The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1903-08-25

perience goes, to give vent to religious
scepticism which often verges on con-
tempt. The letters we receive in stout
| defence Of orthodox Judaism usually be-
tray more or less unfamiliarity with our
language, indicative of comparatively
recent immigration.
The renascence of Jewish nationality
is not likely to appeal to these younger
Jews. Nor practically has the Zionist
scheme found much more than purely
sentimental support from the great mass
OF the race in any country. A speaker
at meeting Of the Jewish Educational
Alliance in the district of the East Side
Ghetto argued, last Sunday, in support Of
the practicability Of the Zionist move
ment, that while the return of scattered
Germans and Irish to Germany and Ire
land, respectively, would be manifestly
impossible, precedents in Jewish history
proved that the reestablishment of the
race in Palestine as a distinct Jewish
State is reasonable probability. Other
people, he said, had assimilated with the
races about them, but the Jews had re-
NAMED distinct and peculiar, and three
times already had gone back to Palestine
out of Egypt, out Of Babylon and when
they made themselves nation under the
Maccabee5.
Unquestionably, there is something in
this. In all the world there is no other
race which has resisted such assimilation
SO stubbornly as have the Jews. In this
country the greatest mixture OF races in
the history Of mankind is taking place,
but it is true that Of the elements which
are contributing to it the least is the
Jewish Yet, if we take the whole period
since the Jews began to come hither in
the seventeenth century we shall find
much more Of a Jewishstrain in the MKT
ure than is usually supposed, even by
Jews themselves. 1t will be found in
many Christian families in whose blood
1t is least suspected, and some Of them
are New York families Of social distinc-
ton, while in others of like prominence
its presence is generally known. 1t is
suggested in many patronymics of fam
lilies which have been accounted purely
Christian for generations.
The aggregate Of Jewish assimilation
may have been small relatively, but
actually it has been large. At Newport
in the old days when Unitarians frater-
nized with Jews there was great deal OF
it. Probably now there is less, proper
tionallv, than there was before the period
when the Jewish immigration began to
be great, in $780, but, TO some extent, it
is going on still, and the emancipation
from Jewish prejudices illustrated in
the correspondents of whom we have
spoken would seem to suggest that there
will be much more of it in the future.
The Zionist movement, at the bottom,
is an organized resistance to any such
tendency and an attempt to preserve
the Jewish religion, the Jewish idea and
the Jewish race popularity. So far as
that sentimental purpose is concerned,
it has been successful to degree which
will stimulate leaders Of the race to per-
sist in the movement. The practical
establishment Of distinctively Jewish
State in Palestine is another matter.
Instead Of the present Jewish exodus
from Russia and from other countries Of
eastern Europe being to Palestine, it is
to this country most numerously. The
East Side Ghetto alone liz now receiving
annually by immigration more Jews
than the whole Jewish population OF
Jerusalem.