VI. THE TWO RABBIS. THE Rabbi Nathan, twoscore years and ten, then, Just as the almond blossomed in his hair, Counsel in need. At Ecbatana dwells 20 In righteousness and wisdom. as the trees Of Lebanon the small weeds that the bees 12. Daughter of the Voice is the meaning of Bath-Col, which was a sort of divination practised by the Jews when the gift of prophecy had died out. Something of the same sort of divination has been used amongst Christians when the Bible has been opened at hap-hazard and some answer expected to a question in the first passage that meets the eye. And he went his way Barefooted, fasting long, with many prayers; 25 But even as one who, followed unawares, Suddenly in the darkness feels a hand Thrill with its touch his own, and his cheek fanned Of words he loathes, yet cannot choose but hear, 30 So, while the Rabbi journeyed, chanting low The wail of David's penitential woe, Before him still the old temptation came, And mocked him with the motion and the shame Of such desires that, shuddering, he abhorred 35 Himself; and, crying mightily to the Lord To free his soul and cast the demon out, Smote with his staff the blankness round about. At length, in the low light of a spent day, 40 Rose on the desert's rim; and Nathan, faint 45 Answer thy prayers, O stranger!" Whereupon sense 50 Of his transgression smote him, Nathan tore 55 May purge my soul, and make it white like thine. Pity me, O Ben Isaac, I have sinned!” Awestruck Ben Isaac stood. The desert wind Blew his long mantle backward, laying bare The mournful secret of his shirt of hair. 66 60 "I too, O friend, if not in act," he said, "In thought have verily sinned. Hast thou not read, 'Better the eye should see than that desire Should wander'? Burning with a hidden fire That tears and prayers quench not, I come to thee 65 For pity and for help, as thou to me. Pray for me, O my friend!" But Nathan cried, Side by side In the low sunshine by the turban stone They knelt; each made his brother's woe his own, 70 Forgetting, in the agony and stress Of pitying love, his claim of selfishness; Peace, for his friend besought, his own became; His prayers were answered in another's name; And, when at last they rose up to embrace, 75 Each saw God's pardon in his brother's face! Long after, when his headstone gathered moss, In Rabbi Nathan's hand these words we read: 66 Hope not the cure of sin till Self is dead; 59. Which he wore as a mortification of the flesh. 77. The targum was a paraphrase of some portion of Scriptare in the Chaidee language. It was on the margin of the most ancient targum—that of Onkelos wrote his words. that Rabbi Nathan 80 Forget it in love's service, and the debt VII. THE GIFT OF TRITEMIUS. TRITEMIUS OF HERBIPOLIS, one day, Thereat the Abbot paused: the chain whereby And withered hands held up to him, who cried She cried, "For the dear love of Him who gave His life for ours, my child from bondage save, 15 My beautiful, brave first-born, chained with slaver In the Moor's galley, where the sun-smit waves Lap the white walls of Tunis!"—" What I can I give," Tritemius said: "my prayers." 20 man "0 Of God!" she cried, for grief had made her bold "Mock me not thus; I ask not prayers, but gold. Words will not serve me, alms alone suffice; "Woman!" Tritemius answered, "from our door None go unfed; hence are we always poor: 25 A single soldo is our only store. Thou hast our prayers;-what can we give thee more?" "Give me," she said, "the silver candlesticks God well may spare them on His errands sped, 30 Or He can give you golden ones instead.' "Even as thy word, Then spake Tritemius, 35 Above the gifts upon His altar piled!) Take what thou askest, and redeem thy child." But his hand trembled as the holy alms He placed within the beggar's eager palms; And as she vanished down the linden shade, 40 He bowed his head and for forgiveness prayed. So the day passed, and when the twilight came And, dumb with grateful wonder, to behold |