Note (return) — Chapter V

These united efforts of the Government, the Maskilim, and the Jewish financiers produced an effect the like of which had perhaps been witnessed only during the Hellenistic craze, in the period of the second commonwealth of Judea. Russian Jewry began to "progress" as never before. In almost all the large cities, particularly in Odessa, St. Petersburg, and Moscow, the Jews were fast becoming Russified. Heretofore cooped up, choking each other in the Pale as in a Black Hole, they were now wild with an excessive desire for Russification. What Maimon said of a few, could now be applied to hundreds and thousands, they were "like starving persons suddenly treated to a delicious meal." They flocked to the institutions of learning in numbers far exceeding their due proportion. They were among the reporters, contributors, and editorial writers of some of the most influential Russian journals. They entered the professions, and distinguished themselves in art.11