Note (return) — Chapter IV

The Lilienthal tragedy thus came to a premature close. The hero disappeared at the beginning of the play. He had the potency, but he lacked the conditions, for producing great results. His German birth and training, the very qualities which recommended him to the Government, operated against him when he came to deal with Russian Jews. Yet he succeeded in giving a strong impetus to the Haskalah movement, and builded better than he knew. The statement in his address at the dedication of the Riga school,14 "This hour we may call the hour of the renaissance of the mental education of Israel," which reads like an oratorical platitude, was not entirely visionary. The real history of Haskalah in Russia commences with Lilienthal.