JEW JEWS. 



241 



gate science, as poetry was then termed. It was 

 founded before Hie year 13x!3. Seven Troubadours 

 and a chancellor formed the college ; they conferred 

 the degrees of doctor and bachelor, and taught in 

 their palace and gardens the lots d'amour or fleurs 

 du gai savoir (laws of love, or flowers of the gay 

 science). In 1323, they sent a letter, in verse, to 

 all the poets of the Langue d'Oc, inviting them on 

 the 3d of May, 1324, to a poetic festival, where the 

 composer of the best poem was to receive a violet 

 of fine gold. The celebrated Troubadour Arnauld 

 Vidal won the prize. The capitouls (magistrates) of 

 the city, who had likewise been invited, to encourage 

 a festival so much to the honour of Toulouse, offered, 

 in future, to furnish the golden violet. To increase 

 the splendour of the annual celebration, two other 

 prizes were added to the violet an eglantine and 

 a pansy, both of silver. Similar institutions after- 

 wards arose at Barcelona, in the reign of king John, 

 and at Tortosa, in the reign of king Martin. 

 The original institution at Toulouse, on the other 

 hand, began to decline, and, at the end of a century, 

 was nearly extinct, when it was revived by Clemence 

 Isaure. (See Clemence Isaure.} She left by will a 

 considerable sum for the celebration of this poetic 

 festival, which was now continued under the name of 

 jettx fioraux. Mass, a sermon, and alms-giving, 

 commenced the ceremonies. Before the awarding 

 of prizes, the tomb of Clemence was strewed with 

 roses. More costly flowers rewarded the zeal of the 

 competitors. Four prizes were offered an amaran- 

 thus of gold, of the value of 400 livres, for the best 

 ode ; a violet of silver, value 250 livres, for an essay 

 in prose, which was of not less than a quarter nor 

 more than a half hour in reading; a silver pansy, 

 value 200 livres, for an eclogue, elegy or idyl ; and 

 a silver lily, value sixty livres, for the best sonnet, or 

 hymn, in honour of the holy virgin. Instead of 

 doctors, there were now a master of the games, and 

 forty judges (mainteneurs). In 1694, the college 

 was formally erected into an academy. The office 

 of chancellor, and other distinctions of rank, were 

 abolished in 1773. The seal is kept by a standing 

 secretary, and one of the members presides, with the 

 title of moderafeur, who is appointed by lot every 

 three months. After an interruption of fifteen years, 

 from 1790 1806, the mainteneurs assembled again 

 in Toulouse, the academy went into operation, and, 

 according to the old custom, awarded the prizes 

 founded by Clemence Isaure. Since then, this festi- 

 val, associated with so many poetic recollections, has 

 been annually celebrated. The academy assembles 

 in the council-house of Toulouse, which is called the 

 capiioUum. 



JEW, THE WANDERING, or ETERNAL; a poetical 

 personage of popular traditions, who owes his 

 existence to a story connected with the well-known 

 scene in the history of Christ's passion. As the 

 Saviour was on the way to the place of execution, 

 overcome with the weight of the cross, he wished to 

 rest on a stone before the house of a Jew, whom the 

 iJtory calls Ahasuerus, who drove him away with 

 curses. Jesus calmly replied " Thou shalt wander 

 on the earth till I return." The astonished Jew did 

 not come to himself till the crowd had passed, and 

 the streets were empty. Driven by fear and remorse, 

 he has since wandered, according to the command of 

 the Lord, from place to place, and has never yet 

 been able to find a grave. This punishment of 

 unbelief and hardness of heart a condemnation to 

 wander for ever on the earth, and to be the contem- 

 porary of all centuries has afforded materials for 

 the poets and novelists. Shelly, Monk, Lewis, Dr 

 Croly, and Mrs Norton in England, and Schubart and 

 Schlegel in Germany, have turned this legend to ac- 



count. Goethe (in the third volume of his own Life) 

 has sketched Ahasuerus. with great spirit and humour, 

 as a philosophic cobbler at Jerusalem, who opposes 

 the Saviour with a cold, worldly logic, which will not 

 look above the things of earth, and is therefore con- 

 demned to remain in this world (which is all to him) 

 until a desire for higher things should awaken in 

 him. 



JEWS. After the Babylonish captivity, the He- 

 brews (see Hebrews) were called Jews, the greater 

 part of the nation having remained in the middle 

 and eastern provinces of the Persian empire, and 

 only 42,360 men, with their families, principally of 

 the tribes of the kingdom of Judah, having returned 

 to their country, when permission was granted by 

 Cyrus (536 B. C.) They founded a new kingdom in 

 Judea, dependent on Persia, but under the domestic 

 direction of high priests and elders, according to the 

 Mosaic constitution. Jerusalem, the temple, and the 

 Levitical cities of the country were rebuilt, not with- 

 out difficulty; the writings of Moses, the historical and 

 prophetical books collected ; the great synagogue of 

 120 learned men established for the critical revision 

 and explanation of the Holy Scriptures, as well as 

 separate synagogues and schools for the expounding 

 of the law, and the instruction of the people. All 

 these institutions did not enable Ezra and Nehemiah, 

 the restorers of their nation, to revive the primitive 

 Mosaic constitution. The spirit of his code belonged 

 to another age, and to other circumstances. The 

 later Jews could retain only the letter of the law, 

 and, in their expositions, lost themselves in the 

 subtilties which they had learned from the Chal- 

 deans. In enterprise and activity, however, they 

 surpassed their fathers. Their commerce, and their 

 annual pilgrimages to the temple, to which each Jew 

 was obliged to make an offering, accumulated at 

 Jerusalem, under the mild government of the Per- 

 sians, more treasures than Solomon's age had ever 

 seen. They were not therefore destitute of the 

 means for conciliating the Macedonian conquerors, 

 and although, on the fall of the Persian monarchy, 

 they submitted to Alexander the Great, and were 

 involved in the wars of his generals for the supre- 

 macy, yet their fate was not hard. Ptolemy, king of 

 Egypt, who took possession of Palestine 320 B.C., 

 allowed them the enjoyment of their singular cus- 

 toms, and granted the colonies which he transplanted 

 to his capital (Alexandria), for the purpose of extend- 

 ing its commerce, peculiar privileges over the natives. 

 The Jews were for from improving their condition by 

 engaging in the war between the Syrian and Egyp- 

 tian kings, on the side of the former (197 B. C.); for 

 the Syrian Seleucidae considered their possessions as 

 lawful subjects of plunder. Seleucus IV. attempted 

 to plunder their temple, and Antiochus IV., in order 

 to reduce them to a uniformity with the rest of his 

 subjects, determined to destroy their religion. His 

 pretext for this was the shameful spectacle of 

 intrigue and corruption displayed at the Syrian 

 court, in the rivalry of the priests and nobles for 

 the dignity of high priest ; but the nation adhered, 

 with its characteristic obstinacy, to the forms of the 

 Mosaic worship. When, therefore, Antiochus set up 

 the Olympian Jupiter for worship in the temple, ami 

 compelled the Jews to sacrifice and eat swine, many 

 suffered the most terrible death, rather than trans- 

 gress the la;v of Moses. In vain were Jerusalem 

 and the surrounding country laid desolate. These 

 persecutions only served to develope a national spirit, 

 which broke out in the insurrection of the Mac- 

 cabees. Judas, surnamed Maccabaus (the hammer), 

 was the third son of a priest, who had fled, with his 

 family from persecution, and had collected, in the 

 mountains ot Judea, a baud of faithful believers. 

 



