Yet it would be an error to suppose that the emancipation and the attainments of the Jews in England were due to mere accident. Rather have they been due to certain characteristics of the English people, and to those tendencies and qualities of English civilization which have made it so distinguished and potent in the world. The rise of the Jew in England may have been slow, but it has been sure, and it came because it was inevitable under the conditions that have served to make England herself great and strong and free. It is these facts we must consider if we would understand the ascendency of the Jew in England.
First of all, there is the fact of England's democracy. It has often been observed that in no country is democracy more widespread and secure than in England. One thing is certainly true, namely, that England has led in the democratization of the world.
And nothing is more potent a lesson of history than that the Jew has always been benefited by true democracy. There have been autocrats who have been kind to the Jews, and there have been times when democracy has betrayed the Jew; but these are exceptions. As a rule, the cause of Israel in the world has gone hand in hand with the progress of democracy--of true democracy. Democracy has been an invariable aid to the Jew, and not because (as practical politicians assume sometimes) its government depends on votes, and Jews might command votes; not at all, but rather because under the protection and in the atmosphere of democracy it is easiest for principles to be promulgated and for ideals to penetrate. When we fight for the cause of democracy, when our sons are preparing to shed their blood for it, when we are asking for the support of it with our wealth and our work, let us remember that we are fighting also for the cause of Israel in the world.
That is why the great movement for democratic freedom and justice in England was bound to make for the recognition and liberation of the Jewish soul. That is why Cromwell became a champion of the re-admission of the Jews to England, and namely, of their re-admission on the most honorable terms, and not, as some of his associates would have it, surreptitiously and half-heartedly. Nay, that is why, some forty years before Cromwell's effort, in the year 1614, when Leonard Busher wrote his noteworthy tract on "_Liberty of Conscience_", he demanded that such liberty be extended to all alike, including the Jews. That is why, two centuries later, Thomas B. Macauley could not help pleading for the removal of the disabilities of the Jews, as he did in 1830 and 1834 supporting the noble efforts of Lord Holland and Robert Grant. That is why Gladstone, at first opposed to Jewish emancipation, could not help coming over to the more liberal view. It was impossible for the democratic conscience to affirm itself and for the democratic consciousness to grow in England, without freedom being granted, and justice being done, to the Jew, seeing it is for freedom and justice that democracy stands.