"'They say, Gütele, that you are wise. Tell me, then, I beg you, what is a soul?'
"Only all at once she grew sad, and tears filled her eyes.
"'I just happened to think,' she said, 'when my mother of blessed memory was alive, my father used to say that she was his soul ... they loved each other so much!...'
"I do not know how it came to me, only I suddenly took hold of her hand, and trembling, said:
From these two soulful, tender stories, we pass to one not less pathetic and an even more profound psychological study. The beggar-student, harmlessly insane, has grown faint from two days' fasting and long poring over the Talmud, and is discussing with himself whether he is one, or two, or more, and whether he is really himself. He has finally the same doubts of Wolf the Merchant, who is just reading in the Talmud. He imagines that three Wolfs are sitting there: one who is trying to cheat God with his piety; one who cheats his fellow-men in his shop; and one who beats his wife who furnishes the beggar-student with an occasional meal. He takes a violent dislike to the third Wolf, and would like to kill him, but he does not wish to injure the other two Wolfs. The monologue of this beggar-student, told in about twenty octavo pages, is one of the most remarkable to be found in any literature: it must be read in the original to be fully appreciated.
With such a book Perez made his entrance into the field of letters. To say that his future works show a riper talent would be to place too low an estimate on his first book, which, in spite of the many excellent things he has written, still remains among the very best. In 1891, when Spektor's annual was temporarily suspended, and Rabinowitsch's periodical had ceased appearing, Perez issued a new periodical, _Die jüdische Bibliothēk_, which he intended to be a semi-annual, but of which only three volumes have so far been issued. In the introduction to the first volume Perez makes a plea for the education of the people, in which are the following significant words: "Help us educate the poor, wretched people; leave them not a prey to fanatics, who will suck out the last trace of blood and the last trace of marrow from their lean bones. Leave them not in the hands of the visionaries, who will entice them into wildernesses! Let not boys and school-children lead them by the nose,--have pity on the people! Let them not fall! The people have in themselves a certain amount of vital power, a fund of energy. The people are the carriers of a civilization that the world does not undervalue, of ideas that would be of great use to it. The people are an ever living flower.... In daytime, when the sun shines, when the spirit of man is developing, it revives and unfolds its leaves; but no sooner does dark night approach than it closes up again, shrivels up, and goes back into itself.... It is then that it has the appearance of a common weed ... and when the sun once more rises, some time passes before the sun seeks out the flower and the flower discovers that the sun shines.... At night it becomes dusty and soiled, so that the beams of light cannot penetrate it easily! Help the people to recognize the sun early in the morning!... But the main thing, means must be devised for the people to earn a living...."