Alas, earthly life has passed, and I must
Sleep again on the bosom of Mother Nature.
Witness this stone. I fought with God's
Foes, not with a Sword, but with the Word;
I fought for Truth and Justice among the Nations
And _Zerubbabel_ and _Efes Dammim_ testify thereto.
Contemporaneous with Isaac Baer Levinsohn, and hardly less distinguished
and influential, was Mordecai Aaron Guenzburg (ReMAG, Salanti, Kovno,
December 3, 1795--Vilna, November 5, 1846). His family had been
prominent in many walks of life since the fourteenth century, and,
whether in the land of the Saxons or of the Slavs, represented the cream
of the Jewries in which they lived. His father was a Maskil of great
repute, who had written several treatises, in Hebrew, on algebra,
geometry, optics, and kindred subjects. He sought to supplement his son
Mordecai Aaron's heder education with a knowledge of secular sciences.
But at that time and in that place not many were the books, outside the
Talmud, accessible to a lad eager for learning, the only ones available
being such as the _Josippon_, _Zemah David_, and _Sheerit Yisrael_ on
Jewish History, the _Sefer ha-Berit_, and a Hebrew translation of
Mendelssohn's _Phaedon_ on general philosophy.
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