uch secrecy that even their kinsmen and those among
whom they dwelt were unaware of their existence. If through the
discovery of some forbidden book any of them happened to be
detected, he never betrayed his friends. Such a one was usually
compelled to marry, so that, being burdened with family cares,
he might desist from his unpopular pursuits.

From which it would appear that though the opposition to Haskalah in
Russia was by no means as violent as had been the opposition to
enlightenment in France, for instance, or even among the Jews of Germany
and Austria,[21] it was a bitter and stubborn conflict between parents
and children in the adjustment of old ideals to a new environment.

Aside from the hindrances which Haskalah encountered because of
Nicholas's conversionist policy, it was greatly hampered by the
geographical distribution of the Jews. Here again the czar defeated his
own end by segregating the three or four million of his Jewish subjects
in certain districts, technically called the Pale, the greatest ghetto
the world has ever known. It was a Judea in itself. The Jews there
seldom came in contact with outside civilization. The languages they
used were Hebrew as the literary tongue, Yiddish among themselves, and
the local Slavonic dialect with their non-Jewish neighbors. Russian was
strange, not only to the great majority of Jews, but to the Russians
themselves. It was merely the State language, and even the Government
officials fell back on their mother tongue whenever they were at liberty
to do so. It was this that made it very difficult for the Jews to be
Russified.

But even if Russification had been a much easier process, Russian
civilization was hardly worth the having.[22] To become Russified would
have meant not only religious but also intellectual suicide. Whatever
was good in the Russia of that day was an importation. The language was
scarcely beyond the barbarous state. Its literature possessed neither
original nor adopted writings, no profound philosophical systems, no
Rousseau or Goethe, no Franklin or Kant, not even any practical
information with which to reward the student. The best writers were
Kryloff, Pushkin, Zhukovsky, and Dyerzhavin. The prices of books were so
high as to make them unattainable. Karamzin's _History of the Russian
Empire_ sold at fifty-five rubles per copy. The royal library, which had
been founded by the Jewish court physician Sanchez, contained onl