THE REACTION AND TEUTOMANIA.
The Jews in the Wars for Freedom--The Congress of Vienna--
Hardenberg and Metternich--Rühs' Christian Germanism--
Jew-hatred in Germany and Rome--German Act of Federation--
Ewald's Defense of Judaism--Jew-hatred in Prussia--Lewis Way
--Congress at Aix--Hep, hep Persecution--Hartwig Hundt--
Julius von Voss--Jewish Avengers.
1813-1818 C. E.
Like the Persian monarch Xerxes, Napoleon, hitherto invincible, and
grown haughty and brutal through his successes, summoned the nations
and princes to a universal war, and they followed him as submissively
as slaves follow their master. Proudly he led forth Europe, subdued by
him, against Asiatic Russia. Within the memory of man such an immense
expedition had not been known. But, if ever, the words of the text
were fulfilled in this gigantic contest: "An horse is a vain thing for
safety, neither shall he deliver any by his great strength"; if ever,
Divine justice manifested itself in him who had trampled upon right
and liberty. Napoleon was defeated, not by the power of his enemy,
but by a Higher Hand which struck him with blindness--a blindness
which permitted the glow of the flames at Moscow and the ice of a
Russian winter to work his ruin. When God and fortune had forsaken
him, the princes who had promised him service and allegiance fell away
from him, and turned the points of their swords against him, and the
people, which, relying upon his own warlike talents, he had so greatly
despised, rose up against him. But the nations likewise were stricken
with blindness; whilst breaking asunder one sort of bonds, they forged
new ones for themselves. The two years (May, 1812-April, 1814) form
an instructive chapter in history, from the moment when Napoleon led
an army of more than half a million men against Russia, until the day
when, abandoned by all, he was compelled to flee, in order to escape
the threats and insults of the embittered French people. It was a
sanguinary, horrifying drama.
No one could have suspected that the greater would drag down the
less in its ruin, that by the downfall of Napoleon, the Jews whom he
had liberated, though reluctantly, would be hurled into their former
slavery. Jewish youths belonging to wealthy families had emulated
their Christian friends in courage, and rushed to battle to help in
slaying the giant. Large numbers of Jews, especially in Prussia,
animated by burning love of country, had joined the volunteers, had
rejoiced to be accepted in the ranks, and wipe away with their blood
on the battlefield the stain of cowardice, so often imputed to them
by the opponents to their emancipation. Jewish young men paid for the
freedom accorded them on paper with their lives. Jewish physicians and
surgeons sacrificed themselves in the camps and hospitals in their
devoted attendance on the wounded and the plague-stricken. Jewish women
and girls spared no efforts to bring help and comfort to the wounded.
Again, as in the days of national independence, sons of the same race
and religion were opposed to each other--German Jews engaged in
deadly combat with French, Italian, and Dutch Jews, and recognized each
other only in the last hour, in time to embrace as brothers. Those
unfit to bear arms had shown their attachment to Germany and their
worthiness of emancipation by sacrifices in other ways. Nevertheless,
the seemingly forgotten Jew-hatred was rekindled in the hearts of the
Germans, extended ever further, and robbed the Jews of the reward
which the hard-won victories had promised to bring even to them.
With the fall of the hero began the rule of petty, intriguing, reckless
speculators, who bartered both men and lands. They misled the princes
who earnestly desired to restore long banished freedom, and ensnared
them with lying artifices. In France these intriguers, the Talleyrands,
reinstated the throne of the Bourbons. In Germany Metternich and
Gentz turned the struggles for freedom into mockery. Only the more
far-sighted knew that Europe, owing to the closer connection between
the rulers, would be reduced to a more degrading state of slavery,
because sloth and pettiness were the order of the day.
The Jews felt the first effects of the reaction now commencing in
Germany. It arose in Frankfort, the seat of unmitigated, mediæval
anti-Semitism. As soon as the artillery of the retreating enemy had
ceased within the precincts of this city, loud voices were heard
encouraging each other to demand that boundaries be set at once to
the unheard-of presumption of the Jews. In Lübeck and Bremen, the
citizens did not content themselves with depriving the Jews of their
recently-acquired rights, but energetically strove to banish them
altogether. The proposal was seriously made to drive all adherents of
the Mosaic religion from the town. In Hanover, Hildesheim, Brunswick,
and Hesse, they were at one blow divested of their rights of equality.
These events naturally gave great anxiety to the Jews throughout
Germany. If the privileges granted them by law, as in Frankfort, could
be abolished, what security had they for the continuance of their
equality? What a contrast this reaction presented to that in France!
Here, although the nobility, who hated freedom and were thirsting for
revenge, and the Catholic clergy were in power at the court of Louis
XVIII, and looked upon the terrible events since 1789 as if they had
not happened, yet the rights of the Jews were not abridged.
The Jews, concerned about their freedom, honor, nay, their very
existence, especially in the so-called free towns, looked hopefully
forward to the Congress of Vienna, which was to readjust dismembered
Europe. The monarchical and diplomatic members of the Congress,
however, did not hasten to act the part of Providence assigned to them.
They opened the meetings in November instead of in August, and from
the bosom of this Congress, intended to establish eternal peace, a
desolating war arose. The community of Frankfort had sent two deputies
to Vienna, one of them Jacob Baruch, the father of Börne, chosen
because he had patrons at the Viennese court. Baruch fulfilled his task
in a disinterested manner worthy of his great son. Together with his
less known colleague, he presented a memorial (October, 1814) to the
Congress, wherein the arguments in favor of the claim of the Frankfort
Jews were clearly set forth. They made the formal claim, that their
equalization had been duly purchased for a large sum, and the patriotic
claim, that they had taken part in the liberation of Germany. Their
chief aim was to remove the suzerainty of the Senate over them.
The Jews of the three Hanse Towns sent a Christian lawyer as deputy,
to guard their interests in Vienna, who of his own accord had drawn
up an appeal for the equalization of the Jews. In combination with
the deputies, certain influential personages worked quietly and
unobtrusively. The banking-house of Rothschild by its circumspection
and fortunate enterprises had made itself a power in the money world;
and not even prying suspicion could find a trace of dishonesty in
the accumulation of its riches, which might be used as a pretext
by anti-Jewish opponents. The founder of the house, Mayer Amschel
Rothschild, was held in the highest esteem in Frankfort, and in
consequence of the equalization had a seat in the Electoral College.
Happily he died before the beginning of the reaction (September, 1812),
but his five sons increased the wealth left by their father. Although
they appear to have adhered to the principle, not to throw the power
of their riches into the scale on behalf of their co-religionists and
their faith, yet they could not be indifferent to the attempt made in
Frankfort, their home, to reduce the Jews again to a state of serfdom.
One of the brothers probably addressed words of remonstrance to the
most influential German members of the Congress against diminishing the
rights of his co-religionists.
The statesmen who controlled German affairs in the Congress showed
themselves favorable to the Jews. Hardenberg and Metternich in a letter
on the subject expressed their disapproval of the oppressions to which
the Jews in the Hanse Towns were subjected (January, 1815), and advised
the Senate--advice which amounted to a command--to treat them in
a humane, just spirit. Hardenberg pointed out to the Hanse Towns the
example of Prussia and the edict of March 11, 1812, and remarked, with
some sarcasm, that they would succeed in depriving the Jewish houses of
the prosperity to which they had attained, and that constant oppression
would compel them to withdraw their capital. In the sketch of the
constitution for Germany drawn up by the Prussian plenipotentiary,
William von Humboldt, which was submitted to Metternich, and accepted
as a basis for discussion, the Jews were promised equality, even
though they were mentioned separately. "The three Christian religious
sects enjoy equal rights in all German states, and the adherents
of the Jewish faith, so long as they undertake all the duties of
citizenship, are to enjoy corresponding rights." But the goodwill of
the two chancellors, even though their sentiments had been shared by
the monarchs whom they represented, did not suffice at that time. A
new enemy rose up against the Jews, tougher and more dangerous than
envy and bourgeois pride. This terrible enemy who now turned his arms
against the Jews was the German visionary. The yoke so long imposed on
the Germans by the French, the compulsion under which they had been
to obliterate their most characteristic peculiarities, had rendered
hateful to them, not alone everything French, but all that was foreign,
that did not bear the stamp of pure German origin. Allowances should
certainly be made for a nation which, arriving at a consciousness of
its strength and solidarity, breaks its fetters, if it conceives an
exaggerated notion of its importance. But it was unpardonable and
childish that grown men should dream in broad daylight, representing
their dreams as truth and trying to foist them upon others. Extravagant
Teutomania was a dream of this kind, and resulted in the ruin of the
Germans. For the first time the German nation had acted as a unit;
hitherto it had been the tool of princes in Italian expeditions,
Turkish wars, or civil strife. The Germans sought analogous cases
in their own history by which to regulate their conduct, and found
them only in the Middle Ages, in the time of the Empire and the
omnipotence of the papacy, or in early Teutonic times when uncouth
barbarism and childish simplicity prevailed. The romantic school,
the Schlegels, Arnims, and Brentanos, had shown them this grewsome
specter of the Middle Ages in so wonderful a light, that the Germans
in their delusion considered it an ideal, the realization of which
was a holy task. To the Middle Ages belonged Christianity, credulity,
unthinking clericalism, which became the dearest possessions of the
Germans, because they were diametrically opposed to the unbelief of the
French and the revolutionary epoch. From that time the hollow phrase,
Christian-German (or Teutsch), arose, and speedily became a catchword.
But only the devoted followers of Catholicism, with the papacy as
supreme authority, could be pious in the sense of the Middle Ages.
Honest romanticists, such as Görres, Frederick Schlegel, Adam
Müller, etc., logically went over to the Roman Church, and helped to
re-establish the empire of the Jesuits and the Inquisition. As for
the German Protestants, "God had poured out upon them the spirit of
confusion and they tottered like drunken men." Instead of directing
their attention to Vienna, where the Congress, amidst dancing and
revelry, was running its quarry, the German people, to earth, the
romanticists built castles in the air, and at once announced that
certain people would be denied admission.
Christian Teutomania was the armed specter which for many decades
robbed the German Jews of rest, honor, and joy in life. Because this
race, strongly marked by descent and tradition, was distinguished from
the Germans by external marks, by features, carriage, and vivacity,
although akin in language, feeling, and temperament, they were repelled
as foreigners, as a force breeding disturbance and discomfort, and
had the spirit of the times permitted they would have been expelled
from German territory. But to find a reason for this blind hate, the
enemies of the Jews had recourse to old contemptible publications,
and extracted rubbish from sources where others had found the rich
intellectual treasures of the Jews, and drew such a portrait of them as
to arouse terror both in themselves and others.
The first to clothe vague prejudice in words and heap abuse upon the
Jews was not a knavish writer, but an academical professor named
Friedrich Rühs, whom the newly-founded Berlin University had appointed
to the chair of history. He wished to investigate the decline of
Germany, and hit upon the Jews, as though they had been the authors
of Germany's disgrace during its occupation by foreign powers. Rühs
discussed the "Claims of the Jews to German Citizenship," developed
the unwholesome theory of a Christian state, and thence derived his
justification, if not actually to expel the Jews from Germany, yet to
humble them and thwart their growth. He drew up a complete programme
for their treatment, which was afterwards conscientiously carried out.
Above all things he wanted the Jews to live merely on sufferance, and
on no account to claim equal rights of citizenship. They were once more
to pay protection-money, a Jew-tax, and limits were to be set to their
increase. The cities which had hitherto not tolerated them were to be
supported in this course, and naturally Jews were not to be admitted to
any office, nor even permitted to defend their country. Rühs, moreover,
insisted that the Jews should again wear a badge, not a repulsive
yellow patch, but a "national cockade"; at any rate some mark of
distinction, "that the German who could not recognize his Hebrew enemy
by face, gait, or speech, might do so by the doubtful badge of honor."
Above all things, Rühs exhorted the German states and the German people
to promote the conversion of the Jews to Christianity; that was most
important. It was generally asserted, even in Christian quarters, that
only bad and abandoned men exchanged Judaism for Christianity; but that
was prejudice.
Rühs' pamphlet excited great interest. Worthy and learned men declared
their agreement with him. The learned German world at the time of
Lessing, Abt, Kant, and Herder, the apostolic messenger of universal
humanity, now talked the language of the Church Fathers, and stirred
up hate and persecution. Schleiermacher and Fichte brought the
representatives of German intellect so low that they actually competed
with the ultra-Catholics in hatred of the Jews. Pius VII, who in
consequence of the Restoration once more reigned in the Papal States,
and reintroduced the Inquisition, in order to drive out godlessness
by means of the auto-da-fé, ordained that the Jews should forfeit the
freedom enjoyed under French rule. The Jews of Rome had to forsake
their beautiful houses in all parts of the city and return to the
dirty, unhealthy Ghetto; the Middle Ages had returned to the Papal
States. The Jews, as in the seventeenth century, had to attend sermons
for their own conversion on pain of punishment. Meantime history had
enacted one of those surprising interludes, which was to prove the
instability of the reactionary Restoration. Napoleon had contrived to
land on French ground despite English sea-guardianship. The props of
the Bourbon throne--the nobility, the clergy, and intriguers, who
had ostentatiously displayed their power,--collapsed before a single
shot had been fired, and Napoleon entered Paris in triumph. The empire
of the hundred days was established. The whole of Europe armed itself
against one man, and the fortune of war decided in favor of the allies
on the Dutch battlefields at Waterloo. In the Prussian army, which
next to the English had been most instrumental in turning the tide of
victory, there were many Jewish soldiers, among them several militia
officers.
What reward did the German Jews receive for their sincere devotion
to their country? When the Congress, alarmed by Napoleon's sudden
reappearance, ceased to dally and began to hold regular sittings, the
Act of Federation for the German states, which despite their union were
to be autonomous, was brought up for consideration, and a paragraph
in it devoted to the Jews. Citizenship was to be assured them, and
in countries where obstacles to this reform existed, they were to be
removed as far as possible. But this paragraph was accepted only by
Prussia and Austria; all the other members of the league, especially
those from the free towns, voted against it. To arrive at an agreement,
a colorless compromise was proposed: "The Congress of the allies will
consider how the civil improvement of those professing the Jewish faith
in Germany is to be effected in the most harmonious manner, and how in
particular the enjoyment of civil rights and participation in civil
duties may be secured to them. The rights already conceded them in the
several federated states will be continued."
The first portion was harmless, and could be accepted by all, since it
remained open to every state to prevent its favorable interpretation.
The latter portion, however, was apt to put the Free Towns into a
delicate position. There the Jews through French influence were
actually in possession of civil equality. Accordingly, the deputy
for Frankfort (the syndic Danz) emphatically protested, and was
supported by the Saxon deputies. To shame German narrow-mindedness,
the Danish government, as if it had anticipated that the hatred of
Jews in Germany would spread, ordered Bernstorff, its representative
for Holstein, to declare that the adherents of the Jewish faith,
if they fulfilled the duties of citizenship, might there expect a
constitutional provision ensuring them against persecution, oppression,
arbitrariness or uncertainty of legislation in respect of the rights
conceded to them. The deputy for Bremen, Senator Schmidt, was cleverer;
he did not protest, but defeated the suspicious resolution by a
master-stroke. Remarking that the privileges of the Jews conferred
by the French in North Germany (the 32d military division) could not
be binding on the Germans, he stated that they need only change the
word _in_ into _by_, and everything would be right. Nobody at first
took notice of this apparently insignificant change. Metternich and
Hardenberg, who hitherto either from inclination or in pursuance of
promises had appeared to favor the Jews, passed over this point in an
incomprehensible manner. Thus the paragraph referring to the Jewish
question in its final form read: "The rights already conceded the
professors of the Jewish faith _by_ the several federated states will
be continued." Of the federated states, however, only Prussia and
Mecklenburg, and perhaps also Baden, had conceded citizenship to the
Jews. The enactment of the French authorities was thus made null and
void, and Germany was saved. What did it matter to the delighted nation
that this verbal change would cost so many tears?
The humiliation of the Jews soon showed itself in practical life.
Lübeck, protected by the unfair interpretation of a paragraph, ordered
more than forty Jewish families to leave the town (September, 1815).
Bremen did the same with its Jews. Frankfort could not eject its Jewish
inhabitants, but their lives were embittered; they were shut out from
civil assemblies, Jewish functionaries were deposed, they were excluded
from many trades and industries, marriage permits asked by Jewish
couples were refused with the heartlessness of the Middle Ages, they
were forbidden to live in certain parts of the town, and were treated
as though they were still _servi cameræ_. But as the Senate knew that
Prussia and Austria regarded it as a point of honor to preserve intact
the civil rights of the Jews of Frankfort, and that the Federal Diet,
at the instance of both great powers, might easily determine the
controversy in favor of the Jews, it applied to three German juridical
faculties, those of Berlin, Marburg, and Giessen, to have the question
decided as one of law.
This struggle between the Frankfort Senate and the Jews, protracted
during nine years (1815-24), and occasioning many vexations, will ever
remain a stain on the time, a monument of German narrow-mindedness.
The Jews, relying on the assurance of the two German powers, believed
that their civil rights were guarded as by a triple wall.
But just this manifest truth, the Teutomaniacs and sophists, suddenly
developed into bigots, sought to obscure and cry down. From all parts
of Germany there resounded simultaneously outcries against the Jews,
urging the nation, or the German federation, to enslave the Jews or
destroy them. Journals and pamphlets raged against them, as if Germany
or Christendom could be saved only by the destruction of the Jews.
The most violent attack was that of a physician and professor of
natural science at Heidelberg, J. F. Fries, "Danger to the Welfare and
Character of the Germans through the Jews" (summer, 1816), in which he
asserted that the Jews ought to be expelled the country, that the tribe
must be exterminated root and branch, as among all secret and political
societies they were most dangerous to the state. "Ask man after man,
and see, whether every peasant and every burgher do not hate and curse
the Jews as national pests and bread robbers." The Jews, he said, had
contrived to get more than half the entire capital of Frankfort into
their hands. "Let them go on for forty years, and the sons of the
first Christian houses will seek service among the Jews in the meanest
capacities." It is remarkable that in the face of such passionate
incitement, wild outbreaks against the Jews did not occur at that time,
especially as Fries' pamphlet was read in all taverns and public-houses.
Was no Christian voice raised against this injustice? For the honor
of the Germans it must be mentioned that some men had the courage to
contend against crass prejudice and blind hatred. A highly respected
and learned councilor in Ratisbon, August Krämer, wrote a defense, "The
Jews and their Just Claims on the Christian States; a Contribution
to the Mitigation of the Cruel Prejudices against the Jewish Nation."
Councilor Schmidt, in Hildburghausen, on the one hand, pictured the
abominable scenes which Christian fanaticism had in the past enacted
against Jews, and, on the other hand, showed the superiority of culture
possessed by the latter over the Christians in Spain. But their most
thorough-going advocate was Johann Ludwig Ewald, a reformed clergyman
of Carlsruhe, of high position, and seventy years old. Rühs' and
Fries' malignant statements about the Jews incensed him so deeply,
that he denied himself a season's recreation in Baden, and employed
the time in giving the lie to their impudent assertions in a pamphlet
(1816). Ewald vindicated the downtrodden sons of Israel in the name of
Christianity, whose representative he was. Every groundless complaint
against them he dissolved into nothing. From England and France, too,
admonitions reached the Germans not to expose their own pettiness by
their insane hatred of the Jews. An English paper thought that the town
of Lübeck, as well as all the free towns, ought to be deprived of their
independence (of which they had made so infamous a use) by the German
federation, on account of the ignorant intolerance displayed against
the Jews. A French writer, M. Bail, vindicated the unhappy people in
glowing language, and covered their German enemies with shame.
"The Jewish nation to a higher degree than any other possesses
the ancient, sanctified character which excites astonishment. I
never meet a rabbi adorned with a white beard without thinking
of the venerable patriarchs. Nothing is more elevating about
the Israelites than their solemn life, which makes them the
most devoted and honorable people on earth. In their midst is
to be found the illustration of all domestic virtues, of loving
care for the needy, and profound reverence for parents. Happy,
a thousand times happy, are the nations among whom the basis of
morality has been preserved."
But if truth and justice had spoken with angels' tongues, the Germans
of those days would have remained deaf to their voices. They were so
deeply imbued with hatred of the Jews that they were irrational.
An organ of the Austrian government directed a sort of threat against
the encroachments of the people of Lübeck upon the rights of the Jews.
"How can the future Federal Diet discuss the improvement of the
condition of the Jews, if individual states anticipate it by
the most cruel and arbitrary resolutions? This conduct exhibits
want of respect as much towards the ensuing Federal Diet as
towards the foremost courts of Germany, whose principles
in regard to this matter have been often and loudly enough
expressed."
What was done by Austria itself, which displayed such righteous
indignation against Lübeck on behalf of the Jews? Francis I and his
ruler Metternich completely forgot the benevolent intentions of Joseph
II, and kept in mind only the hateful laws of Maria Theresa against the
Jews. They did not indeed expel the Jews, as in Lübeck and Bremen, but
they were relegated to Ghettos within Austria, beyond which they were
not allowed to pass. Tyrol, the secluded mountain province, was closed
to them as to Protestants. In Bohemia the mountain cities and villages
were forbidden them, and in Moravia, in the great cities of Brünn
and Olmütz, they were allowed to stay only over-night or for a short
time. Everywhere there were Jew-streets; the restrictions imposed on
the Jews of Austria had become proverbial, whilst in Galicia they met
with greater oppression than in the Middle Ages. Even the benevolent
regulations of Joseph II, in regard to compulsory school attendance and
practical religious instruction, were carried out not so much to spread
culture among the Jews as to torment and injure them. Emperor Francis
ennobled a few Jews, but the others were humiliated; they were obliged
to render military service, but the bravest were rarely admitted even
to the lowest rungs of the military ladder.
Austria, to be sure, had made the Jews no promises, and had awakened
no hope of freedom. But Prussia, where they had already enjoyed full
citizenship, conjured up a hobgoblin worthy of the Middle Ages, and
wounded their honor the more deeply. Frederick William III, who had
confirmed the equality of the Prussian Jews by law, annulled it, or
rather left it unexecuted, a dead letter. Unconsciously he succumbed
to the theory of the Christian state set up by the Teutomaniacs
and sophists, who insisted that no place of honor be conceded the
Jews. The promised equalization of the Jews in the newly-acquired or
reconquered provinces was continually delayed. In the latter they
remained subject to the restrictions of a former time, and Prussia's
legislation regarding the Jews was a curious petrifaction. There were
twenty-one fundamental laws for their treatment, and they were divided
into French, old Prussian, Saxon, and Polish Jews, naturally to their
disadvantage.
The specific aim of Prussia was to make Jews despicable in society.
Whereas formerly the government had been at pains to avoid in
official correspondence the words Jew, Jewish, as having an offensive
connotation, they were now insisted upon.
The Judæophobist spirit in Prussia showed itself in a case which
challenges comparison with France. The unjust Napoleonic law which
had suspended the equality of the Jews of the German departments for
ten years in respect of free migration and commerce was to fall into
abeyance after the end of the respite (March 17, 1818), unless it
was prolonged. The government of Louis XVIII, although besieged by
clerical and political reactionaries, did not for a moment make an
attempt to preserve the limitation. In the Chamber, which occupied
itself with this point (February and March, 1818), only one hostile
voice (Lathier) was raised against the Jews in Alsace. This opponent
of the Jews alleged that the whole country would soon be in the hands
of the Jews, if a check was not put to their greed. Not even the Right,
which was clerically disposed, uttered a word against the Jews in
general and for the restriction of their liberties. The phantom of a
Christian state was quite unknown to the French. The Chamber rejected
Lathier's proposal, and thus the Jews of Alsace were restored to their
former equality. A similar law had been passed against the Jews of the
district on the left bank of the Rhine, which was added to Prussia,
or the Rhine province and Westphalia. The Prussian government, on
taking this former French territory, had permitted the continuance of
restrictive legislation, and a cabinet order of March 3d, 1818, renewed
it for an indefinite period.
About this time a distinguished Englishman, with the Old and New
Testaments in his hand, advocated the equality and freedom of the Jews
throughout Europe with extraordinary zeal. Lewis Way, a disciple of the
Fifth Monarchy enthusiasts of the English War of Independence, accepted
the prophecies of the Old Testament and the Apocalypse, and was
convinced that the Jewish nation would be resurrected, and be restored
in glory to the land of their fathers. Only when they had recovered
their independence would they be converted to the doctrines of Jesus.
It was therefore a matter of conscience with him to promote the welfare
of the Jews. He made a journey to Poland to ascertain the number and
condition of the Jews in that country. Way now elaborated a remarkable
memorial in which he dwelt on the high significance of the Jews in the
past, and also in the future. With this memorial he betook himself to
Aix, where the king of Prussia and the emperors of Russia and Austria
with their ministers and diplomatists were met in Congress (end of
September, 1818). He sought to make a favorable impression on Emperor
Alexander, whose mystical temperament was known to him. As soon as the
Czar showed himself in favor of the equalization of the Jews, it could
not be doubted that Frederick William III and Emperor Francis would
also be well disposed towards it.
Way started with the supposition that the Jews were a royal nation,
and had not ceased to be so even in exile, in the misfortunes of their
tragical career. This people possessed the key to the history of the
whole globe. The same divine grace which had guided them in former
times rested on them in banishment and exile. The promises which the
prophets had foretold for the Israelite race would not fail to be
accomplished; they would once more be gathered together in the land
of their fathers. All the nations of the earth which have received
salvation through them, were bound by gratitude to show the Jews the
greatest honors and boundless beneficence, so as to wipe out the guilt
incurred against this divinely-gifted race by the cruel persecutions
inflicted on them. The present moment was highly favorable to their
complete liberation. In some countries fanatical, narrow-minded
clamorers had raised their voices against the emancipation of the Jews,
but they no more represented public opinion than the furious outcries
of a few American planters against the suppression of slavery. If Way
was an enthusiast, when he tried to prove the necessity of emancipation
in a mystical manner from prophetic and apocalyptic verses, he was
still true enough to the practical instincts of the English race to be
able to prove to their majesties what profit the emancipated Jews would
bring the state. He conceded that much about the Jews must be altered,
but their national peculiarity was holy property, which must not be
touched. It was the invisible tie which bound the past of the Jews with
their future, the past of mankind with its future; the fulfillment of
prophecy depended on Israel.
This mystical, yet sensible memorial was handed by Way to the Emperor
of Russia, on whom it must have made an impression, for he delivered
it to his plenipotentiaries, Nesselrode and Capo D'Istrias, charging
them to bring it and the emancipation of the Jews under the notice of
the Congress. Out of respect for Alexander, who at that time pulled
the strings of European politics, the plenipotentiaries were obliged
to give attention to the matter, if only in appearance. The protocol
said (November 21, 1818) that, though they could not in every respect
accept the point of view of the writer of the memorial, they must
render justice to the tendency and laudable aim of his conclusions.
The plenipotentiaries of Austria and Prussia (Metternich, Hardenberg,
and Bernstorff) declared themselves ready to give any information with
regard to the question in both monarchies, which might aid in solving
a problem important to the statesman and the philanthropist; but this
was no more than a courtly phrase. Another voice addressed enthusiastic
words in favor of the German and Polish Jews to the Congress at
Aix-la-Chapelle. Michael Berr, like his father, untiringly active in
the elevation of his co-religionists, poured forth the stream of his
oratory in their cause.
"In Charlemagne's favorite city the monarchs will finally
decide concerning the political existence of my co-religionists
in Germany. The honor of Germany, the honor of the age and
that of monarchs, loudly demand the reinstatement of the Jews
in their civil and political rights. With justice are they
exercised about laws, which still exist here and there to the
disadvantage of the Jews."
The Italian Jews also combined to send a petition to the Congress of
Aix-la-Chapelle concerning the abolition of their grievances and the
cessation of persecution. They lost nothing by failure to carry out
their design. The time had passed when princes and statesmen, sages and
citizens, interested themselves in "the improvement of the condition of
the Israelites," as the phrase ran.
The ill-feeling against the Jews in Germany continued to grow without
ground or provocation. Jewish preachers celebrated the battle of
Leipsic (October 18, 1818) in the synagogue with great enthusiasm, but
to the Teutomaniacs this was no proof of their patriotic love. The
hatred against Jews assumed so violent a character that a writer, one
not badly disposed, saw reason to foretell the outbreak of popular
attacks on life and property.
Germany was at that time intensely excited by the murder of Kotzebue,
in Mannheim, by a half-mad Christian student, Karl Sand (March, 1819),
and by the harsh regulations of the government against demagogic and
Germanizing movements, which it had formerly fostered. The Germanizers
panted for a sacrifice, and, as they could not attack the statesmen,
such as the Metternichs, Gentzes, and Kamptzes, the helpless Jews were
marked as victims. A series of brutal outbreaks occurred during several
months. With the cry of "Hep, hep!" against the Jews, the Middle Ages
revived again like a jeering ghost, and persecution was galvanized into
life by the student and commercial classes.
The city of Würzburg commenced the attack. A new professor was inducted
into office (August 2) amidst the rejoicings of the students, who were
joined by a large number of people. Suddenly an old professor, Brendel,
was noticed, who had shortly before written in favor of the Jews, for
which it was alleged that he had received a box of ducats. On seeing
him, there resounded from the mouths of the students the insane cry,
"Hep, hep!" together with the outcry "Jude, verreck," _i. e._, "Jew,
die like a beast." The former expression, then used for the first time,
meant in student's slang, "Jerusalem is destroyed" (Hierosolyma est
perdita). Brendel was pursued, and had to flee for safety. Perfect fury
took possession of the people of Würzburg, who broke into the shops of
the Jews, throwing the goods into the streets, and when they defended
themselves with stones, the bitterness increased to frenzy. A regular
battle ensued, many wounds were received, and several persons killed.
About forty citizens took part in the affray. The military had to be
called out, or the Jews would have been massacred. The next day the
burghers appealed to the civic authorities to order the dismissal of
the Jews from Würzburg, and to this they had to submit. Overcome with
grief, about four hundred Jews of all ages left the town, and encamped
for several days in the villages or under tents, looking forward to a
terrible future. The persecution of the Jews in Würzburg was repeated
in Bamberg, and in almost every town of Franconia. Wherever a Jew
showed himself, he was assailed with the insulting cry of "Hep, hep!"
and ill-treated.
This persecution of the Jews in Franconia was a hint to the
Frankforters how to humble their hated fellow-citizens, who had dared
bring an action against the Senate, and were protected by the Federal
Diet. Thus a riot was re-enacted here (9th and 10th August), which
began with the cry, "Hep, hep!" and with the breaking of windows in
Jewish houses; then the mob advanced to brutality, and drove away all
Jews from the promenades with insults and outrage. Artisans, workmen,
shop assistants, secretly encouraged by their employers, as in the time
of Vincent Fettmilch, two centuries before, made violent attacks on
Jewish houses. The house of the Rothschilds in particular was selected
for attack, their wealth and political importance being a thorn in
the side of Christian patricians. In Paris at this time, all the
ambassadors and diplomatic representatives appeared at a ball given by
James Rothschild, and in Germany the Rothschilds were still treated
as peddlers. Several wealthy Jews left Frankfort after this outrage.
The storm, which became frenzy in Frankfort, the seat of the Diet,
was not an indifferent matter to the ambassadors. The moneys of the
Diet were placed in Rothschild's coffers for security. The president,
Count von Buol Schauenstein, summoned a conference of members, and it
was resolved to call out the federal troops, as the city militia could
not be trusted. The persecution of the Jews in Frankfort aroused great
attention throughout Europe, but the excitement against them continued,
in spite of the arrival of the troops. Several Jews consequently sold
their houses, and even the Rothschilds put no trust in the lull,
and had serious thoughts of leaving Frankfort; they would have had
to emigrate to France or England, as they were not safe anywhere in
Germany.
This massacre of the Jews spread like wildfire in Germany, as if the
people had everywhere waited for a sign to break out. In Darmstadt
and Bayreuth the riots were repeated (August 12). The few Jews in
Meiningen were expelled. In Carlsruhe, one morning, a placard was found
posted on the synagogue and the houses of prominent Jews--"Death and
destruction to the Jews!"
In Düsseldorf black marks and threatening placards were found on the
doors of several Jewish houses. In the territory of Baden, where Sand
had sealed the Teutomaniac folly with a murder, and the excitement
still lasted, the bitterness against the Jews was so great that not one
could appear in the streets without being maltreated. In Heidelberg a
tumult arose (beginning of September) in consequence of a vulgar scene,
which curiously illustrates German chivalry. A citizen had outraged a
Jewish maiden, and had been arrested by the police. Nearly the whole
populace immediately rushed to rescue the hero and destroy the Jewish
houses. Cries of "Hep, hep!" resounded in the streets; axes, crowbars,
tools of all sorts were collected as if to carry a place by storm. The
city guard, which ought to have dispersed the assaulting party, refused
their services. The city governor, Pfizer, instead of standing by the
persecuted, assisted their assailants. Blood would have been spilled,
had not the Heidelberg students, humanized, perhaps, by contact with
France, defended the unprotected people at their own risk, under the
leadership of two professors, Daub and Thibaut. When at length the
armed force appeared, and patrols swept through the whole province of
Baden, and every small town and village was made responsible for the
attacks of certain of their number upon the Jews, the outbreaks against
the Jews gradually subsided, but the hatred against them was only
intensified.
"From Germany the spark of Jew-hatred flew even into the capital of
the Danish state," which a few years before had extended citizenship
to the Jews, and had refused to revoke it. In Copenhagen the mob rose
up (September), and commenced by throwing stones at the Jews, and
ended with acts of violence. The government proclaimed martial law.
The citizens, in the few cities where Jews lived, stood by them, and
the preachers preached tolerance and love to them from the pulpit.
In Germany the ministers of religion did not utter a single protest
during these outrageous scenes. That no feature of the persecution of
the Jews of the Middle Ages might be wanting, a synagogue was stormed
in a small Bavarian place, and the scrolls of the Law rudely torn
to pieces. Even where actual violence could not be resorted to, the
insulting cry of "Hep, hep!" was hurled at the Jews in small and large
towns, to the amusement of the spectators. The police or military force
which appeared against the rioters and disturbers secretly took part
against the Jews, and the governments which protected them did so more
from fear, because they suspected a demagogical movement behind the
outbreaks against the Jews. Reference was afterwards made to these
outrages, as illustrating the feeling, or rather ill-feeling towards
the Jews, to withhold equal rights from them.
The zenith of Teutomaniac Jew hatred was reached by the inflammatory
pamphlet which appeared at this time of excitement, "The Mirror of
the Jews" (November, 1819). Hartwig Hundt, a man of adventurous life,
boldly advocated the slaughter of the Jews. He made most laudable
propositions, which, he flattered himself, would satisfy the "Hep, hep"
people.
"Although I for my part hold the killing of Jews neither a sin
nor a crime, but only a police offence, I would nevertheless
never counsel that they be condemned and punished unheard, as
seems to be the fashion now."
What then? His proposals were:--
"Let the children of Israel be sold to the English, who could
employ them in their Indian plantations instead of the blacks.
That they may not increase, the men should be emasculated, and
their wives and daughters be lodged in houses of shame. The
best plan would be to purge the land entirely of this vermin,
either by exterminating them, or as Pharaoh and the people of
Meiningen, Würzburg, and Frankfort did, by driving them from
the country."
The "Hep, hep" storm and Hundt's murderous lessons were the poisonous
fruit of the seeds which Fichte and Schleiermacher had sown, and which
had shot up quickly and abundantly.
Hundt's inflammatory book, in which every word is an abomination,
was as ravenously swallowed by the German reading public, as his bad
novels. Only at the request of Jews it was forbidden and confiscated
by the censorship, which had become omnipotent through the Carlsbad
regulations. In Portugal, at about the same time, a motion was brought
forward in the Cortes to re-admit the banished Jews and atone for the
crime perpetrated against them, whilst in Germany authors and statesmen
justified this crime, and wished it to be repeated in the nineteenth
century. Hundt did not stand alone in his advocacy of the extirpation
of the Jews. Who cares to enumerate all the virulent, hostile writings
against the Jews of the years of the "Hep, hep" storm? Conversation
on questions of the day, however remote from the subject of the Jews,
always ended in abuse of them. If an author glorified Sand and his
murder of Kotzebue, and praised his Christian religious spirit, he did
not fail to add that "Christian hate would call down a day of judgment
upon the Jews, the accomplices of financiers who worked the ruin of
the state, even though no writer had ever printed a syllable to the
disadvantage of the Jews."
Thus every man's hand was against them; no defender of any weight or
influence appeared for them, whose word, if it could not silence, might
at least curb the opposition. The aged Jean Paul (Friedrich Richter)
did not raise his voice for them, although he had a predilection for
the Jews; nor Varnhagen von Ense, although Rachel was his wife, and
was included in the general obloquy. Only one writer overcame his
prejudice, and defied public opinion in order to take up cudgels
on behalf of the universally despised and downtrodden Jews. This
was the comedy writer Julius von Voss, whose voice certainly had no
great weight, and whose disordered affairs roused the suspicion that
Jewish liberality encouraged his venturesomeness. Voss himself in his
comedies and novels had exposed the Jews to ridicule, but from regret
and remorse, he confessed, he desired to protect the Jews against the
"Hep, hep" insults. His words were little regarded, and even were
derided. Still less impression was created by the anonymous writings of
various freemasons in favor of the Jews, but their goodwill should be
recognized. The converted Jews conducted themselves at this juncture
in a shameful manner. Not one of them, except Börne, came forward,
in behalf of their former brethren, with that just indignation
which violence against the defenseless ought to inspire. Rachel von
Varnhagen, it is true, wrote to her brother, Ludwig Robert, who had
been a witness of the "Hep, hep" storm, in the following manner:--
"I am intensely moved, as I have never yet been, on account of
the Jews. They are to be preserved, but only for torture, for
contumely, for insult, for brutal outrage. The hypocritical
newborn love for the Christian religion (God forgive me for
my sin!), for the Middle Ages with their art, poetry, and
hideousness, incites the people to the only abomination to
which, mindful of all past experiences, it can still be
incited. It is not the action of the people, who are taught to
cry "Hep, hep." The professors Fries and Rühs, and others, such
as Arnim, Brentano, 'our connections,' and yet greater persons
are filled with prejudices."
She thought that the Christian priests ought to step forward to check
the outrages of the people. "Aye, the priests." But neither Rachel, nor
her brother Robert, nor her husband Varnhagen, who elaborated their
periods for every childish folly, and had a voice in public opinion,
raised it against violence, and against the rule of oppression.
The Jews had, it is true, their own literary exponents to protect them.
In Germany alone there were nearly forty Jewish writers who could
address the German public. They possessed two Jewish organs, and the
daily journals occasionally opened their pages to them. They advanced
boldly to the battle-field to ward off the universal accusations
against their race. Even the aged David Friedländer raised his voice,
wrung his hands over the enemies of the Jews and their persecutions
in Germany in the nineteenth century, and could not conceive--he
who considered official Christianity and the State as ideal--how
these gods could wallow in so much filth. He addressed himself
to the Countess Von der Recke, and reminded her of the time when
eminent Christians conversed pleasantly with Jews, and both received
instruction from each other. This sounded like a forgotten fairy
tale from ancient days. But the Jewish combatants only threw light
missiles, and could scarcely prick the thick hide of prejudice. For
this purpose sharp and heavy harpoons were necessary. At this point the
Guide of all history, who had not abandoned the Jews, awakened for them
two avenging angels, who with fiery scourges lashed the perverseness
of the Germans. These avenging spirits, who brought the Germans more
blessings even than their guardian angels, were Ludwig Börne and
Heinrich Heine.