Note 30 — Chapter VI · NATIONS, WHETHER PROGRESSING OR STAGNATING, ARE INDEPENDENT OF THE REGIONS IN WHICH THEY LIVE

We may cite, on the subject treated in this chapter, the opinion of a learned historian, though it is rather truculent in tone:

“A large number of writers are convinced that the country makes the people; that the Bavarians or the Saxons were predestined by the nature of the soil to become what they are to-day; that Protestantism does not suit the South, nor Catholicism the North, and so on. Some of the people who interpret history in the light of their meagre knowledge, narrow sympathies, and limited intelligence would like to show that the nation of which we are speaking (the Jews) possessed such and such qualities—whether these gentlemen understand the nature of the qualities or not—merely from having lived in Palestine instead of India or Greece. But if these great scholars, who are so clever in proving everything, would condescend to reflect that the soil of the Holy Land has contained in its limited area very different peoples, with different ideas and religions, and that between these various peoples and their successors at the present day there have been infinite degrees of diversity, although the actual country has remained the same—they would then see how little influence is exerted by material conditions on a nation’s character and civilization.” Ewald, Geschichte des Volkes Israel, vol. i, p. 259.