The Potency of the Jewish Race
By Charles W. Eliot
CHARLES WILLIAM ELIOT (born in Boston, 1834), preëminent as educator and publicist; for forty years President of Harvard University; revered not only by Harvard men but by all Americans as a great leader of thought and opinion. Dr. Eliot warmly welcomed the organization of the first Menorah Society at Harvard, in 1906; and to his encouragement is due in large measure the growth of the Menorah movement. At a time when the problems and lessons of the war are absorbing his attention, Dr. Eliot has generously shown his continued sympathy with the Menorah aims and his interest in the Menorah Journal by preparing this article.
FOR many centuries the Jews have had no country of their own or even national headquarters. They have been scattered among many nations, all more or less unfriendly, and some cruelly oppressive; yet they have retained, under the most adverse circumstances, the capacity to earn their livelihood, to bring up families, and to maintain the great traditions of their race. The main reason for the indestructibility of the Jews is that they early embraced certain invaluable ideals, and have struggled towards them indomitably for thousands of years.
Races and Ideals
THE principal difference between races is difference of ideals. Whenever several distinct races come to live side by side on the same territory in the bonds of a peaceful and coöperative fellowship for all common public purposes, it will be found that they have all reached common political and social ideals, although in regard to many racial attributes and even in regard to religious beliefs they remain distinct.
The assimilation of different races can be brought about only by a gradual acceptance of the same ideals and aspirations. For several centuries this process of assimilation has been going on in many parts of the earth, and is now going on at an accelerated pace, resulting in larger conceptions of nationality and larger political or governmental units.
The Influence of Lofty Ideals on the Jewish Race