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Speaking of concentration, Dr. Herzl has a clear insight into the value of that. Have you heard of his plan? He wishes to gather the Jews of the world together in Palestine, with a government of their own–under the suzerainty of the Sultan, I suppose. At the Convention of Berne, last year, there were delegates from everywhere, and the proposal was received with decided favour. I am not the Sultan, and I am not objecting; but if that concentration of the cunningest brains in the world were going to be made in a free country (bar Scotland), I think it would be politic to stop it. It will not be well to let that race find out its strength. If the horses knew theirs, we should not ride any more.

Point No. 5.–‘Will the persecution of the Jews ever come to an end?’

On the score of religion, I think it has already come to an end. On the score of race prejudice and trade, I have the idea that it will continue. That is, here and there in spots about the world, where a barbarous ignorance and a sort of mere animal civilisation prevail; but I do not think that elsewhere the Jew need now stand in any fear of being robbed and raided. Among the high civilisations he seems to be very comfortably situated indeed, and to have more than his proportionate share of the prosperities going. It has that look in Vienna. I suppose the race prejudice cannot be removed; but he can stand that; it is no particular matter. By his make and ways he is substantially a foreigner wherever he may be, and even the angels dislike a foreigner. I am using this world foreigner in the German sense–stranger. Nearly all of us have an antipathy to a stranger, even of our own nationality. We pile grip-sacks in a vacant seat to keep him from getting it; and a dog goes further, and does as a savage would–challenges him on the spot. The German dictionary seems to make no distinction between a stranger and a foreigner; in its view a stranger is a foreigner–a sound position, I think. You will always be by ways and habits and predilections substantially strangers–foreigners–wherever you are, and that will probably keep the race prejudice against you alive.

But you were the favourites of Heaven originally, and your manifold and unfair prosperities convince me that you have crowded back into that snug place again. Here is an incident that is significant. Last week in Vienna a hailstorm struck the prodigious Central Cemetery and made wasteful destruction there. In the Christian part of it, according to the official figures, 621 window-panes were broken; more than 900 singing-birds were killed; five great trees and many small ones were torn to shreds and the shreds scattered far and wide by the wind; the ornamental plants and other decorations of the graces were ruined, and more than a hundred tomb-lanterns shattered; and it took the cemetery’s whole force of 300 labourers more than three days to clear away the storm’s wreckage. In the report occurs this remark–and in its italics you can hear it grit its Christian teeth: ‘…lediglich die israelitische Abtheilung des Friedhofes vom Hagelwetter ganzlich verschont worden war.’ Not a hailstone hit the Jewish reservation! Such nepotism makes me tired.

Point No. 6.–‘What has become of the Golden Rule?’

It exists, it continues to sparkle, and is well taken care of. It is Exhibit A in the Church’s assets, and we pull it out every Sunday and give it an airing. But you are not permitted to try to smuggle it into this discussion, where it is irrelevant and would not feel at home. It is strictly religious furniture, like an acolyte, or a contribution- plate, or any of those things. It has never intruded into business; and Jewish persecution is not a religious passion, it is a business passion.