But, if the Hebrew muse was silent for want of themes, the Hebrew genius, which had dictated the ancient psalms and inspired the ancient prophets, was not dead. The national attachment to tradition and strict Judaism was manifested by the revival of Hebrew as a spoken tongue. It was employed on the coinage, in public edicts, and in popular songs. Patriotism was nourished by the celebration of the anniversaries of the national victories over the enemies of Judaism. In one word, the crowd refused to follow the fashions of the Court. The Jew had tasted the fruit of Occidental culture and pronounced it unpalatable. Hellenism had been touched and found base metal; and, notwithstanding his Kings’ efforts--their Greek temples and Greek theatres--the Hebrew remained an Oriental. “Cursed is the man who allows his son to learn the Grecian wisdom” was the verdict of the Talmud, and a Jewish poet many centuries after repeats the anathema in a milder form: “Go not near the Grecian wisdom. It has no fruit, but only blossoms.”[3] But, though the bulk of the nation agreed in its attitude towards foreign culture, there now appears an internal division into several parties, differing from one another in the degree of their attachment to the traditions of the past, and in their aspirations for the future. Two of these sects stand out pre-eminently as representative of Hebrew sentiment, and as the exponents of the two attitudes which have continued to divide the Jewish nation through the ages down to our own day. These are the Pharisees and the Sadducees, whose names are first heard under the early Hasmonaean chiefs, but whose views correspond with those of the Hellenistic and national parties of the Seleucid period. The Pharisees were an offshoot of the Assidean party which, as we have seen, had waged a truceless and successful war against Hellenism. After their victory, the most enthusiastic of the “Pious” retired from public life and nursed their piety and disappointment in ascetic seclusion. But the majority of the party were far from considering their mission fulfilled, or from being satisfied with abstract devotion. They regarded it as a duty both to the faith and to the fatherland to take an active part in politics. The preservation of Judaism in its ancient exclusiveness was their programme. All public undertakings, all national acts, as well as all private transactions, were to be measured by the rigid standard of religion. The Law in the hands of the Pharisees became a Procrustean bed upon which the mind of the nation was to be stretched or maimed, according to the requirements of nationalism and the interpretations of the Scribes. This inflexible orthodoxy, with its concomitants of discipline and sacrifice of individuality, was in perfect accord with the Hebrew temperament, and the Pharisees must be regarded as the interpreters of the views dear to the great mass of their compatriots. As time went on,