State, not only by granting them special privileges, but also, and perhaps more thoroughly, by subjecting them to special restrictions. As an inevitable result of this treatment, the thoughts, feelings and aspirations, the daily interests, the public opinion, the collective will of the Jewish masses have been driven to assume a tendency necessarily peculiar to themselves even in economic and general questions, in which they would otherwise have no special concern as Jews. In spite of the exceptional conditions artificially created for them they yet contrive on the whole to maintain their loyalty to the State, and make supreme sacrifices for it. It stands to reason that when, in the course of one generation, a certain class of men has been called upon to suffer the martyrdom of violent persecutions and is constantly threatened by this gruesome spectre, the consequence is that whether they will or no, the members of the group become welded and cemented together into one body. It is also self-evident that given a certain class of men confined within a _Ghetto_ or debarred from many professions――only a few in fact remaining open to them――the members of the community are bound to become a people of entirely exceptional character, with cares and problems of their own. In our day, as on innumerable previous occasions in Jewish history, malice makes use of this fact to bring forward fresh accusations against the Jew. The Jews are driven into certain positions, and are then held responsible for them. It is of no avail to give serious consideration to these charges. They are so numerous and so obstinate that it would be impossible to dispose of them all in an apology. Impartial observers will understand that the exceptional status of the Jews within the States, and the separate interests resulting therefrom, were not a consummation desired by the Jews, but a necessity imposed upon them against their will and of which they are compelled to bear the consequences. They are obliged to combine in many countries, just as any people taken collectively usually combine, when their interests as a collective body are at stake. This is a necessity even in the most ordinary matters of daily life, and it results in a national combination for economic interests, as, for instance, in the case of boycott or of social ostracism. But for these aggravations, it would not occur to the most zealous of Jewish nationalists to make attempts at organization in this direction. The distinctive Jewish national concept is not embodied in these organizations, nor dependent upon them. But the demand that these special organizations shall cease, is first of all a chimera: and secondly an injustice: a chimera because it transgresses the law of the instinct of self-preservation, and an injustice because one must not forbid a man who has been attacked to defend himself. One can only demand that the grievances shall be removed. Whether they will ever vanish, and when, is another question.