Page:The Shield (Knopf, 1917).djvu/35

Rh These principles were ratified by 350 rabbis, and published just at the time of the anti-Jewish pogroms in Russia.

"Judaism teaches respect for the life, the health, the forces and the property of one's neighbour."

I am a Russian. When, alone with myself, I calmly scrutinise my merits and demerits,—it seems to me that I am intensely Russian. And I am deeply convinced that there is much that we Russians can and ought to learn from the Jews.

For instance, the seventh paragraph of the "Principles of the Jewish Moral Doctrine" says: "Judaism commands us to respect work, to take part by either physical or mental labour in the communal work, to seek for life's goods in constant productive and creative work. Judaism, therefore, teaches us to take care of our powers and abilities, to perfect them and apply them actively. It, therefore, forbids all idle pleasure not based on labour, all idleness which hopes for the help of others."

This is beautiful and wise, and this is just what we Russians lack. Oh, if we could educate our unusual powers and abilities, if we had