With much of this ideal the modern world has lost sympathy, but the Judaism of the first century maintained it and built on it a moral structure which had never been excelled amongst all the manifold attempts made by man to arrive at an effective discipline of life.
In Jewish law divorce was always, from first to last, the husband's act. Where the wife was the moving party she could only demand that her husband should divorce her. It was not probable that the death penalty for conjugal infidelity was inflicted in the age of Jesus. It would seem, however, that the ordeal of the bitter waters in the case of a suspected wife was still prevalent.
Book Notices
The first volume of Moneypenny's Life of Beaconsfield has been published by the Maomillans. This volume is devoted to Disraeli's youth, and concludes with his entrance into Parliament, after a great deal of rather vociferous political hack work on the part of the future statesman. His juvenile letters reveal him as a person with an inordinate amount of conceit and vanity, but one catches glimpses of the shrewd statesman who later, in spite of his being a Jew, was the leader of British politics for a long number of years. Probably the political methods Disraeli adopted at the time were quite common, but they leave an impression of a man who was determined to succeed no matter what tactics he adopted.
Mr. Zwee Cohen has published his little book on the Holy Land, with the name "The Mirror of Palestine." It is in Yiddish, and contains a large amount of firsthand observation, couched in simple, terse and at times forceful language. Mr. Cohen is a sturdy upholder of the view that the Jews should without parley enter into the practical work of reviving the Holy
Land, and his book is directed to the task of clearing up the obscurity that hovers about that much debated phrase. By practical work he means the settlement of Palestine by Jews, and it does not mat-: ter to him what theories one may hold as to the principles of Zionism, if the work is done He sees great danger to the future of the Jews in Palestine if they neglect to do the work at once, for he views with alarn the great activities of Germans in the same territory and is afraid that if the work is now delayed the great opportunity will be lost. The book is. an excellent guide to prospective settlers, containing descriptive matter, statistical data, direotions, fares and a thousand and one details of considerable value. For copies of the book, which is published by Mr. Cohen himself, he may be addressed at 200 East Broadwar.
Mr. Herman Bernstein is the sponsor for Leonid Andreyev, the Russian writer. An English translation of "The Seven who were Hanged," was published by Mr. Bernstein last year. This year he has translated Andreyev's symbolic drama "Anathema," which comes to us with the Macmillan imprint. "Anathema" bears a close resemblance in form to Gordin's "Gott, Mench und Teufel," but its symbolism is enveloped in obscurity, although there are a number of scenes of great beauty. The character of Anathema, the Accursed, is very difficult to explain, and as a result, his relations with David Leizer, the hero of the drama, lack interest and clarity. Had the author deigned to solve his own riddle, the work would have gained a great deal, for it has in it the undeveloped germ of a great idea. The play is being given on the Yiddish stage, where its delineation of Jewish life is revealed in all its incongruity. At times the figure of David Leizer resembles Job, at other times Jesus, but at no time is it a Jewish figure.