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e of them. And to Howells: I couldn't get along without work now. I bury myself in it up to the ears. Long hours--8 & 9 on a stretch sometimes. It isn't all for print, by any means, for much of it fails to suit me; 50,000 words of it in the past year. It was because of the deadness which invaded me when Susy died. He projected articles, stories, critiques, essays, novels, autobiography, even plays; he covered the whole literary round. Among these activities are some that represent Mark Twain's choicest work. "Concerning the Jews," which followed the publication of his "Stirring Times in Austria" (grew out of it, in fact), still remains the best presentation of the Jewish character and racial situation. Mark Twain was always an ardent admirer of the Jewish race, and its oppression naturally invited his sympathy. Once he wrote to Twichell: The difference between the brain of the average Christian and that of the average Jew--certainly in Europe--is about the difference between a tadpole's brain & an archbishop's. It is a marvelous race; by long odds the most marvelous race the world has produced, I suppose. Yet he did not fail to see its faults and to set them down in his summary of Hebrew character. It was a reply to a letter written to him by a lawyer, and he replied as a lawyer might, compactly, logically, categorically, conclusively. The result pleased him. To Mr. Rogers he wrote: The Jew article is my "gem of the ocean." I have taken a world of pleasure in writing it & doctoring it & fussing at it. Neither Jew nor Christian will approve of it, but people who are neither Jews nor Christian will, for they are in a condition to know the truth when they see it. Clemens was not given to race distinctions. In his article he says: I am quite sure that (bar one) I have no race prejudices, and I think I have no color prejudices nor caste prejudices nor creed prejudices. Indeed I know it. I can stand any society. All that I care to know is that a man is a human being, that is enough for me; he can't be any worse. We gather from something that follows that the one race which he bars is the French, and this, just then, mainly because of the Dreyfus agitations. He also states in this article: I have no special regard for Satan, but I can at least claim that I have no prejudice against him. It may even be that I lean a little his way on account of his not having a fair show. Clemens
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