My soul is no longer oppressed by frightful pictures of
tyranny and persecution."[13] He was in the land of the free!
The Lilienthal tragedy thus came to a premature close. The hero
disappeared at the beginning of the play. He had the potency, but he
lacked the conditions, for producing great results. His German birth and
training, the very qualities which recommended him to the Government,
operated against him when he came to deal with Russian Jews. Yet he
succeeded in giving a strong impetus to the Haskalah movement, and
builded better than he knew. The statement in his address at the
dedication of the Riga school,[14] "This hour we may call the hour of
the renaissance of the mental education of Israel," which reads like an
oratorical platitude, was not entirely visionary. The real history of
Haskalah in Russia commences with Lilienthal.
Time helped greatly to restore, even to deepen, the affection of the
Maskilim for Lilienthal. A modern critic speaking of "life and
literature" in Hebrew, pictures him in glowing colors, and finishes his
description thus:
I have presented to you, reader, a man of deep culture, known
and respected in the highest circles, and yet inseparably
connected with his race and religion, and ready to offer his
life for their welfare; a man who worked with might and main for
others at the sacrifice of his own comfort and advancement; an
orator whose exalted phrases shattered the pillars and
foundations of ignorance and superstition; a hero who in time of
peril was proof against the arrows and missiles of the enemy,
and who did not relax his hand from the flag.
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