Of the remarkable capacity of Jews for culture, Solomon Maimon was a still more striking example. This Pole, whose real name was Solomon of Lithuania, or of Nieszwiez (born about 1753, died 1800), rose from the thickest cloud of Polish ignorance to pure philosophical knowledge, attaining this height by his unaided efforts, but owing to his scepticism, he fell a prey to shocking errors. The story of his life is full of travel and restlessness, and is a good example of the versatility of Jews.
As in the case of Mendelssohn, Maimuni's philosophical religious work, "The Guide of the Perplexed" (More Nebuchim), was the cause of Solomon's intellectual awakening. He read the book until it became part of him, consequently assumed the name of Maimon, swore by the name of the Jewish sage whenever evil desire prompted him to sin, and conquered by its aid. But whereas Mendelssohn reached the right way through Maimuni, Solomon Maimon was led into error, doubt, and unbelief, and to the end of his life lived an aimless existence. In despair he snatched at the Kabbala, wishing to become a Jewish Faust, to conjure up spirits who would obtain deep wisdom for him; he also made a pilgrimage to the leader of the Chassidim, Beer of Mizricz. But the deception practiced disgusted him, and he quickly turned away from him. But what was he, with his spirit of scepticism, to do in a narrow world of rigid orthodoxy? Continually play the hypocrite? Rumor had carried a report to Poland, that in certain towns of Germany a freer religious system prevailed, and that more scope for philosophical inquiry was given. At this period a Pole felt no scruples in forsaking wife, children, and home, and wandering abroad. It cost Maimon the less effort, seeing that his wife had been thrust upon him when he was a child, and it was to his vexation that children were born to him. To appease his conscience he deceived himself by the pretext that he would study medicine in Germany, and be enabled to maintain himself and his family.
Thus Maimon left Lithuania (spring, 1777), at the age of twenty-five, "with a heavy, dirty beard, in torn, filthy clothes, his language a jargon composed of fragments of Hebrew, Judæo-German, and Polish, together with grammatical errors," as he himself says, and in this guise he introduced himself to some educated Jews in Königsberg, saying that he desired to devote himself to science. In this ragged Pole was a brain full of profound thoughts, which, as he grew older, developed into maturity. His journey from Königsberg to Berlin by way of Stettin was a succession of pitiful troubles. In Berlin the authorities refused to grant him residence. Those Poles who had severed themselves from the Talmud, and devoted themselves to science, lived in the odor of the worst heresy, and often gave occasion to suspicion. Maimon was sincere enough to admit the justice of this opinion. A moral life, activity of any kind, participation in the work of mankind, utilization of talent in the conquest of nature, man's liberation from the shackles of self-interest, the awakening of his moral impulse to act for the welfare of his brethren, the realization of the heavenly kingdom of justice and beneficent love—of all these ideals Maimon had no appreciation. These were indifferent matters, with which a thinker need not trouble himself. In this unsound state of mind he shunned all active work; to meditate idly and draw up formulas were his chief occupations. He attained no fixed goal in life, but staggered from folly to folly, from misery to misery.
To the general public he was first known through his "Autobiography," wherein he revealed the weak points of the Polish Jews, to him the only representatives of Judaism, as well as his own, with unsparing, cynical severity, as some years previously Rousseau had done in his "Confessions." He thereby performed an evil service for his co-religionists. His opinions concerning his brethren, originating in ill-humor, were accepted to their detriment as universal characteristics; and what he depicted as hateful in the Polish Jews was attributed to all Jews.
This kind of confession was considered extraordinary, and aroused great attention, in stiff, pedantic Germany. The "Autobiography" found its way into numerous circles, and gained many readers. The two great German poets, Schiller and Goethe, were absurdly fond of the cynical philosopher; and Goethe expressed the wish to have him live near him. His fame made Maimon neither better nor happier, and he did honor to the Jewish race only with his mental powers; in his actions he altogether dishonored it.
The third Jewish thinker of this time, Lazarus Ben-David (born in Berlin 1762; died there 1832), had neither the tragic nor the comic history of Maimon. He was a prosaic, pedantic personality, who in any German university could have filled the chair of logic and mathematics, and year after year given the same instruction unabridged and unincreased. For the philosophy of Kant, however, Ben-David possessed ardor and enthusiastic devotion, because he recognized it as the truth, and faithfully conformed to its moral principles. This philosophy was well suited to Jews, because it demanded high power of thought and moral action. For this reason Kant, like Aristotle in former days, had many Jewish admirers and disciples. Ben-David was also learned in the Talmud, and a good mathematician. It was perhaps a mistake on his part to go to Vienna to lecture upon the Kantian philosophy. At first the University permitted his discourses in its halls,—a Jew lecturing on a philosophy which denied the right of Catholicism to exist! He soon however had to discontinue them; but Count Harrach offered him his palace as a lecture-room. Meeting with obstacles here, too, he left the imperial city, continued his discourses in Berlin, and for some time acted as editor of a journal. Ben-David produced but little impression upon the course of Jewish history.
The German Jews, however, under Mendelssohn's inspiration, not only elevated themselves with great rapidity to the height of culture, but unmistakably promoted the spread of culture in Christian circles. Intellectual Jews and Jewesses created in Berlin that cultured public tone which has become the distinction of this capital, and has influenced the whole of Germany. Jews and Jewesses were the first to found a salon for intellectual intercourse, in which the elements of elevated thought, taste, poetry, and criticism mingled together in a graceful, light way, and were discussed, and made accessible to men of different vocations. The Christian populace of Berlin at the time of Frederick the Great and his successor greatly resembled that of a petty town. The nobility and high dignitaries were too aristocratic and uneducated to trouble themselves about intellectual and social affairs and the outside world. For them the court and the petty events of everyday life were the world. The learned formed an exclusive guild, and there was no high or wealthy class of burghers. The middle classes followed the narrow path of their old-fashioned German fathers; met, if at all, over the beer-jug, and were continually engaged in repeating stories of "old Fritz's victories." Particularly, the women lived modestly within their four walls, or occupied themselves wholly with the concerns of their family circles. With the Jews of Berlin it was entirely different. All, or most of them, had been more or less engaged with the Talmud in their youth; their mental powers were acute, and susceptible to fresh influences. These new elements of culture Mendelssohn gave them through his Bible translation, and his philosophical and æsthetic writings. In Jewish circles, knowledge procured more distinction than riches; the ignorant man, however wealthy, was held up as a butt for contempt. Every Jew, whatever his means, prided himself on possessing a collection of old and new books, and, when possible, sought to know their contents, so that he might not be wanting in conversation. Every well-informed Jew lived in two worlds, that of business, and that of books. In consequence of the impulse given by Mendelssohn, the younger generation occupied itself with belles-lettres, language, and philosophy. The subjects of study had changed, but the yearning for knowledge remained, or became still stronger. Amongst the Jews of Berlin, shortly after the death of Mendelssohn, were more than a hundred young men burning with zeal for knowledge and culture, from whose midst the contributors to the periodical "Ha-Meassef" were supplied.
To this honest inclination for study, there was added a fashionable folly. Through Frederick the Great, French literature became acclimatized in Prussia, and Jews were especially attracted by the sparkling intellectuality of French wit. Voltaire had more admirers in the tents of Jacob than in German houses. Jewish youths ravenously flung themselves upon French literature, and acquired its forms; French frivolity naturally made its entry at the same time. The clever daughters of Israel also ardently devoted themselves to this fashionable folly; they learned French, at first, to be sure, for the purpose of conversing in the fashionable language with the youthful cavaliers who borrowed money from their fathers. It was one more ornament with which to deck themselves. Through the influence of Mendelssohn and Lessing, such trifling gave way to earnest endeavors for the acquisition of solid knowledge, in order that they might occupy an equally exalted footing with the men. Mendelssohn's daughters, who were continually in the society of cultivated men, led the way, and stirred up emulation. In no town of Germany were there so many cultured Jewish women as in Berlin, for they learned easily, were industrious, and altogether superior to their Christian sisters in knowledge of literature.
Mendelssohn's house became the center for scientific and literary intercourse, and was the more frequented as his friends might expect to meet distinguished strangers there who were attracted by his wide-spread renown, and from whom something new might be learned. His daughters were admitted to this witty and charming society, to which they also introduced their young companions. After Mendelssohn's death David Friedländer and Marcus Herz took his place. Friedländer was, however, too stiff and plain to exercise attraction. Thus Herz's house became headquarters for Mendelssohn's friends, who became the nucleus of a large circle. Herz was a popular physician, and had numerous acquaintances among distinguished Jewish and Christian families. His lectures attracted people of every rank to his house, and those eager for knowledge were admitted into the intimacy of the family circle. Herz was gifted with caustic wit, with which he seasoned the conversation. But more powerful than his science and his genius was the influence of his wife. Hers was a magic circle, into which every native or foreign personage of importance in Berlin was magnetically drawn. Intercourse with the beautiful and gifted Jewess Henrietta Herz was, next to the court circle, the most sought after in Berlin. Had she not been misled by seductive influences, she might have been a source of rich blessings to Judaism.
This beautiful woman, then, made her house the gathering-place of the select society of Berlin, and illustrious strangers pressed for the honor of an introduction to her. Here the Christian friends of Mendelssohn, already accustomed to intercourse with Jews, mingled freely with cultured Jews, but also new men, who filled high positions, and diplomatists were to be met there. Mirabeau, in whose mind the storm-charged clouds of the Revolution were already forming, and to whom the Jews owed so much, during his secret diplomatic embassy (1786) to Berlin was more in the society of Henrietta Herz than in that of her husband. Gradually ladies of high degree and education also entered into relations with Madame Herz and her friends, attracted by the charm of refined, social communion. But her salon exercised most powerful attraction upon cultured Christian youths, by reason of its beautiful Jewish damsels and ladies, the satellites of the fair hostess. These Jewish beauties, however, did not merely form the ornament of the salon, but took an active part in the intellectual entertainment, and distinguished themselves by their originality. Gentz called them "the clever women of Jewry." Among them were two who shone by superior intellectual qualities, and combined modern culture with Jewish keenness of mind and wit: Mendelssohn's eldest daughter Dorothea, and Rachel Levin, afterwards the wife of Varnhagen von Ense. Both possessed eminent talents, in addition to which Rachel Levin had an inflexible love for truth, united with gentleness and amiability.