u that should have opened your eyes. I must escape from the house
of bondage--must be master of myself, of my word and thought. Oh, the
world is so wide, so wide--and we are so narrow! Only gradually did the
web mesh itself about me. At first my fetters were flowery bands, for I
believed all I taught and could teach all I believed. Insensibly the
flowers changed to iron chains, because I was changing as I probed
deeper into life and thought, and saw my dreams of influencing English
Judaism fading in the harsh daylight of fact. And yet at moments the
iron links would soften to flowers again. Do you think there is no
sweetness in adulation, in prosperity--no subtle cajolery that soothes
the conscience and coaxes the soul to take its pleasure in a world of
make-believe? Spiritual statesmanship, forsooth!" He made a gesture of
resolution. "No, the Judaism of you English weighs upon my spirits. It
is so parochial. Everything turns on finance; the United Synagogue keeps
your community orthodox because it has the funds and owns the
burying-grounds. Truly a dismal allegory--a creed whose strength lies in
its cemeteries. Money is the sole avenue to distinction and to
authority; it has its coarse thumb over education, worship, society. In
my country--even in your own Ghetto--the Jews do not despise money, but
at least piety and learning are the titles to position and honor. Here
the scholar is classed with the _Schnorrer_; if an artist or an author
is admired, it is for his success. You are right; it is oxen that carry
your Ark of the Covenant--fat oxen. You admire them, Leon; you are an
Englishman, and cannot stand outside it all. But I am stifling under
this weight of moneyed mediocrity, this _regime_ of dull respectability.
I want the atmosphere of ideas and ideals."

He tore at his high clerical collar as though suffocating literally.

Raphael was too moved to defend English Judaism. Besides, he was used
to these jeremiads now--had he not often heard them from Sidney? Had he
not read them in Esther's book? Nor was it the first time he had
listened to the Russian's tirades, though he had lacked the key to the
internal conflict that embittered them.

"But how will you live?" he asked, tacitly accepting the situation. "You
will not, I suppose, go over to the Reform Synagogue?"

"That fossil, so proud of its petty reforms half a century ago that it
has stood still ever since to admire them! It is a synagogue for
snobs--who nev