452 TRADITION AND HEREDITY 



the public schools of England which embody the distinctive 

 elements in social tradition. The case of the Jews is especially- 

 noteworthy. There is no common language, no Jewish state, but 

 one thing a Jew has in common with other Jews — his religion. 

 Round the Jewish religion centres all that is distinctively Jewish, 

 and the clinging of the Jew to his religion has resulted in the main- 

 tenance of a Jewish race amidst all the strange vicissitudes to 

 which the Jews have been subject. * Qu'est-ce qui a conserve 

 le Juif a travers les siecles et I'empeche de disparaitre au milieu 

 des nations ? C'est sa religion. ... Or ces rites protecteurs, cette 

 cuirasse ou cette carapace d'observances qui I'a defendu durant 

 deux mille ans, et que rien ne pouvait transpercer, notre esprit 

 occidental I'a entamee. . . . Si le judaisme, debilite, venait a se 

 decomposer et a se dissoudre, qu'adviendrait-il du Juif ? Ferme 

 et sauvegarde par sa religion, le Juif ne risquait-il point de 

 s'evanouir avec le judaisme ? ' ^ 



Again, it has been pointed out that men have often achieved 

 fame as contributors to the civilization or literature of countries 

 other than that to which they by race belonged. It has been said 

 that no one could have been more French than the English 

 Hamilton, the Swiss Rousseau, the Italian de Maistre, the German 

 Heine, or the mulatto Dumas, Great contributions to the building 

 up of what is typically British have been made by men who were 

 not of British blood though of course distinguished British 

 patriots. A string of names from Simon de Montfort to Disraeli 

 can be quoted. On the other hand, ' natives of the British Isles 

 have helped to create the armies and fleets, and to build up the 

 politics of most European States. In the eighteenth century 

 you might have found an Irishman directing as Prime Minister 

 the fortunes of Spain, and another those of Naples, a third com- 

 manding the forces of Austria, and a fourth seeking to rebuild the 

 French dominions in India. Scots as a rule restricted their 

 attention to Protestant countries, but John Law in the early 

 years of that century did wonderful things with French finance. 

 The right-hand man of Frederick the Great was a Scot, and Scots 

 took more than their share in the making of Russia — an article 

 of almost exclusively foreign manufacture. Peter the Great 

 himself had a mother of Scottish birth, and the fact made all the 

 difference between him and his imbecile half-brothers. Napoleon 



1 Leroy-Beaulieu, Israel chez les Nations, p. 77. j 



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