lized the danger. The sad
conditions prevailing in the era after the expulsion from Spain, a third
exile, were in all respects calculated to promote the development of
mysticism, and it did flourish luxuriantly.

Some few philosophers, the last of a long line, still await mention:
Levi ben Gerson, Joseph Kaspi, Moses of Narbonne in southern France,
long a seat of Jewish learning; then, Isaac ben Sheshet, Chasdai
Crescas, whose "Light of God" exercised deep influence upon Spinoza and
his philosophy; the Duran family, particularly Profiat Duran, successful
defender of Judaism against the attacks of apostates and Christians; and
Joseph Albo, who in his principal philosophic work, _Ikkarim_, shows
Judaism to be based upon three fundamental doctrines: the belief in the
existence of God, Revelation, and the belief in future reward and
punishment. These writers are the last to reflect the glories of the
golden age.

At the entrance to the next period we again meet a man of extraordinary
ability, Isaac Abrabanel, one of the most eminent and esteemed of Bible
commentators, in early life minister to a Catholic king, later on a
pilgrim scholar wandering about exiled with his sons, one of whom,
Yehuda, has fame as the author of the _Dialoghi di Amore_. In the train
of exiles passing from Portugal to the Orient are Abraham Zacuto, an
eminent historian of Jewish literature and sometime professor of
astronomy at the university of Salamanca; Joseph ibn Verga, the
historian of his nation; Amatus Lusitanus, who came close upon the
discovery of the circulation of the blood; Israel Nagara, the most
gifted poet of the century, whose hymns brought him popular favor;
later, Joseph Karo, "the most influential personage of the sixteenth
century," his claims upon recognition resting on the _Shulchan Aruch_,
an exhaustive codex of Jewish customs and laws; and many others. In
Salonica, the exiles soon formed a prosperous community, where
flourished Jacob ibn Chabib, the first compiler of the Haggadistic tales
of the Talmud, and afterwards David Conforte, a reputable historian. In
Jerusalem, Obadiah Bertinoro was engaged on his celebrated Mishna
commentary, in the midst of a large circle of Kabbalists, of whom
Solomon Alkabez is the best known on account of his famous Sabbath song,
_Lecho Dodi_. Once again Jerusalem was the objective point of many
pilgrims, lured thither by the prevalent Kabbalistic and Messianic
vagaries. True literature gained