The man who undertook and executed this difficult task did not belong to the first rank of intellectual men, but possessed the right measure of insight and narrowness, strength of will and flexibility, knowledge and imagination, self-denial and vanity, required for so arduous an undertaking. Manasseh ben Israel, second or third rabbi at Amsterdam, who at home played only a subordinate part, the poor preacher who, to support his family, was obliged to resort to printing, but obtained so little profit from it, that he wished to exchange pulpit oratory for mercantile speculation, and was near settling in Brazil; he it was who won England for Judaism, and, if he did not banish, diminished the prejudice against his race. To him belongs the credit for a service not to be lightly estimated, for there were but few to help him. The release of the Jews from their thousand years' contempt and depreciation in European society, or rather the struggle for civil equality, begins with Manasseh ben Israel. He was the Riesser of the seventeenth century. As has been stated, he was not in the true sense great, and can only be reckoned a man of mediocrity. He belonged to the happily constituted class of persons, who do not perceive the harsh contrasts and shrill discords in the world around, hence are confiding and enterprising. His heart was deeper than his mind. His power rested in his easy eloquence, his facility in explaining and working out ideas which lay within his narrow field of vision, and which he had acquired rather than produced. Manasseh ben Israel had complete grasp of Jewish literature, and knew the Christian theology of his time, and what was to be said on each point, _i. e._, what had been said by his predecessors. On the other hand, he had only a superficial knowledge of those branches of learning which require keenness of intellect, such as philosophy and the Talmud. His strength was in one respect his weakness. His facility in speaking and writing encouraged a verbose style and excessive productiveness. He left more than 400 sermons in Portuguese, and a mass of writings that fill a catalogue, but discuss their subjects only superficially. Manasseh's contemporaries looked upon his writings with different eyes. The learning amassed therein from all literatures and languages, and the smoothness of form riveted their attention, and excited their admiration. Among Jews he was extraordinarily celebrated; whoever could produce Latin, Portuguese, or Spanish verse, made known his praise. But even Christian scholars of his time over-estimated him.