[Footnote 1:  In the Western provinces outside the Kingdom of Poland, in Lithuania, Volhynia, and Podolia, the Jewish population held itself aloof from the insurrectionary movement.  Here and there the Jews even sympathized with the Russian Government, despite the fact that the latter threw the Polish rulers into the shade by the extent of its Jewish persecutions.  In some places the Polish insurgents made the Jews pay with their lives for their pro-Russian sympathies.]

When the “aristocratic revolution,” having failed to obtain the support of the disinherited masses, had met with disaster, the revolutionary leaders, who saved themselves by fleeing abroad, indulged in remorseful reflections.  The Polish historian Lelevel, who lived in Paris as a refugee, issued in 1832 a “Manifesto to the Israelitish Nation,” calling upon the Jews to forget the insults inflicted upon them by present-day Poland for the sake of the sweet reminiscences of the Polish Republic in days gone by and of the hopes inspired by a free Poland in days to come.  He compares the flourishing condition of the Jews in the ancient Polish commonwealth with their present status on the same territory, under the yoke of “the Viennese Pharaohs,” [1] or in the land “dominated by the Northern Nebuchadnezzar,” [2] where the terror of conscription reigns supreme, where “little children, wrenched from the embraces of their mothers, are hurled into the ranks of a debased soldiery,” “doomed to become traitors to their religion and nation.”

[Footnote 1:  Referring to Galicia.]

[Footnote 2:  Nicholas I.]

The reign of nations—­exclaims Lelevel—­is drawing nigh.  All peoples will be merged into one, acknowledging the one God Adonai.  The rulers have fed the Jews on false promises; the nations will grant them liberty.  Soon Poland will rise from the dust.  Let then the Jews living on her soil go hand in hand with their brother-Poles.  The Jews will then be sure to obtain their rights.  Should they insist on returning to Palestine, the Poles will assist them in realizing this consummation.

Similar utterances could be heard a little later in the mystic circle of Tovyanski and Mitzkevitch in Paris, [1] in which the historic destiny of the two martyr nations, the Poles and the Jews, and their universal Messianic calling were favorite topics of discussion.  But alongside of these flights of “imprisoned thought” one could frequently catch in the very same circle the sounds of the old anti-Semitic slogans.  The Parisian organ of the Polish refugees, Nowa Polska, “New Poland,” occasionally indulged in anti-Semitic sallies, calling forth a passionate rebuttal from Hernish, [2] an exiled journalist, who reminded his fellow-journalists that it was mean to hunt down people who were the “slaves of slaves.”  Two other Polish-Jewish revolutionaries, Lubliner and Hollaenderski, shared all the miseries of the refugees and, while in exile, indulged in reflections concerning the destiny of their brethren at home. [3]