200 
people were not afhamed to fofter. From 
that time, the legai condition cf Jews in 
England has not altered; but the people 
no longer view them with rancor, or 
miftruli, or unbrocherly. emotions. 
PostTCRiIPT. 
The Jews have been fingularly un- 
fortunate. They fhared the opprefiion 
and contumely which the Chriftian 
fects underwent, as foon. as the jealouly 
of the Pagan priefis and emperors was 
excited by the progrefs of their meno- 
theifm ; but they in no degree partook 
of the fecurity or triumphs conquered fer 
the charch by Conftantine. Their in- 
credulity was coniidered by orthodox and 
heretics as of all others the meft criminal, 
nor was it till after the Manomedan con- 
quetts, that they obtained, in part of Afia, 
along the fouthern fhores of the Me- 
diterranean and in Spain, a refling place 
for their feet. 5 
In modern Italy, the earlieft haunt of 
reviving literature and philofophy, the 
firtt attempts were made to prepare tne 
European -mind for the toleration of 
Judaifm. Simone Lazzurato, of Venice, 
3s Mentioned as a pleader of their caufe. 
‘The friends of the Socini were thought 
to entertain fentiments very favourable to 
the Jews; but the interference of the 
inguifition in 1546, to fupprefs the cele- 
brated club of Vicenza, an event prepa- 
yatory to the exile and difpe:fion of all 
the rational Chriftians of Italy, defrauded 
them of rifing advocates. In the feveral 
Itaiian republics, the- Jews enjoyed only 
a contemptuous protection. Their fate 
was fomewhat more favourabie in Poland, 
and much more favourable in. Holland, 
where Bafnage, and, no coubr, others, 
wrote of them becomingly. 
In Germany, Gutthold Ephraim Leff- 
ing, a celebrated dramatift, by his philo~ 
fophical plays, Nathan the Wife, and the 
Monk of Libanon, attacked the prejudice 
againft Judaifm in its fortrefs, the public 
mind; while his friend, Mofes Mendel- 
folm, was ilufirating the feét, both by 
his elegant writings and by a well-argued 
Defence of general toleration, publiithed 
under the title jferufalem. C.W. Dohm, 
a Pruffian, offered, in +781, to the German 
public, two fmal! volumes of Remarks on 
the Means of Improving the Civil Condi- 
tion of the Jews, which called forth feve- 
ral pamphlets on the fame topic, ameng 
which thofe of Schlétzer and Michaelis, 
no doubt, deferve confultation. 
In France, the prejudices of Voltaire 
againft the .Jewifh religion, proved a 
powerful obftacle to the adyances of the 
| Hiflory of Fews in England. 
[ April 
philofophie party, in at equitable difpo- 
fition towards its. profeffors. In 1788, 
however, the academy of Metz propofed 
as a prize queftion: Are there means of 
rendering the Jews in France uiefulier 
and happier? Zakind Hourwitz, 2 
Poiifh Jew, M. Thierry, a counfellor of 
Nanct, and the Abbé Gregoire, fhared the 
prize, but not the public foffrage. The 
work of the latter, on the moral, phyfical, 
and political regeneration of the Jews, 
has obtained the: more impreflivé publi- 
city. Among the moft difinguithed coad- 
jutors in obtaming a legal improvement of 
their condition, -the confituting. affem- 
bly of France numbered Mirabeau, Ciers 
mont-Tonnerre, and Rabaud. 
In our own country, the well-intended 
conduct of the Enghth government, under 
the protectorate of Cromwell, and under 
the adminiftration of Mr. Pelham, were 
aiike defeated by the fanaticifm of the peo- 
ple. Mr. Toland’s naturalization of the 
Jews in England, is the beft antidote of 
elder date that has defcended to us. Tovey 
and Ockley have aifo ftored up informa- 
mation on rhefe topics. 
Of late, Priefiley’s Letters to the Jews, a 
work, which, probably, under the matk of 
purfuing their converfion, had for its ob- 
je€t to do away the ungrateful preiudices of 
religionifts againft their parent fect, has 
_rendered to them in the devout world, the 
fame fervice as Cumberland’s comedy of 
the Jew in the polifhed. There can 
fcarcely remain any apprehenfion among 
thinking men, that the flighteft popular 
odium would now be incurred by the le- 
giflature, if it repealed every law which 
incroaches upon the political equality of 
this and other feéts.. It may not, how- 
ever, have been amiis to bring within a 
{mall compafs, fuch particulars of the 
fortunes of this people in our ifland, and 
fach notices of the writings in their be- 
haif, as may be likelieft to mvite attention, 
whenever a reformed and reforming legif- 
lature fhall confider of their condition. — 
er EE ee 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
SIR) 
A> your Magazine embraces every ob- 
jeét calculated to intereft the mind, 
perhaps a few hints upon the caufe of the 
prefeot fcarcity of money may not be 
unaceeptable.—It calls for the attention 
equaliy of the philofopher, the politician, 
and the moralift.—I have been induced to 
trouble you principally from the general 
cenfure caf upon the mercantile intereft 
for the neceflities they are now finarting 
Sirarae! under, 
