By the time that these lines are in print Mr. Belloc’s latest book will have been reviewed in many papers; and I cannot but fear that, if it is taken as gravely as it deserves, it will provoke impatient comment from both English and Jewish readers. For it has been written deliberately to raise the Jewish question, to make it a conscious issue, and to insist that only by the frank acceptance of this issue on both sides can an impending calamity be forestalled. At the moment, for reasons which Mr. Belloc explains, there is only one section of the community alertly conscious of the Jewish problem, and anxious to raise it, namely the Anti-Semites, who are eager to take the first opportunity of attacking the Jews. The rest of us, including the Jews themselves, do not want the question raised at all, and even deny its existence. They severally declare, or wish it be assumed, that the Jews are not an alien nation, but fellow nationals only differentiated by a religion peculiar to themselves. It would not be surprising therefore if the first effect of the book were to excite an irrational Jewish protest, scepticism and annoyance in the general mass, and among the Anti-Semites embittered disappointment that one as alive to the issue as themselves should yet deliberately dissociate himself from their antagonistic policy. For in matters liable to acute controversy the disinterested seeker after truth and consideration is rarely welcomed.

Mr. Belloc is not an Anti-Semite.