seminaries! But probably there will be nothing else for me to do. If the winter evenings here are really so long and dreary, I may not be able to resist the torment of hearing young lips, soft and rosy for kissing, put the question to me: "What do you think of Nietzsche's 'Beyond evil and good,'" or "Do you think the painters of the Quatrocento and the Secessionists have anything in common?" How that hurts! Almost a physical pain! At all events it has often spoilt my taste for kissing soft, rosy lips.

If I would seek wisdom, if I would drink at the source of life, here, in this place, I shall not go to youth, but to old age.

I spent some time again with Simon Eichelkatz this afternoon. Outside it was raining and storming. A raw, grey day of autumn, the first this year. Up to this time the weather has been good. Over the small, quiet room a something brooded, something contemplative, genial, spiritual. Half dream-like, half meditative. Like the dying away of a great melody. I wondered if Simon Eichelkatz had ever heard of Stimmungen. I longed to put the question to him. "Tell me, Reb Shimme" (that is how I call him now), "when you are here all by yourself, in this great silence, do you ever have a feeling as if—as if—how should I say?—as if you were a part of your surroundings, as if everything that is about you helped along to give form to certain ideas in your mind?"

I had to smile as I put the question. "Now say milieu," I scoffed at myself; and yet I never before felt the significance of the word so strongly as in that moment. The old man looked at me as though he wanted to find the meaning of the incomprehensible question in my face. His gaze, still clear and keen, rested on me thoughtfully, then passed quickly through the room, as though this would bring him enlightenment upon the relevancy of my question. Finally, he said slowly, as though he were formulating his thoughts only with difficulty:

"I hear the silence about me—is that what you mean, Herr Doktor? I hear the silence, and so I am not alone. My soul is not deaf, and everything about me speaks to me. And the table has a language, and the chair on which I sit, and my pipe, Herr Doktor, my long pipe, it talks a good deal—and the Kiddush cup here, and the spice-box—I wonder what they have lived through and have to tell about—and when the sun shines outside and peeps through the window, it's one thing, and when it rains like to-day, it's another." He rested his head on his hand. "But the silence is never dead—it lives as I live."

Friedrich Eichner's form rose before me, as it looked several years ago, when I heard him in his lecture room speak on Zarathustra's "still hour."

"That's just what is called Stimmungen, Reb Shimme," I said, as in a confused dream. He nodded his head several times, but said nothing in response.

September 25.

To-day Simon Eichelkatz told me about Rabbi Dr. Merzbach. This is his favorite topic. He finds the most forceful expressions when he gets to talking about him. "That was a man!" he exclaims over and over again, "fine, clever, good—much too good for the Parchonim in the Khille. My, how it did look when he came here! I remember it as though it were yesterday. The first Shabbes in Shul—it was still the old Shul—they little dreamed a time would come when there would be a 'New Synagogue.' And he built it. The old one was almost more below the ground than above it. And that's the way the people here were, too. Black! Black of heart, black of morals! And first he built a new synagogue in the spirits of the people, and then he built a synagogue of stone and wood, so that they could hold their services in a worthy place. That's what he said, Herr Doktor, I can hear him preaching yet; and I learned much from what he said, for I never missed a sermon, and, besides, he was good and friendly toward me and spoke with me as often as he saw me. A great scholar—a real Doktor, not just a Talmid Chochom; he knew other things, too. On that first Shabbes, the old Shul was so full that the people stood out on the street, and they were so quiet, you could hear every word. And there he preached, like Mosheh Rabbenu when he came down from Mount Sinai to the Children of Israel. Not that they were bad, he told them, but that they must become better. And that they must not let themselves be ruled by their instincts and desires, but that each one must work away at himself to become nobler, more intelligent, and that each one could do this, because it was his Divine heritage, which was given to every man when God created him in His image. And they should be proud to be men, and for that they should acquire the dignity of man. It sounded glorious; and even if they didn't understand him, they were so touched, they would cry, and say it was rare good fortune for the congregation that such a man had become their Rav. People came from all the places near here to listen to the sermons of Doktor Salomon Merzbach; and in the wine-room of Heimann at the Ring you heard about nothing else. Whoever was fine, or wanted to be considered fine, stuck to him at first, but still more the plain people and the poor and unfortunate, because to them he was like a messenger of God."

The narrator paused a while, as though he were letting the past take form again in his mind.

"He was gentle with the bad, and friendly and forbearing with the hardened and the malicious, and he explained to them, that if it was their will, they could be good, because the will was given to man to be exerted and to be conquered. I was still young then, and I did not understand him; but one thing I did understand, that a great and good man had come to preach in our wilderness."

Whence had Simon Eichelkatz taken these metaphors, these conceptions, these words? I stood before a great riddle.

"But later," he continued, "I understood what he meant. In ourselves there is nothing good and nothing bad; it is only what we do, how we act that determines the moral worth of things." I had to suppress an exclamation. I jumped up and hastily said good-night. It was positively uncanny to hear the new values, the basic principles of good and evil, conveyed by one so absolutely unsuspecting of their import. The Jews, without doubt, possess philosophic instincts.

When I stepped out into the open air, it was still raining. Impenetrable clouds hung low in the heavens, as if the whole world would sink down into the cold, trickling mass of fog. The steps leading down to the Flour Market were smooth and slippery. I groped my way cautiously.

"Verily, I say unto you: Good and evil that perishes not—there is no such thing. Out of itself it must always reconquer itself."

I said these words half aloud. I shivered, and worn and weary I crept home.

September 26.

Now I know about how Dr. Salomon Merzbach looked. Simon Eichelkatz owns an old daguerreotype of him, which he cherishes carefully and honors as a holy relic. He showed it to me when I was there this morning. On the shining, mirror-like surface, the features were almost obliterated; but when I shaded it with my hand, they came out more distinctly. A fine, noble face, a lovable expression, and endlessly good. In the eyes a gleam as of hidden scorn, but benevolence, too, and good humor—perhaps some sadness. He looks, not as one who scoffs at the weaknesses of his fellow-men, but as one who pities them, sympathizes with them. The supernal humor of the wise man plays about the strong mouth with its somewhat sensuous lips. In studying the features, one feels the greatness and goodness of a pure nature. A narrow line of beard frames the face and rounds off under the strong chin, giving the countenance a clerical expression, reminding one more of a pastor