Wherever I went and whatever I did, the hump
was with me; at night it disturbed my sleep, and in my waking hours,
when I was among people, it filled me with feelings of confusion and
shame.
It is not my intention to demonstrate the soundness and justice of the
proposed measures and to force the door which to me was always open,
but I am going to take the liberty of adding a few more words about my
hump. When did the "Jewish question" leap on my back?--I do not know.
I was born with it and under it. From the very moment I assumed a
conscious attitude towards life until this very day I have lived in
its noisome atmosphere, breathed in the poisoned air which surrounds
all these "problems," all these dark, harrowing alogisms, unbearable
to the intellect.
Who needs it? Whom does it benefit? If all this exists and is
supported, if there are people who assert it fiercely and firmly,
there must be some definite sense in it; evidently, the Pale, the
educational norm, and the rest increase mankind's sum of joy, exalt
life, broaden the limits of human possibilities.
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