He could do all the thinking for the family, he believed; and being convinced that to hold to the outward forms of orthodox Judaism was to be hampered in the race for Americanization, he did not hesitate to order our family life on unorthodox lines.

There was no conscious despotism in this; it was only making manly haste to realize an ideal the nobility of which there was no one to dispute.
My mother, as we know, had not the initial impulse to depart from ancient usage that my father had in his habitual scepticism.

He had always been a nonconformist in his heart; she bore lovingly the yoke of prescribed conduct.

Individual freedom, to him, was the only tolerable condition of life; to her it was confusion.

My mother, therefore, gradually divested herself, at my father's bidding, of the mantle of orthodox observance; but the process cost her many a pang, because the fabric of that venerable garment was interwoven with the fabric of her soul.
My father did not attempt to touch the fundamentals of her faith.