Die Welt

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No. 37. — Vienna, 9 September 1904. — 29 Elul 5664. — 8th Year.

New Year.

A span of time is past. Out of the infinite, something finite has passed before us. Not so very much when set beside a full human life, a scarcely perceptible part in the life of nations, in the being of mankind. But they were days that we shall remember even should the age of our patriarchs be granted to us — days that will show enough of the extraordinary to those, too, who come after us.

The events of Kishineff and Homel stood fresh in our memory when we began the year. The terrors of persecutions long believed to be overcome awoke anew, and even the place of refuge that England offered us could not console us for them. It lay far away from the land that has been the goal of our longing for thousands of years, and we could take no joy in the well-meant help. It was indeed the first time since the fall of our kingdom that land had been offered to the Jewish people as such, in which it was to enjoy a modest independence; but it was not our land, not the Land.

Then mistrust and blind passion were quick to spring up in our ranks. Our ancient curse, inner discord and revolt against our leaders, threatened to shatter even our firmly knit organisation. There came the deed of the madman who, at a national festival, argued his views with a revolver, and we all saw with horror whither such dissensions must lead the weak and the fanaticised among us.

The desire for peace became general. It was then our leader who, by his wise moderation and his friendly readiness to meet them, won over his opponents too; and, thanks to him, after grievous shocks we were able to see calm and peace return to our camp.

Already we thought it was granted us to see that which had begun so sadly end in gladness. Then came the heaviest blow that could befall us. Our leader, our pride and our hope, was torn from us; he who had cared for us with the boundless love of a tender father was taken from us for ever.

Let others sniff out the small failings of this noble man; let them, for the comfort of their own littleness, zealously seek out whatever in him was all too human. Let them heap praise upon others, since they find it so hard to diminish him himself; we know what our people has lost in him, we know how many great, proud and well-founded hopes were borne to the grave in the little cemetery at Döbling. Our grief is still too young to have gripped the whole people deep in its heart, but it will not fade so long as those live who worked with him. May we be spared its growing ever more violent with the years; for that it will make itself felt even by those who stood far off is only too certain to us.

It is no sign of weakness or faint-heartedness that we cannot get over this loss. Love for our people, devotion to our cause, to which he consecrated his life, make us feel with deep pain how sad was the year that has just slipped away from us. This small span of time has been of greater significance for our people than whole decades of its life at other times. It does not count double; it is to be valued infinitely higher, and only distant descendants will be able to measure what this year signifies in the history of our people.

Therefore let us today once more remember Herzl, recall his work, and tell our people again that it owes him as much as it owes to few others for many a century.