different religion and particularly of their antagonism to the doctrine of the Incarnation and all that flowed from that doctrine. And there had been even, before that great quarrel, the reproach that they were bad citizens within the pagan Roman Empire, perpetually in rebellion against it and guilty of massacring other Roman citizens.
In another civilization than ours, in that of Islam, another set of reproaches had arisen, or rather another species of contempt and oppression. After long periods of peace there would come, in particular regions, the most violent oppression. Within the last few years, for instance, a Jew in Morocco was treated as though he was hardly human. He had to turn his face to the wall when any magnate was passing by. He had to dress in a particular manner to mark him off as something degraded among his fellow-beings. He might not ride through the gate of a town, but had to dismount. There were twenty actions normal to civic life in the Moroccan city which were forbidden to the Jew.
All this is as much as to say that the friction between the Jews and those among whom they live is always present, and has always been present, now latent, now rising furiously to the surface, now grumbling through long periods of uncertain peace, now boiling over in all the evils of persecution—which is as much as to say that this friction between Jew and non-Jew, while finding different excuses for its action on different occasions, has been a force permanently at work everywhere and at all times.
What is the cause of it? What is its nature?
The matter is very difficult to approach, because we are not dealing with things susceptible of positive proof. You can prove from historical record that the thing has existed. You can show its terrible effects, ceaselessly recurrent throughout all our history. But it is another matter to analyse the unseen forces which produce it, and any such analysis can be no more than an attempt.