France. The contradiction of the Jewish position outdistances that of
the Russian. But both contradictions are resolved in the fact that the
ideal in question concerns not Russia alone, nor England alone, nor
the Jews alone, but the whole of Europe, the whole world. What is at
stake is not something local, personal, political, but a universal
principle, the goal toward which mankind has been so slowly and
deviously crawling from the beginnings of modern history--the
principle of democracy in nationality and nationality in democracy.

It is for this that our brethren in the armies are fighting; it is for
this that they are undergoing crucifixion in the Pale, for this that
our people have suffered and died from the beginnings of our history.
Our whole recorded biography is the narrative of a struggle for social
justice against the exploitation of class by class within our polity,
for nationality against imperialism without. Our statesmen and leaders
were the first to formulate the ideal of the cooeperative harmony of
nationality, and the ideal of international peace.[F] Mr. Asquith is
echoing our prophets, and our embattled brethren are engaged in the
defence of a principle which is the constituent of the genius of their
own nationality.

_The Service of Jewish Nationality to Civilization_

The genius of their own nationality! That with all its implications is
an issue in the war not only as a principle but as a fact. The Jewish
people are the great historic incarnation of the _casus belli_. In
fortune and in disaster, through difficult and terrible centuries,
they have cherished their language, their history, their culture, have
sustained their "corporate consciousness" and in terms of it have
served civilization in all the institutions of civilization. Not
freely, not by free development; not because of conditions, but in
spite of them. The Bible, whose moral vision inspires the world, we
gave the world only as we had or yearned for "independent existence"
and "free development." Our best, like the best of every people, has
been a function of this "independent existence and free development."
We also, scattered among the nations, tortured and oppressed by the
mighty and the weak among them, are among "the smaller nationalities"
for whose sake the war is being fought. With Serbia, with Belgium,
with Poland, we claim our public right and our national security, and
we claim it not merely for ourselves, but for the ser