Amidst all these adverse circumstances, the indestructible vital energies of this people still continued, as we find them among the Jews of the present day: privileged by the Emperor, helpless before the law of the country, indispensable, yet deeply hated, desired, but cursed, in daily danger of fire, robbery, and murder, yet the quiet, masters of the property and welfare of hundreds, in an unnatural adventurous position, and yet always steadily occupied, amidst the densest mass of Christians, yet separated from them by iron boundaries, they lived a twofold life; in presence of Christians they were cold, stubborn, patient, timid, cringing, and servile, bowed down under the oppression of a thousand years: yet all the pride of noble blood, great wealth, and superior talent, the full glow of southern feeling, every kindly emotion and every dark passion were to be found in that race. After the Thirty years' war, the Jews obtained scarcely more protection from the fury of the multitude, and their spiritual trials became greater. If the Protestants, who were then weak and embarrassed, vexed them more by repulsive arrogance than by their arts of proselytism, the old Church was the more zealous. They were more prosperous in trade and usury since the Westphalian peace, indeed a splendid prospect had opened for them. The diminution of international wholesale business, the ruin of old commercial houses at Nuremberg and Augsburg, the continued depreciation of the coinage, the unceasing need of money, with the territorial lords, small and great, was favourable to the multifarious activity of the Jewish business, which found skilful instruments throughout all Germany, and connections from Constantinople to Cadiz. The importance to German trade of the close cohesion of the Jews amongst themselves, at a period when bad roads, heavy tolls, and ignorant legislation, placed the greatest limits upon commerce, is not yet sufficiently appreciated. With unwearied energy, like ants, they everywhere bored their secret way through the worm-eaten wood of the German Empire: long before the letter post and system of goods carriers had spread a great network over the whole circuit of the country, they had quietly combined for these objects; poor chafferers and travelling beggars, passed as trusty agents between Amsterdam and Frankfort, Prague and Warsaw, with money and jewels under their rags, nay concealed within their bodies. In the most dangerous times, in spite of prohibitions, the defenceless Jew stole secretly through armies, from one German territory into another; and he carried Kremnitzer ducats of full weight to Frankfort, while he circulated light ones among the people. Here he bought laces and new church vestments for his opponents, the ecclesiastics; there he smuggled through an enemy's territory, to some prince, arms and implements of war; then he guided and accompanied a large transport of leather from the interior of Russia to the fair of