Note 25 — INDEX

Footnote 25:

(return)

The same phenomenon was witnessed to a certain extent also in Galicia, where for a while Haskalah flourished in great splendor. There, too, the charm and fecundity of German literature, the similarity of Yiddish to German, and the privileges the Austrian Government accorded them, proved too strong a temptation for the Jews, and many of those who became enlightened were rapidly assimilated with their Gentile countrymen. While, therefore, in Galicia the Haskalah movement lasted longer than in Germany, it had ceased long before it reached its fullest development in Russia. Austrian civilization accelerated the assimilation of the educated, Polish prejudice retarded the progress of the masses. So that though Erter, Letteris, Krochmal, Goldenberg, Mieses, Rapoport, Perl, and Schorr exerted a great influence in Russia, their own country remained unaffected. Many of them, like A. Peretz, Eichenbaum, Feder, Pinsker, Werbel, and Rosenfeld emigrated to Russia, where they found a wider field for their activities, while others, like Professor Ludwig Gumplowicz, the sociologist, Marmorek, the physician, and Scheps, the litterateur, became alienated from their former coreligionists.