Dr. Abraham Geiger should be classed among the most prominent rabbis of his time. The modern development of the religious life had been proceeding quietly though steadily, when it was convulsed to its depths by the storm announced by his first appearance upon the rabbinical scene. As a speaker and as a writer he handled a popular style with masterful skill, which manifested itself in felicitous copiousness rather than in the concentration of precise, forcible language. One of the best pulpit orators among Jews, he succeeded in holding attention and stimulating thought by his simple manner and brilliant turns of expression. His published sermons, very limited in number, give not even an approximate idea of the powerful impression produced by his spoken words, totally unaided though they were by charms of person.[11] His scholarly contributions to Jewish science are of pre-eminent and of permanent value. He has rendered particularly valiant service by his researches into the history of literature, a field in which he was master. On the other hand, one sometimes misses thoroughness of scholarly culture in his early productions, especially those of the first part of his Breslau period. Besides, he was fond of obtruding his reform bias. In spite of his scientific attainments, his historical sense lacked profundity, and in spite of his great achievements in the province of modern liturgy, his appreciation of the needs and emotions of the people’s spiritual life was neither sufficiently delicate nor sufficiently intense. At bottom he was a doctrinaire rationalist. His religious program and aims, too, were not clearly and definitely put forth. For example, his attitude towards the radical currents at that time rolling their destructive waves over Judaism amounted to more than benevolent neutrality. The observer cannot ward off the impression, that he was inclined to steer straight for ethical deism, and was restrained only by opportunist reasons. At this above all Graetz took umbrage, and by and by his antipathy to Geiger was complete. A good deal of sham and tinsel had probably slipped into the various tentative organizations which Geiger endeavored to call into existence; perhaps they were unavoidable concomitants of such efforts. It is possible, too, that the unpleasant impression was reinforced by a tendency to officiousness observable in Geiger--at worst a pardonable foible. As Graetz was constituted, he felt so strong a repugnance to humbug and pretense that he exercised neither forbearance nor consideration towards such faults. He visited Geiger only once, possibly twice. Immediately after Graetz had made himself at home in the lecture-rooms of his department, he paid his respects to the two rabbinical party-leaders. The entry in his diary is as follows: