slaves, and the Jews would choose their own rulers and kings. Orthodox literalists argued that according to Christian prophecies they were to remain without a home until gathered to the land of their fathers. Surprisingly enough, a bill was passed by the Upper House permitting Jews who had resided in England or Ireland for three consecutive years to be naturalized; but they were not to occupy any secular or clerical office, nor to receive the Parliamentary franchise. The lords and the bishops, then, were not opposed to the Jews. The majority of the Lower House also agreed to the bill, and George II ratified it (March, 1753). Was the decision of the Three Estates really the expression of the majority of the nation? This at once became doubtful: imprecations were immediately thundered from pulpits, guilds, and the taverns against the ministry which had urged the Naturalization Act for Jews. In our days it seems hardly credible that the London merchants should have feared the ruin of their trade by the influx of Jewish capitalists. Deacon Josiah Tucker, who took the part of the Jews, and defended the Naturalization Act, was attacked by the opposition in parliament, in the newspapers, and in pamphlets, and his effigy, together with his defense of the Jews, was burnt at Bristol. To the vexation of the liberal-minded, the ministry were weak enough to yield to the clamor of the populace arising from mercantile jealousy and fanatical intolerance, and to annul their own work (1754) "because it had provoked displeasure, and the minds of many loyal subjects had been disquieted thereby." For, even the most violent enemies of the act could not impute evil to the Jews of England; they created a good impression upon Englishmen by their riches, accumulated without usury, and by their noble bearing. Public opinion warmly sided with them and their claims for civil equality, and if, for the moment, these were disregarded, yet no unfavorable result ensued. The second occurrence, although originating in a single person, roused even more attention than the action of the English Parliament towards the Jews. This person was Arouet de Voltaire, king in the domain of literature in the eighteenth century, who with his demoniacal laughter blew down like a house of cards the stronghold of the Middle Ages. He, who believed neither in Providence nor in the moral progress of mankind, was a mighty instrument of history in the advancement of progress. Voltaire--in his writings an entrancing wizard, a sage, in his life a fool, the slave of base passions--picked a quarrel with the Jews, and sneered at them and their past. His hostility arose from personal ill-humor and irritability. He maintained that during his stay in London he lost eighty per cent of a loan of 25,000 francs, through the bankruptcy of a Jewish capitalist named Medina. He cannot, however, always be believed.