Letter from Abraham de Sola to Isaac Leeser;August 17, 1857
- Title
- Letter from Abraham de Sola to Isaac Leeser;August 17, 1857
- Author
- Abraham de Sola
- Contributor
- Isaac Leeser
- Date Created
- 17 August 1857
- Format
- Letter. 3 page(s) on 2 sheet(s).
- Letter
- Type
- Letter
- Language(s)
- English
- Has Format
- https://colenda.library.upenn.edu/items/ark:/81431/p3ms3kn06/manifest.json
- Link to Colenda
- https://colenda.library.upenn.edu/catalog/81431-p3ms3kn06
- Physical Characteristics
- Unlined Paper
- Manuscript
- content
-
Montreal 17th August 5617.
Rev Isaac Leeser
Dear Sir
I am much obliged to you for your testimonial in favor of Mr Alber?. He is unquestionably a well educated, talented man, but very bashful—a quality not possessed by many of our Drs in the present day. I wrote Wellington Hart in his behalf for the office of Teacher in Milwaukee, and Mr A. has left Montreal for that place having been elected “in preference to others” as Mr Otterburg wrote him. He is nearer Chicago & some other western places and will have better opportunity to judge for himself. It would be a difficult thing to counteract U's prayer book It will have its run, until cut out by some other. People like abridgments nowhere better than in Prayer Books & W's as I learned is short enough in all conscience. The synagogue in America is fast approaching the state of the Protestant church there— Presently there will be a “no prayer book” no ritual at all” proposed by some, Extensive prayer being so superior, as they will assert, Indeed I should not be at all surprised to find the doctrines of Mormonism advocated by some Drs—at least polygamy for I am told that one of our celebrated nothingarians? lives with his wife in as bellicose a state as any dog & cat could desire—and what a pleasant thing it would be after swilling lager -bier or schnapps to go home where if one wife was in the blues another might be all smiles. The truth is we have too many “carnal minded Jews” in our midst. It is the
peoples fault as much as the Doctors, or could the latter play the antics they do? Eating on a Hebrew—smoking on a Hebrew I have heard some curious accounts of the doings of some of these Hebrew, but I have too much confidence in the divine strength of our holy faith to suppose that such a set can at all injure it permanently. She may have to witness some “sorry sights” but they will not remain to blast our vision longer than Banquo's ghost. I am not at all afraid, nor do I despond. Good will yet come of all the evil we see or fancy— and Judaism will remain intact though it has to withstand blows ten thousand times fiercer than those now levelled at it by hyper-orthodox or ultra heterodoxy. The middle ?—as Hebrew in his Hebrew so strongly recommends, we must ?. It is the safest because it is the truest; This is the cause I would like to see our Editors follow. We have fanatics on both sides and both are destructives.
You are mistaken or rather misinformed of the engagement of young Archer? & Louisa Joseph. It is his cousin young Altman whom people call the happy man—but we have heard yet nothing official. Your plan of making the Occident weekly is something new again; have you abandoned the Advocate enterprise altogether? I have had inquiries made about it, and I told them it was delayed. I send you by this mail a pamphlet my father denied me to send you—the life of Reggio written by my father in Dutch for the Dutch Jewish paper—but it is all Dutch to me, and I would be very glad to see an English version of it in the Occident by your Dutch translator of Dr. Mulder. The subject is very interesting and I am satisfied ably & learnedly handled. My father writes he had some little difficulty in writing Dutch after so many years.
We are honored just now with the meetings of the American Association for the promotion of Science;—the most troublesome move is of course in Philadelphia. Professor Hare, the inventor of great things no doubt & questionless a clever man—very clayver as Lord Verisopht says—but what makes me think him now a little Hebrew is that in opening a door with a couple of friends the other evening at a Soiree given to the association by the Natural History Society, we found him ? at table turning &c. Do you know him? I have made the acquaintance of several of the ? among them Dr Benedict of New Orleans—a friend of Gutheims. Dr Thomson of New York who knows Raphall & others. I am now employed (or will be when I done? this) in giving some information on Jewish Coinage for Mr Gillbon N. C. U. S. mint. The City is full—every hotel boarding house crowded—I wish you had roped over when in Detroit & remained if only to be present at the opening of the Association; I give some time to it as I have become a member, and hope to profit by the ?thrological departure.
I trust this will meet you restored to perfect health and strength, and wishing you Hebrew
I am yours truly
Abraham de Sola - Identifier
- LSDCBx2FF4_64
- Date
- 1857-08-17
Part of Letter from Abraham de Sola to Isaac Leeser;August 17, 1857
Abraham de Sola, “Letter from Abraham de Sola to Isaac Leeser;August 17, 1857”, 1857-08-17, Isaac Leeser Digital Repository, accessed September 7, 2024, https://judaicadhpenn.org/legacyprojects/s/leeser/item/66260