Page:The poems of Emma Lazarus volume 1.djvu/34

20 of a miracle, has been deprived of the natural means of development and progress, and has remained a stationary force. The next hundred years will, in our opinion, he the test of their vitality as a people ; the phase of toleration upon which they are only now entering will prove whether or not they are capable of growth."

By a curious, almost fateful juxtaposition, in the same number of the magazine appeared Madame Ragozin s defense of Russian barbarity, and in the following (May) number Emma Lazarus’s impassioned appeal and reply, &quot; Russian Christianity versus Modern Judaism.&quot; From this time dated the crusade that she undertook in behalf of her race, and the consequent expansion of all her faculties, the growth of spiritual power which always ensues when a great cause is espoused and a strong conviction enters the soul. Her verse rang out as it had never rung before,—a clarion note, calling a people to heroic action and unity, to the consciousness and fulfillment of a grand destiny. When has Judaism been so stirred as by &quot; The Crowing of the Red Cock &quot; and

Wake, Israel, wake! Recall to-day The glorious Maccabean rage, The sire heroic, hoary-gray, His five-fold lion-lineage; The Wise, the Elect, the Help-of-God, The Burst-of-Spring, the Avenging Rod.