The Jew and American Ideals | Page 8

well aware of the capacity
of the human mind to believe whatever accords with preconceived
prejudices, suspicions, or impressions, even in the face of evidence to
the contrary, and, correspondingly, to reject the most conclusive
evidence when it runs counter to such prejudices, suspicions, or

impressions. Laying upon my own mind the warning implied by this
knowledge, and guarding myself against the danger of rejecting, or
ignoring, or undervaluing unpleasant and unwelcome facts, I am bound
to say that those who find in these alleged protocols a sufficient basis
for bringing the Jewish race under indictment seem to me to have
brought preconceived suspicion and fear of the Jew to their study of the
documents themselves. Personally, I can find nothing in them which
suggests any highly organized intelligence, such as the leaders of the
Jewish race represent and command in abundance; rather, they seem to
me to clearly indicate the disordered mind and distorted vision of a
very common type of monomaniac, the genus "crank."
I believe that historical study is not one of Mr. Ford's strong points, but,
even so, he must be aware of the fact that it is one of the commonest
things in history to encounter charges of conspiracy directed against
religious and political sects, supported by more or less plausible
arguments and believed by considerable numbers of people. Were it
necessary to my purpose, and did time permit, I could quite easily fill a
considerable volume with illustrations of this fact. For example, there
exists a great literature devoted to the object of proving that the Vatican
is the headquarters of such a conspiracy to bring about or to attain
world domination. Thousands of books and pamphlets have been
written to convict the Jesuits of such a conspiracy, many of them far
more convincing than these protocols. Pamphlets aiming to convince
the American people that the Knights of Columbus is an organization
aiming at the overthrow of the American Republic and the
establishment of the temporal sovereignty of the Pope over the United
States have been circulated by the million. It is a matter of court record
that this charge has been supported by the publication of what
purported to be exact copies of oaths pledging the members of that
organization to the end stated. Let me say at once that I do not credit
these sensational stories and charges. I have confined myself to charges
made against one of the two great sections of Christianity for reasons
which seem to me peculiarly cogent. The charges made against the
Jews have produced the most terrible results in the countries where the
Roman Catholic Church is strongest, and no leader of the Christian
religion has such strong reason for denouncing such appeals to

prejudice and hatred as the head of that Church.
Belief in widespread conspiracies directed against individuals or the
state is probably the commonest form assumed by the human mind
when it loses its balance and its sense of proportion. I venture to hazard
the opinion that of all the cranks who have pestered Mr. Ford since he
has attained a conspicuous position, those who imagined themselves to
be the victims of conspiracies have outnumbered all the others. These
protocols are either preposterous forgeries deliberately wrought for the
purpose of fostering anti-Semitism in Russia, or they are the pitiable
ravings of a familiar type of monomaniac.
Concerning the authorship of the protocols, there has been much
conjecture, especially on the part of those who have seriously regarded
them as an authentic expression of Jewish opinion. It has been
whispered in those places where the so-called Jewish question is
discussed, that they are the work of the well-known Zionist leader, Dr.
Theodor Herzl. This is the theory which Nilus himself advances in the
introduction to the edition of 1917. He says:
... my book has already reached the fourth edition, but it is only
definitely known to me now and in a manner worthy of belief, and that
through Jewish sources, that these protocols are nothing other than the
strategic plans for the conquest of the world under the heel of Israel,
and worked out by the leaders of the Jewish people ... and read to the
Councils of Elders by the "Prince of Exile," Theodor Herzl, during the
first Zionist Congress, summoned by him in August, 1897, in Basle.
This is the first time Nilus has so much as hinted at the date of the
alleged secret conclave of the Elders of Zion, at the close of which,
according to the story of 1905 so elaborately contradicted in 1917, the
protocols were stolen by a woman. It is perhaps as well to remark in
passing that the first Zionist Congress was held in the open and its
proceedings freely reported in the press. Now, Herzl