development, the spirit of toleration was speedily exhausted; the Jews were expelled by the act of the state.  England was the first kingdom in which this occurred (1290); France followed in 1395, Spain and Portugal in 1492 and 1495.  In this way it came about that the Holy Roman Empire—­ Germany, Italy, and adjoining districts—­became the chief abode of the Jews. 1 In the anarchy which here prevailed they could best

***************************************** 1.  The Polish Jews are German Jews who migrated in the Middle Ages to Poland, but have maintained to the present day their German speech, a mediaeval South-Frankish dialect, of course greatly corrupted.  In Russian “German” and “Jew” mean the same thing. ******************************************

maintain their separate attitude, and if they were expelled from one locality they readily found refuge in some other.  The emperor had indeed the right of extirpating them altogether (with the exception of a small number to be left as a memorial); but, in the first place, he had in various ways given up this right to the states of the empire, and, moreover, his pecuniary resources were so small that he could not afford to want the tax which the Jews as his “servi camerae” paid him for protecting their persons and property.  In spite of many savage persecutions the Jews maintained their ground, especially in those parts of Germany where the political confusion was greatest.  They even succeeded in maintaining a kind of autonomy by means of an arrangement in virtue of which civil processes which they had against each other were decided by their own rabbins in accordance with the law of the Talmud. 2

********************************************** 2.  Stobbe, Die Juden in Deutschl. waehr. d.  Mittelalt., Brunsw., 1866. **********************************************

The Jews, through their having on the one hand separated theselves, and on the other hand been excluded on religious grounds from the Gentiles, gained an internal solidarity and solidity which has hitherto enabled them to survive all the attacks of time.  The hostility of the Middle Ages involved them in no danger; the greatest peril has been brought upon them by modern times, along with permission and increasing inducements to abandon their separate position.  It is worth while to recall on this point the opinion of Spinoza, who was well able to form a competent judgment (Tract.  Theol. polit., c. 4, ad fin.):—­ “That the Jews have maintained themselves so long in spite of their dispersed and disorganised condition is not at all to be wondered at, when it is considered how they separated themselves from all other nationalities in such a way as to bring upon themselves the hatred of all, and that not only by external rites contrary to those of other nations, but also by the sign of circumcision, which they maintain most religiously.  Experience shows that their conservation is due in