The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1899-09-10

III THIS great traged1enne, VINO con-
quered circumstances through native
gifts and not through adventurous circum-
stances, has had a successor since her
death forty years ago that successor is
no other than Jewess, too. Those whose
memories stretch not back to the hour
when Rachels genius burned-a flaming
torch in the sky Of art-declare with I'M
faltering trust that the dramatic in
stincts and capabilities of Sara Bern
hardt cannot even have been eQualed,
that they never can be surpassed. 1t is
not the purpose of this article to advance
dicta or lay down comparative criticism,
| but it may safely be said that not in her
| own day has Bernhart had rival. This
Jewess sprung from the loins of poverty,
struggling with want afiame with sacred
| fires Of genius, which looked with sneer-
| ing contempt upon the awkward ungain-
| ly, laughter-provoking figure of the girl,
! become in time that imperial woman be-
! fore whose superb art nations sat en-
| tranced and bent In homage. What is
| her life away from the footlights to
| those who would place convention before
higher things? They whose feet have
| found Immortality by treading upon
| high Olympus are not to be measured as
are those who walk the earth alone.
Perhaps the greatest living actor in
Europe is Won Sonnenthal, who for forty
years has delighted the Viennese in al
| ternate tragedy and comedy. The Emper-
| or Francis Joseph himself attended the
| twenty-fifth anniversary Of Sonnenthars
| connection with the Hofberg kheater as
| lea ding man, and at it's conclusion created
plain Adolf Somewhat a ritter Won"
| There is in Austria an imperial mandate
| which forbids audiences to call actors be-
fore the curtain. but on this night it
| was revoked and Sonnenthal, the Jew,
| was called out less than forty-two
| times. On this occasion, too, the great
| actor received the royal gold medal for
art and wisdom from the king of Ba-
| varia and the royal order of the Red Ea-
| gle from the emperor of Germany What
especially gratified him, however, was the
fact that from nearly all the German
| theaters in the world came tokens of es-
TEEN and appreciation
Nine. Judith was Jewess and the
| celebrated Ada 1saacS Menken. So was
| Pauline Lucca. So is Rose Eytinge.
In literature the Jew has achieved dis
| ttnctton and won places among the high
| est since literature began. His people
kept alive the fires of knowledge among
| themselves when the night of ignorance
| lowered like a giant bat above medieval
Europe. He has given poets to every
| land, masters Of fiction to most His es-
| sayists and his historians, his rabbins
I learned in ecclesiastical polemics, send
shining names like a shower of stars
down the long pages of biography.
To choose no lesser name, one may be
| pardoned for dwelling a moment upon
| that Of Heinrich Heine, the pupil and
friend of Schlegel. 1t would be little to
| say that few minds of his generation
made a more enduring impress upon Ger
man thought In the brilliant sparklings
of Keisebilder pictures Of traveD young
| Germany grew drunk with enthusiasm.
Excepting, perhaps, by those lyrics
! Goethe wrote in the sDringtime OF his
| poetic fancies. Heines songs are I'M
matched In German literature for ex-
| quisite and ethereal beauty. AS wit he
was unrivaled; as a satirist he snatched
| the pen from Voltaire. Derisive 1nfidel
| that he was at heart, who called the AL
| mighty 1.-The almighty Ar1stophanes Of
heaven. who laughs at my misfortunes,'A
he was no less born a Jew, and his con-
Vent1onal apostasy, Of which he himself
made scott, was committed merely that
he might pursue as nominal Christian
learned professions of the brutal laws Of
his time closed to his race.
Berthold Auerbach is a distinguished
name in German literature. His peace
full stories Of village life are painted with
| serene art which has made them well
come to millions. It is probable that
''On the Heights" has been translated
into most Of the modern languages and Is
salable work in our book stores today.
Is there writer Of fiction today, a
thinker, master of epigrammatic
| thought, who surpasses in depth Of feel
Ing, in keenness of analysis, in breadth
end beauty of coloring that child of the
| ghetto, Israel ZangWill,- who only last
winter entertained and delighted thou
sands in Chicago? If not foremost in the
| practice Of his art, who is there that
| stands before him?
Caesare Lombrose and Max Nordau
| the apostles Of the theory of degeneracy,
| whose arguments and submitted proofs
! startled the world but recently and al
ready are accepted as the new gospel
| whose light discloses the hidden springs
| of crime, are Jews.
| Adolph Philippe D'Ennery, who died
during the present year, the most fer
! tile, if not the most powerful, dramatfst
| Of his long day, who was decorated with
| the cross of the Legion of Honor, and
! afterward received promotion as an Off
Ger Of the legion, who wrote 200 success
| full plays, who was the author of 1.-The
| Two Orphans" who sometimes, thirty
| odd years ago, when he was in his prime,
had five of his own plays being produced
| on the same night on as many Partisan
stages, was a Jew. One of the earliest
! American dramatists was Mordecai Noah,
| of Philadelphia, who, in 1921, achieved at
| the Park theater, New York so brilliant
a success with his ''Siege of Tripoli''
| that the event was remembered for years
afterward.
| That eminent German philosopher who
was at once the friend and intimate of
| men like Leasing, Sulzer and Nicolai,
who was unanimously elected a member
Of the Berlin academy, but whose name
the rude hand of the great Frederick
struck from his list, Moses Mendelssohn,
was a Jew of Jews. To his personal in
fuence and to his philosophic writings
may be traced a vast degree the exter-
mination Of the brutal prejudices and the
repeal of many of the disgraceful laws
affecting them. Rainier wrote Of him
this eptaph:
True to the religion of his forefathers,
wise as Socrates, teaching Immortality,
and like Socrates, becoming immortal"
Little more than score of years after
this great man died to his son Abraham
was born a son, Felix, whose fame out
shines the fame of his forbears, whose
Tyre still charms a mute and listening
world, whose wordless songs still thrill
within millions Of bosoms. The ALIEN,
bracing musical genius of Felix Mendels-
sohn has perhaps not been paralleled in
the history of his magic art. In his
ninth year he made his first public con.
cert in Berlin and a year later made a
triumphant appearance in Paris. From
this period he began to write compost
lions, some of them of the most difficult
character, for such adversely played in,
struments as the piano, the violin, the
violincelo, the flute. When he was but
fifteen the first of these-three quar-.
tettes for the piano-was published. His
on