from anxiety for certain self-sacrificing, veritably sympathetic friends, whom Destiny has brought to me from out the kindred of that national-religious element of the newer European society whose implacable hatred I have drawn upon me through discussion of peculiarities so hard to eradicate from it, and so detrimental to our culture. Yet on the other hand, I could take courage from the knowledge that these cherished friends stand on precisely the same footing as myself, nay, that they have to suffer still more grievously, and even more disgracefully, under the yoke that has fallen on all the likes of me: for I cannot hope to make my exposition quite intelligible, if I do not also throw the needful light on this yoke of the ruling Jew-society in its crushing-out of all free movement, of all true human evolution, among its kith and kin.” [740W-{1/1/69}Appendix to ‘Judaism in Music’: PW Vol. III, p. 78]
[741W-{1/1/69}Appendix to ‘Judaism in Music’: PW Vol. III, p. 119]
[P. 119] {anti-FEUER} “As you see, respected lady, I herewith certify the total victory of Judaism on every side; and if now once more I raise my voice against it, it certainly is from no idea that I can reduce by one iota the fulness of that victory. (…)
(…) {anti-FEUER} I fall back on the plea that an insight into the inevitable downfall of our musical affairs imposed on me the inner compulsion (Noethigung) to trace the causes of that fall.” [741W-{1/1/69}Appendix to ‘Judaism in Music’: PW Vol. III, p. 119]
[742W-{1/1/69}Appendix to ‘Judaism in Music’: PW Vol. III, p. 120-122]
[P. 120] “Just as humane friends of the Church have deemed possible its salutary reform through an appeal to the downtrod nether clergy, so also did I take in eye the great gifts of heart, as well as mind, which, to my genuine refreshment, had greeted me from out the sphere of Jew society itself. Most certainly am I of opinion that all which burdens native German life from that direction, weighs far more terribly on intelligent and high-souled Jews themselves. Methinks I saw tokens, at that time, of my summons having called forth understanding and profounder stir. If dependence, however, is a great ill and hindrance to free evolution in every walk of life, the dependence of the Jews among themselves appears to be a thraldom of the very utmost rigour. (…)
[P. 121] (…) If I suppose that this openness alone is able, not so much to bring me friends from out the hostile camp, as to strengthen them to battle for their own true emancipation: then perchance I may be pardoned, if a comprehensive view of our Culture’s history (ein umfassender kulturhistorischer Gedanke) screens from my mind the nature of an illusion that instinctively has found a corner in my heart. For on one thing am I clear: just as the influence which the Jews have gained upon our mental life – as displayed in the deflection and falsification of our highest culture-tendencies – just as this influence is no mere physiologic accident, so also must it be owned-to as definitive and past dispute. Whether the downfall of our Culture can be arrested by a violent ejection of the destructive foreign element, I am unable to decide, since that would require forces with whose existence I am unacquainted. If, on the contrary, this element is to be assimilated with us in such a way that in common with us, it shall ripen toward a higher evolution of our nobler human qualities: then is it obvious that no screening-off [P. 122] the difficulties of such assimilation, but only their openest exposure, can be here of any help.” [742W-{1/1/69}Appendix to ‘Judaism in Music’: PW Vol. III, p. 120-122]
