d sphere of activity now opened to them.

Thus a schism arose in Kief. The progressive Israelites siding with
Mendel founded a congregation of their own, leaving the more
conservative to work out their salvation in their old accustomed way. It
must not be supposed that Mendel observed this break in the ranks of
Judaism without a pang. He spent many a sleepless night in planning how
to avert further differences and to appease existing animosities. Balzac
truly says: "Every great man has paid heavily for his greatness. Genius
waters all its work with its own tears. He who would raise himself above
the average level of humanity, must prepare himself for long struggles,
for trying difficulties. A great thinker is a self-devoted martyr to
immortality."

In spite of the anathemas of the narrow-minded, in spite of the cry that
the Messiah could never come as long as such sacrilege was tolerated in
the household of Israel, the good work went steadily forward, to the
manifest advantage of the entire body of Jews.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 13: Foulke.]

CHAPTER XXI.

A DEN OF NIHILISTS.

Let us open the records of Kief for the year 1879.

Fifteen years have elapsed since the events last narrated; fifteen years
of peace and plenty, of security and prosperity for Jew and gentile.

What sudden change do we behold! Is this the country whose future looked
so hopeful in the early days of Alexander's reign? Is this the people
who saw the golden promise of a constitutional government? Alas, for the
instability of human purpose! The reforms then instituted have been
revoked, the men who were the leaders in these reforms have been exiled
to Siberia. A period of reaction has set in: Despotism and Nihilism meet
face to face. The entire nation is in chains.

Russia during these troublous times presents a dreary picture. At a
period when the intellectual activity of Europe is at its height, she
still groans under the unrestricted despotism of an autocrat. Here the
effects of progress that obtain elsewhere seem inverted. Such advance as
is made in civilization and knowledge is used to buttress imperial
tyranny and the knout is wielded more cruelly than ever before. We
behold liberal institutions overthrown and a whole people held in
bondage worse than slavery. We hear of families torn asunder, of
innocent men condemned to life-long exile in Siberia, simply because
they have aroused the suspicion or incurred the ill-will of thos