t it with the dignity conferred
by poetic art. This first essay in the domain of the Jewish drama was
followed by a succession of dramatic creations by Jews, who, exiled from
Spain, cherished the memory of their beloved country, and, carrying to
their new homes in Italy and Holland, love for its language and
literature, wrote all their works, dramas included, in Spanish after
Spanish models. So fruitful was their activity that shortly after the
exile we hear of a "Jewish Calderon," the author of more than twenty-two
plays, some long held to be the work of Calderon himself, and therefore
received with acclamation in Madrid. The real author, whose place in
Spanish literature is assured, was Antonio Enriquez di Gomez, a Marrano,
burnt in effigy at Seville after his escape from the clutches of the
Inquisition. His dramas in part deal with biblical subjects. Samson is
obviously the mouthpiece of his own sentiments:

"O God, my God, the time draws quickly nigh!
Now let a ray of thy great strength descend!
Make firm my hand to execute the deed
That alien rule upon our soil shall end!"

Towards the end of the seventeenth century, the Portuguese language
usurped the place of Spanish among Jews, and straightway we hear of a
Jewish dramatist, Antonio Jose de Silva (1705-1739), one of the most
illustrious of Portuguese poets, whose dramas still hold their own on
the repertory of the Portuguese stage. He was burnt at the stake, a
martyr to his faith, which he solemnly confessed in the hour of his
execution: "I am a follower of a faith God-given according to your own
teachings. God once loved this religion. I believe He still loves it,
but because you maintain that He no longer turns upon it the light of
His countenance, you condemn to death those convinced that God has not
withdrawn His grace from what He once favored." It is by no means an
improbable combination of circumstances that on the evening of the day
whereon Antonio Jose de Silva expired at the stake, an operetta written
by the victim himself was played at the great theatre of Lisbon in
celebration of the auto-da-fe.

Jewish literature as such derived little increase from this poetic
activity among Jews. In the period under discussion a single Hebrew
drama was produced which can lay claim to somewhat more praise than is
the due of mediocrity. _Asireh ha-Tikwah_, "The Prisoners of Hope,"
printed in 1673, deserves notice because it was the first drama