Nietzsche - The Dawn of the Day or Daybreak.
205.
THE PEOPLE OF ISRAEL. One of the spectacles
which the next century will invite us to witness is
the decision regarding the fate of the European Jews.
It is quite obvious now that they have cast their
die and crossed their Rubicon : the only thing that
remains for them is either to become masters of
Europe or to lose Europe, as they once centuries ago
lost Egypt, where they were confronted with similar
alternatives. In Europe, however, they have gone
through a schooling
of eighteen centuries such as
no other nation has ever undergone, and the experiences
of this dreadful time of probation have
benefited not only the Jewish community but, even
to a greater extent, the individual. As a consequence
of this, the resourcefulness of the modern
Jews, both in mind and soul, is extraordinary.
Amongst all the inhabitants of Europe it is the
Jews least of all who try
to escape from any deep
distress by recourse to drink or to suicide, as other
less gifted people are so prone to do. Every Jew
can find in the history of his own family and of his
ancestors a long record of instances of the greatest
coolness and perseverance amid difficulties and
dreadful situations, an artful cunning in fighting
with misfortune and hazard. And above all it is
their bravery under the cloak of wretched submission,
their heroic spernere se sperni that surpasses
the virtues of all the saints.
People wished to make them contemptible by
treating them contemptibly for nearly twenty centuries,
and refusing them access to all honourable
positions and dignities, and by pushing them further
down into the meaner trades and under this
process indeed they have not become any cleaner,
But contemptible ? They have never ceased for a
moment from believing themselves qualified
for the
very highest functions, nor have the virtues of the
suffering ever ceased to adorn them. Their manner
of honouring their parents and children, the rationality
of their marriages and marriage customs, distinguishes
them amongst all Europeans. Besides
this, they have been able to create for themselves a
sense of power and eternal vengeance from the very
trades that were left to them (or to which they were
abandoned). Even in palliation of their usury we
cannot help saying that, without this occasional
pleasant and useful torture inflicted on their
scorners, they would have experienced difficulty in
preserving their self-respect
for so long. For our
self-respect depends upon our ability to make
reprisals in both good and evil things. Kevertheless,
their revenge never urges them on too far, for
they all have that liberty of mind, and even of soul,
produced in men by frequent changes of place,
climate, and customs of neighbours and oppressors,
they possess by far the greatest experience
in all
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