It is to you English fellow-Jews that we now appeal to help us in this

great enterprise which splendid men have set on foot. The last few years,

nay, the last few days, have brought us a disappointment which must have

touched you in particular nearly. Do not gird at fate, but rather look on

these events as a reason for remaining true to the cause of the Jewish

commonwealth. I am convinced that in doing that we shall also indirectly be

promoting those general human ends which we must always recognize as the

highest.

Remember that difficulties and obstacles are a valuable source of

health and strength to any society. We should not have survived for

thousands of years as a community if our bed had been of roses; of that I am

quite sure.

But we have a still fairer consolation. Our friends are not exactly

numerous, but among them are men of noble spirit and strong sense of

justice, who have devoted their lives to uplifting human society and

liberating the individual from degrading oppression.

We are happy and fortunate to have such men from the Gentile world

among us to-night; their presence lends an added solemnity to this memorable

evening. It gives me great pleasure to see before me Bernard Shaw and H. G.

Wells, to whose view of life I am particularly attracted.

You, Mr. Shaw, have succeeded in winning the affection and joyous

admiration of the world while pursuing a path that has led many others to a

martyr's crown. You have not merely preached moral sermons to your fellows;

you have actually mocked at things which many of them held sacred. You have

done what only the born artist can do. From your magic box you have produced

Innumerable little figures which, while resembling human beings, are compact

not of flesh and blood, but of brains, wit, and charm. And yet in a way they

are more human than we are ourselves, and one almost forgets that they are

creations not of Nature, but of Bernard Shaw. You make these charming little

figures dance in a miniature world in front of which the Graces stand

sentinel and permit no bitterness to enter. He who has looked into this

little world sees our actual world in a new light; its puppets insinuate

themselves into real people, making them suddenly look quite different. By

thus holding the mirror up to us all you have had a liberating effect on us

such as hardly any other of our contemporaries has done and have relieved

life of something of its earth-bound heaviness. For this we are all devoutly

grateful to you, and also to fate, which along with grievous plagues has

also given us the physician and liberator of our souls. I personally am also

grateful to you for the unforgettable words which you have addressed to my

mythical namesake who makes life so difficult for me, although he is really,

for all his clumsy, formidable size, quite a harmless fellow.

To you all I say that the existence and destiny of our people depend

less on external factors than on ourselves remaining faithful to the moral

traditions which have enabled us to survive for thousands of years despite

the heavy storms that have broken over our heads. In the service of life

sacrifice becomes grace.

Working Palestine

Among Zionist organizations "Working Palestine" is the one whose work

is of most direct benefit to the most valuable class of people living

there--namely, those who are transforming deserts into flourishing

settlements by the labour of their hands. These workers are a selection,

made on a voluntary basis, from the whole Jewish nation, an Иlite composed

of strong, confident, and unselfish people. They are not ignorant labourers

who sell the labour of their hands to the highest bidder, but educated,

intellectually vigorous, free men, from whose peaceful struggle with a

neglected soil the whole Jewish nation are the gainers, directly and

indirectly. By lightening their heavy lot as far as we can we shall be

saving the most valuable sort of human life; for the first settlers'

struggle on ground not yet made habitable is a difficult and dangerous

business involving a heavy personal sacrifice. How true this is, only they

can judge who have seen it with their own eyes. Anyone who helps to improve

the equipment of these men is helping on the good work at a crucial point.

It is, moreover, this working class alone that has it in its power to

establish healthy relations with the Arabs, which is the most important

political task of Zionism. Administrations come and go; but it is human

relations that finally turn the scale in the lives of nations. Therefore to

support "Working Palestine" is at the same time to promote a humane and

worthy policy in Palestine, and to oppose an effective resistance to those

undercurrents of narrow nationalism from which the whole political world,

and in a less degree the small political world of Palestine affairs, is

suffering.

Jewish Recovery

I gladly accede to your paper's request that I should address an appeal

to the Jews of Hungary on behalf of Keren Hajessod.

The greatest enemies of the national consciousness and honour of the

Jews are fatty degeneration--by which I mean the unconscionableness which

comes from wealth and ease--and a kind of inner dependence on the

surrounding Gentile world which comes from the loosening of the fabric of

Jewish society. The best in man can flourish only when he loses himself in a

community. Hence the moral danger of the Jew who has lost touch with his own

people and is regarded as a foreigner by the people of his adoption. Only

too often a contemptible and joyless egoism has resulted from such

circumstances. The weight of outward oppression on the Jewish people is

particularly heavy at the moment. But this very bitterness has done us good.

A revival of Jewish national life, such as the last generation could never

have dreamed of, has begun. Through the operation of a newly awakened sense

of solidarity among the Jews, the scheme of colonizing Palestine launched by

a handful of devoted and judicious leaders in the face of apparently