In a sense, of course, this state of mind is a sort of compliment to the Jewish nation. If such a preoccupation with them be not amicable it is at least intense, and those against whom it is directed may well regard it as a proof of their importance in the world. But that aspect of the phenomenon is not consoling for the future of either of us--the Jew who now nervously awaits attack, and we who desire to forestall and prevent such attack. The Anti-Semite is very much more numerous and very much more powerful than might be imagined from the reading of the daily press; for the press is still, for the most part, under the convention of ignoring the Jewish problem and under the terror of the financial results which might follow from a discussion of it. His universal activity is not yet to be read of in the great newspapers; but in conversation and in the practice of daily life we hear of it everywhere. And here I may digress upon a modern feature which applies to all political problems and therefore to this Jewish problem among others. The great movements of our time have never _originated_ in the press of the great cities. They rise and store up their energies in political cliques, in popular gatherings, and spoken rumours long before they appear in this main instrument for the spreading of news. That is because the press of our great cities is controlled by very few men, whose object is not the discussion of public affairs, still less the giving of full information to their fellow-citizens, but the piling up of private fortune. As these men are not, as a rule, educated men, nor particularly concerned with the fortunes of the State, nor capable of understanding from the past what the future may be, they will never take up a great movement until it is forced upon them. On the contrary, they will waste energy in getting up false excitement upon insignificant matters where they feel safe, and even in using their instruments for the advertisement of their own insignificant lives. In all this, the modern press of our great cities differs very greatly from the press of a lifetime ago. It was not always owned by educated men, but it was conducted by highly educated men, who were given a free hand. It therefore concerned itself with problems of real importance and it debated upon either side real contrasts of opinion upon those matters. This modern press of ours does none of these things; but precisely because it is so reluctant to express real emotion it does, when the emotion is forced upon it, let it out in a flood. Just as it would not tell the truth when a thing was growing, so when it reaches an extreme it will not exercise restraint. On the contrary, if the "stunt" be an exciting one, it will push it (once it has made up its mind to talk of it at all) in the most extreme form and to the last pitch of violence.