art of Christianity. And now we have political equality, there's no
excuse for a pretense of that sort. But I am for getting rid of all of
our superstitions and exclusiveness. There's no reason now why we
shouldn't melt gradually into the populations we live among. That's the
order of the day in point of progress. I would as soon my children
married Christians as Jews. And I'm for the old maxim, 'A man's country
is where he's well off.'"

"That country's not so easy to find, Gideon," said the rapid Pash, with
a shrug and grimace. "You get ten shillings a-week more than I do, and
have only half the number of children. If somebody will introduce a
brisk trade in watches among the 'Jerusalem wares,' I'll go--eh,
Mordecai, what do you say?"

Deronda, all ear for these hints of Mordecai's opinion, was inwardly
wondering at his persistence in coming to this club. For an
enthusiastic spirit to meet continually the fixed indifference of men
familiar with the object of his enthusiasm is the acceptance of a slow
martyrdom, beside which the fate of a missionary tomahawked without any
considerate rejection of his doctrines seems hardly worthy of
compassion. But Mordecai gave no sign of shrinking: this was a moment
of spiritual fullness, and he cared more for the utterance of his faith
than for its immediate reception. With a fervor which had no temper in
it, but seemed rather the rush of feeling in the opportunity of speech,
he answered Pash:--

"What I say is, let every man keep far away from the brotherhood and
inheritance he despises. Thousands on thousands of our race have mixed
with the Gentiles as Celt with Saxon, and they may inherit the blessing
that belongs to the Gentile. You cannot follow them. You are one of the
multitudes over this globe who must walk among the nations and be known
as Jews, and with words on their lips which mean, 'I wish I had not
been born a Jew, I disown any bond with the long travail of my race, I
will outdo the Gentile in mocking at our separateness,' they all the
while feel breathing on them the breath of contempt because they are
Jews, and they will breathe it back poisonously. Can a fresh-made
garment of citizenship weave itself straightway into the flesh and
change the slow deposit of eighteen centuries? What is the citizenship
of him who walks among a people he has no hardy kindred and fellowship
with, and has lost the sense of brotherhood with his own race? It is a
charter of selfish ambi