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An eagle flew across a sunlit sky,

In joy and pride;

But lo, an unseen hand clutched it on high,

It fell and died.

A Prince in Israel bestrode the height,

Where greatness stepped;

But God's Dark Angel claimed him in the night;

He sighed and slept.

Approach, ye multitudes, from far and near,

Both old and young;

Though God erase from off your faces each tear,
Give grief its tongue.

Ye thousands, faithful stewards of his creed,
Whose hearts he filled;

Ye youths, whose praise was love and righteous deed;
His voice is stilled.

Ye throngs of children, eager once to press

His garment's hem,

Now chant for him, and win his soul's caress,
Your requiem.

He raised disciples, like Meir of old,

In his own name;

Their lips he kindled, striking heat from cold,
With living flame.

Ye soldier dead, who tramp Valhalla's floor,

A comrade comes,

Who soothed your fears when death flung wide its door, With trump and drums.

He nursed you when in shellfire reason swooned;

He closed your eyes;

He eased the anguish of each burning wound

With sacrifice.

Attend, ye phantom martyrs of the war;
Your welcome lend;

For God has placed His servant in your corps,
And blessed your friend.

THE HUNDRED

BEST AVAILABLE BOOKS IN

ENGLISH ON JEWISH SUBJECTS

Experience has proved the usefulness to Jewish and non-Jewish readers of the list published under the foregoing title by the late Joseph Jacobs in the American Jewish Year Book, 5665, pp. 309-317. The desire to adapt the list to the needs of the present day and to make it more readily accessible is responsible for its publication in the following revised form.

In a general way, the present list rests upon principles similar to the judicious rules that guided Jacobs. Thus an effort has been made to omit books entirely unavailable; hence such omissions as that of the works of Philo, extant in English only in the very rare Bohn translation. It should also be noted that Jacobs' brief but incisive critical remarks on the books taken over from his list have been left virtually untouched.

There are, however, considerable differences between the previous list and the present one. These are due chiefly to the fact that there has been a gratifying increase in the production of English Judaica during the past twenty years. As a result, more changes than were anticipated have been required; only 38 numbers are common to both lists. Jacobs frankly admitted, for instance, that he had to fill the list of one hundred titles by admitting several books dubiously worthy of his hospitality. There is no

longer any need so to do. The problem is rather one of

exclusion.

Thus it has become necessary to set limits narrower than those of 1904. The purpose of the present list is to lead lay readers of a serious trend to Jewish books they might not readily know of, and particularly to assist librarians in meeting their needs. Hence works having an established place in general literature have been omitted. The reader will thus understand the exclusion of the Bible and the Apocrypha, as well as of works about them. The Jewish Publication Society plans to issue at some future time a list of books on the Bible recommendable from a Jewish point of view. It may, however, not be amiss to state here that non-Jewish critics of note have assigned to the translation of The Holy Scriptures issued by the Jewish Publication Society a high place among such versions. Again, writings or biographies of Jews who are well known to the world at large have been excluded, unless their writings as a whole have a specially direct bearing on Judaism; hence the absence of such names as those of Beaconsfield, Judah P. Benjamin, Heine, Lassalle, Karl Marx, Spinoza, as against the inclusion of Josephus and Mr. Zangwill. The omission of such books as George Eliot's Daniel Deronda is to be accounted for somewhat similarly. The foregoing omissions may readily be supplied if desired by consulting Jacobs' list in its original form, as well as the comprehensive and helpful Classified List of Standard Books in English on Jewish Subjects compiled by Mr. I. George Dobsevage in the American Jewish Year Book, 5684, pp. 204-255. Mr. Dobsevage's list will also be of service to those seeking books in some of the various

other classes excluded from the present list, sermons, prayer-books, juvenilia, and technical literature such as works on education and erudition pure and simple.

The desire to stimulate serious reading and the exclusion of books well known to the general reader have restricted the number of works of fiction included in the present list. Those interested in such books should consult Mr. Dobsevage's List of Avaliable Stories of Jewish Interest in English (American Jewish Year Book, 5667, 130-142), as well as his later list just mentioned, and the Bibliography of Jewish Life in the Fiction of America and England by Rebecca Schneider (Albany, New York State Library School, 1916).

As Jacobs says, "besides books in the proper sense of the word there are periodical collections and publications which often contain interesting matter and information, such as the Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society and the Jewish Historical Society of England, The Jewish Quarterly Review; [The Jewish Review (London; now defunct) ;] The Menorah Journal; The Year Book of The Central Conference of American Rabbis; The Jewish Literary Annual; while much information is contained in the Jewish Year Book of London and the American Jewish Year Book". The latter contains, for instance, (5675, pp. 24-158; also separately, 1915) Miss Henrietta Szold's Recent Jewish Progress in Palestine, the best discussion of Zionistic colonisation in English, as well as several notable biographical sketches by Dr. Cyrus Adler (also available in reprints), and much other material of interest. The necrologies, again, contained in the Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society, among

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