Christian orators and writers, when referring to Jews in general, persist in designating them "The Jews;" thus mingling in one heterogeneous mass, and placing on the same social level human beings wholly dissimilar in character and condition; Jews of all nations; the denizens of both civilized and uncivilized countries; those who happily live under' free constitutional governments, enjoying the inestimable blessings of liberty of conscience, liberty of thought, liberty of speech and of action; and those who are still unhappily subjected to the capricious tyranny of despots, deprived of every kind of intellectual freedom, and of all the natural rights of manhood; the well educated and the uneducated; the well-bred and the ill-bred; those whose disposition, character, and deeds are exemplary and deserving of the highest commendation, and those who are the reverse. How manifestly unjust and absurd, therefore, is it to class together Jews whose daily pursuits would naturally tend to ennoble and refine their character and demeanour, with others whose occupations, perhaps not less honourable, would, nevertheless, be likely to produce an opposite result.

The difference between the native Jews of one country and another is easily and clearly discernible. The greater part of the Jews of Russia, Poland, and Hungary are as unlike the Jews of England and of the British Colonies, whether of Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, or German origin, as are the Jews of France and Italy different from those of Greece, Persia, Abyssinia or Jerusalem. Writing upon this subject more than fifty years since, the late Isaac D'Israeli remarked that: "The Jewish people are not a nation, for they consist of many nations; they are Spanish or Portuguese, German or Polish; they are Italian, English, and French, and, like the chameleon, they reflect the colour of the spot they rest on. The people of Israel are like the waters running through the countries, tinged in their course with all the varieties of the soil where they deposit themselves. After a few generations the Hebrews assimilate with the character, and are actuated by the feelings of the nation of which they become part. What a distinct people are the Jews of London, of Paris, of Amsterdam, from the Jews of Morocco, Damascus, and the Volga!" "Every native Jew, as a political being, becomes distinct from the Jew of any other nation. If the Jewish military under the King of Holland were to encounter the French Israelites, the combat would be between the Dutch and the French. The Hebrew adopts the hostilities and alliances of the land where he was born, he calls himself by the name of his country."*

Whatever may be their condition of life, or wherever be the country of their nativity, all Jews, in their *The Genius of Judaism, Isaac D'Israeli.

may