eir lot,
good-tempered, kind-hearted, devoted to their families, and
irreproachable in their general conduct.

I need not add that the Roman rabble, bettering the instruction of
Catholic monks, spurned them, reviled them, and robbed them. The law
forbade Christians to hold converse with them, but to steal anything
from them was a work of grace.

The law did not absolutely sanction the murder of a Jew; but the
tribunals regarded the murderer of a man in a different light from the
murderer of a Jew. Mark the line of pleading that follows.

"Why, Gentlemen, does the law severely punish murderers, and
sometimes go the length of inflicting upon them the penalty
of death? Because he who murders a Christian murders at once
a body and a soul. He sends before the Sovereign Judge a
being who is ill-prepared, who has not received absolution,
and who falls straight into hell--or, at the very least,
into purgatory. This is why murder--I mean the murder of a
Christian--cannot be too severely punished. But as for us
(counsel and client), what have we killed? Nothing,
Gentlemen, absolutely nothing but a wretched Jew,
predestined for damnation. You know the obstinacy of his
race, and you know that if he had been allowed a hundred
years for his conversion, he would have died like a brute,
without confession. I admit that we have advanced by some
years the maturity of celestial justice; we have hastened a
little for him an eternity of torture which sooner or later
must inevitably have been his lot. But be indulgent,
Gentlemen, towards so venial an offence, and reserve your
severity for those who attempt the life and salvation of a
Christian!"

This speech would be nonsense at Paris. It was sound logic at Rome,
and, thanks to it, the murderer got off with a few months'
imprisonment.

You will ask why the Jews have not fled a hundred leagues from this
Slough of Despond. The answer is, because they were born there.
Moreover, the taxation is light, and rent is moderate. Add that, when
famine has been in the land, or the inundations of the Tiber have
spread ruin and devastation around, the scornful charity of the Popes
has flung them some bones to gnaw. Then again, travelling costs money,
and passports are not to be had for the asking in Rome.

But if, by some miracle of industry, one of these unfortunate children
of Israel has managed