himself publicly on the side of the reformers. According to him, the
degradation of the Jews was due to three main causes:

1. Absence of Haskalah, that is, a rational education, founded upon
instruction in the language of the land, the ordinary branches of
knowledge, and a handicraft.

2. The ignorance of the Rabbis and preachers on all subjects outside of
religion.

3. Indulgence in luxuries, especially of the table and of dress.

If the first two causes are more or less just, the third displays a
ludicrously naive conception of life. Lebensohn was speaking of a
famished people, the majority of whom ate meat only once a week, on the
Sabbath, and he reproaches them with gastronomic excesses and
extravagance in dress. We shall see that his simple outlook was shared
by most of the Russian Maskilim.

In 1867, at the time when the struggle for the emancipation of the Jews
and internal reforms in general was at its highest point, Lebensohn
published his drama "Truth and Faith" (_Emet we-Emunah_, Wilna),
which he had written all of twenty years earlier. It is a purely
didactic work, blameless of any trace of poetic ardor. It must be
conceded that the style is clear and fluent, and the ethical problem is
stated with precision. But it lacks every attempt at analysis of
character, and is destitute of all psychologic motivation. These being
of the very essence of dramatic composition, his drama reduces itself to
a moral treatise, wearisome at once and worthless. The plan is simple
enough. Sheker (Falsehood) seeks to seduce and win over Hamon (the