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@@ -1,36 +1,4 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Epic of Saul, by William Cleaver Wilkinson - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org - - -Title: The Epic of Saul - -Author: William Cleaver Wilkinson - -Release Date: July 18, 2013 [EBook #43247] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EPIC OF SAUL *** - - - - -Produced by David Edwards and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 43247 *** [Illustration: Titlepage] @@ -44,9 +12,9 @@ A SEQUEL TO "THE EPIC OF SAUL" The action of THE EPIC OF PAUL begins with that conspiracy formed at Jerusalem against the life of the apostle, which in the sequel led to a prolonged suspension of his free missionary career. It embraces -the incidents of his removal from Jerusalem to Caesarea, of his +the incidents of his removal from Jerusalem to Cæsarea, of his imprisonment at the latter place, of his journey to Rome for trial -before Caesar, and of his final martyrdom. The design of the poem as a +before Cæsar, and of his final martyrdom. The design of the poem as a whole is to present through conduct on Paul's part and through speech from him, a living portrait of the man that he was, together with a reflex of his most central and most characteristic teaching. Its @@ -236,7 +204,7 @@ SAUL AND GAMALIEL. One upright pillar in a fallen state. Fallen, for Rome had pushed her foaming wave Of conquest far into the East, and laid - Judaea under deluge, quiet now, + Judæa under deluge, quiet now, But deep, of domination absolute-- A weight as of the sea upon her breast. Jerusalem was glorious to behold, @@ -245,7 +213,7 @@ SAUL AND GAMALIEL. Alas, but more her glory, more her shame! For all her glory was the Roman's now, The queen a vassal at a tyrant's feet, - She Caesar serving who should serve but God. + She Cæsar serving who should serve but God. And, worse disgrace than heathen servitude, There recreant Jews were found, and more and more, Who their hearts sold to their captivity, @@ -287,7 +255,7 @@ SAUL AND GAMALIEL. False children unto Abraham, to vex Our nation's peace and shame us to our foes. The son of Joseph suffered his desert, - Accursed, on the tree, pretender vile, + Accurséd, on the tree, pretender vile, Who out of Nazareth came forth to claim Messiahship, the gift of David's line, And trailed a glorious banner in the dust, @@ -342,7 +310,7 @@ SAUL AND GAMALIEL. In words that flamed like lightning and that smote Like thunder-stones, against those grovelling men Who Israel taught to grovel at the feet - Of Galilaean Jesus crucified, + Of Galilæan Jesus crucified, Accepted for the Christ, forsooth, of God! Such wish, becoming purpose, Saul has brought This evening to Gamaliel, with high hope, @@ -586,7 +554,7 @@ SAUL AND GAMALIEL. Forthwith the captain of the temple goes, His band attending, and, no violence shown-- For fear was on them of the people, lest - They stone them--leads the Galilaeans in. + They stone them--leads the Galilæans in. Robed venerably each in rich array Of purple, and fine linen, glistering white @@ -602,7 +570,7 @@ SAUL AND GAMALIEL. And, while the high-priest of their nation, throned Middle and chief among the councillors, Denouncing asked: "Did we not straitly bid - Forbear to teach in this accursed name? + Forbear to teach in this accurséd name? And, lo, ye fill Jerusalem with bruit, And seek to bring on us this person's blood!"-- While thus, sternly, he spoke, those simple men @@ -635,7 +603,7 @@ SAUL AND GAMALIEL. The steady, prompt obedience, the serene Courage that dared, without defying, all The terrors brandished by the Sanhedrim-- - This spirit, strange in those despised men, + This spirit, strange in those despiséd men, As with a soft and subtle atmosphere Enfolding and suffusing him, subdued The solid temper of his mind, the strong @@ -678,7 +646,7 @@ SAUL AND GAMALIEL. A full and fell accord conjoined them there!-- Was doubt or question to the Sanhedrim; But in what chosen way their chosen goal, - The doom of death for those accursed men, + The doom of death for those accurséd men, With safe sure speed, most prudently, to reach-- This doubt embroiled a vehement debate. @@ -765,7 +733,7 @@ SAUL AND GAMALIEL. And were at peace! In that secure retreat Withdrawn, the secret place of the Most High, The angel of the Lord encamping round, - Composedly at leisure they looked out + Composédly at leisure they looked out And saw the wicked plot against the just, Vainly, and gnash upon him with his teeth! Within their hearts they knew his day would come. @@ -954,7 +922,7 @@ SAUL AND THE SANHEDRIM. Should rise for speech--and that beloved gray head Before me bowed, unready yet--might seem Unseemly. But to speak after he speaks, - My own revered guide, the guide of all, + My own reveréd guide, the guide of all, Would be, should I then speak to differ, more Unseemly still. And what I have to say, Being my thought, burns in me to be said, @@ -1110,7 +1078,7 @@ SAUL AND THE SANHEDRIM. And reverence his in ample revenue, Was easy master of the Sanhedrim: On him the council rested and revolved, - As on a fixed centre and support. + As on a fixéd centre and support. And now 'Gamaliel! let us hear at last Gamaliel's word' was suddenly the sole, The simultaneous, silent thought to all. @@ -1190,11 +1158,11 @@ SAUL AND THE SANHEDRIM. I dread to trust myself, lest I, myself Obeying, misdeem myself obeying God. - "Hearken, my children. These accused men + "Hearken, my children. These accuséd men Unlikely, most unlikely, choice of Heaven To be His prophets, seemed, and seem, to me. I look at them and find no prophet mien; - I listen and their Galilaean speech + I listen and their Galilæan speech Offends me; and far more the scandal is To think what message they propound to us. Their person and their message I reject-- @@ -1453,7 +1421,7 @@ SAUL AGAINST STEPHEN. That fountain darkling in the depths of self Whence into light all streams of being flowed. Saul daily, nightly, waking, sleeping, dreamed - Of a new nation, his beloved own, + Of a new nation, his belovéd own, Resurgent from the dust consummate fair, And, for chief corner-stone, with shoutings reared To station in the stately edifice-- @@ -1843,7 +1811,7 @@ SAUL AGAINST STEPHEN. And ever a blessing true it is to men To bend the neck beneath an equal yoke Of ruler strong and wise and just to rule. - Then will at last the Gentiles blessed be + Then will at last the Gentiles blesséd be In Abraham, when, from Abraham's loins derived Through David, God's Anointed shall begin, In David's city, His long government @@ -1917,10 +1885,10 @@ SAUL AGAINST STEPHEN. With their illiterate 'Lo, here!' 'Lo, there!'" At this increasing burst of scorn from Saul, - Exultant like the paean and the cry + Exultant like the pæan and the cry That rises through the palpitating air When storming warriors take the citadel, - Once more from Rachel's fixed eyes the tears + Once more from Rachel's fixéd eyes the tears Of sympathetic exultation flowed-- The sister with the brother, as in strife Before the battle striving equally, @@ -2200,7 +2168,7 @@ STEPHEN AGAINST SAUL. He proudly, confidently deemed, against Whatever counter force of eloquence-- This tenure his he saw relaxed, dissolved, - Evanished, as it had never been. + Evanishéd, as it had never been. Perplexed, astonished, but impenetrable, Though dashed and damped in spirit and in hope, Angry he stood, recoiled upon himself. @@ -2340,7 +2308,7 @@ STEPHEN AGAINST SAUL. Resentment fated to bear bitter fruit, But melt at last in gracious shame and tears. - With fixed look impassible, he gazed + With fixéd look impassible, he gazed At Stephen, while, in altered phase, that pure Effulgence of apostleship burned on: "Nor, brethren, let this word of mine become @@ -2931,14 +2899,14 @@ SAUL AND SHIMEI. Though not quite on his errand; Rome agrees To wink, while we indulge ourselves in what To us will be self-rule resumed, to her, - A spasm of our Judaean savagery. + A spasm of our Judæan savagery. Thus is the way made eligibly clear For brother Mattathias with those stones He raves about on all occasions--rubbed Smooth, they must be, as David's from the brook, With constant wear in Mattathias' hands! Was it not grim to hear him talk that day? - His dream of Maccabaean blood aboil + His dream of Maccabæan blood aboil Within his veins has been too much for him, Made him a monomaniac on this point; He sees before him visionary stones, @@ -3293,7 +3261,7 @@ SAUL AND RACHEL. "But when," said Saul, forestalling ruefully The expected and the dreaded change and fall - From such a chanted paean to his praise-- + From such a chanted pæan to his praise-- "But when"-- "But when, O Saul," she said, "when he, @@ -3875,7 +3843,7 @@ STEPHEN AND RUTH. And that far more which never tongue could say, Surges upon me, surge on surge of thought And feeling, like an overflowing flood, - Beloved, then, how weak I am, how frail, + Belovéd, then, how weak I am, how frail, How low and like to die! I lean toward thee, As if the oak should lean upon his vine." @@ -4183,7 +4151,7 @@ STEPHEN MARTYR. Which late from Saul ye heard concerning wounds Intended to this Jewish commonwealth, Ye now have heard forsooth again from these-- - How temple, law, and well-beloved ways + How temple, law, and well-belovéd ways Bequeathed us by our fathers from of old Are threatened in the message that I preach. @@ -4408,7 +4376,7 @@ STEPHEN MARTYR. Meantime a different scene has quietly Been passing unperceived. That company Of ministering women Rachel found, - Salome, and the Marys, blessed name! + Salomé, and the Marys, blessed name! With others who had followed and bewailed When Jesus suffered--these, joined now by those From Bethany, with Lazarus, prevailed @@ -4418,7 +4386,7 @@ STEPHEN MARTYR. Nigh Stephen, and in undertones could speak With him, and hear his words. "Weep not for me," - He said, "ye blessed! I am well content. + He said, "ye blesséd! I am well content. I think how short the way is, not how sharp, To Jesus where just now I saw Him. There He stood in heaven on the right hand of God. @@ -4427,7 +4395,7 @@ STEPHEN MARTYR. I spring toward Him with joy unutterable. I shall not feel the pain, which will but speed Me thither. He hath overcome the world. - Be of good cheer, beloved, ye who wait + Be of good cheer, belovéd, ye who wait A little longer to behold His face. For you too He hath overcome the world. Be strong, be faithful, be obedient, @@ -4532,7 +4500,7 @@ STEPHEN MARTYR. This seen by those, they soon responsively Resumed composure like his own, and walked, Following, molested not, at small remove - From the beloved martyr, cheering him, + From the belovéd martyr, cheering him, And cheered, with sense of some society. So, on, with going less precipitate, @@ -4545,7 +4513,7 @@ STEPHEN MARTYR. Austere, impassive, automatic men Armed, who, though few they might be, yet meant Rome. - Arrived at length at the accursed spot, + Arrived at length at the accurséd spot, They stay. The ground about was strewn with stones, Rejected fragments from the quarry cleft, Flakes from the mason's chisel, interspersed @@ -4645,7 +4613,7 @@ STEPHEN MARTYR. Melted away meanwhile the multitude In silence, and, soon after, all were gone Save the true lovers of the man. Then these - Gathered together round the accursed spot, + Gathered together round the accurséd spot, Now hallowed, where he stood to suffer, where He prayed, and where he fell, and whence he rose Deathless, leaving the sacred body there, @@ -4663,7 +4631,7 @@ STEPHEN MARTYR. "And wash it from the pool of Siloam." Then Lazarus, with three fellow-helpers more-- Nathanael, Israelite indeed, was there, - Joseph of Arimathaea too had come, + Joseph of Arimathæa too had come, Later, and Nicodemus, by nightfall, These were the chosen four, with Lazarus-- Making a litter of their robes, took up @@ -4761,9 +4729,9 @@ RUTH AND RACHEL. Or in the shadows of Gethsemane." "Ruth," Rachel said, "the Angel of the Lord - Round His beloved, like the mountains round + Round His belovéd, like the mountains round Jerusalem, encampeth ever; he - Of God's beloved is, and guarded well!" + Of God's belovéd is, and guarded well!" But Ruth scarce listened; she insisting said: "Perhaps of Stephen some report thou bringest, @@ -5062,7 +5030,7 @@ RUTH AND RACHEL. Then Ruth: "I feel that thou hast told me all Most truly, Rachel, as most tenderly. - Thus, then, God giveth His beloved sleep, + Thus, then, God giveth His belovéd sleep, Thus also! And He doeth all things well! Amen!" Silence once more, that seemed surcharged @@ -5070,7 +5038,7 @@ RUTH AND RACHEL. From both, and Ruth, regarding Rachel, said: "Even so! But, Rachel, us not yet doth God Will thus to sleep. Still, otherwise to sleep-- - For His beloved are not also we?-- + For His belovéd are not also we?-- May be God's gift to us. Thou surely needest, Body and spirit, rest." And Rachel said: @@ -5173,7 +5141,7 @@ RUTH AND RACHEL. Was laid the sacred dust of Stephen down And sealed within a rock-hewn sepulchre. - Joseph of Arimathaea, he who sought + Joseph of Arimathæa, he who sought And gained from Pilate leave to take away The body of Jesus crucified, had sent To Bethany, betimes, before the hour @@ -5271,7 +5239,7 @@ RUTH AND RACHEL. Rejoice, rejoice, for Stephen could not die! "Comfort ye Ruth; thrice among women she - Lives blessed, who, from wife to him, became, + Lives blesséd, who, from wife to him, became, Widowed, partaker of his martyrdom! "Hosanna to the Son of David, Who, @@ -5357,7 +5325,7 @@ SAUL AT BETHANY. This, scandal against scandal doubtful weighed, Would be the hard alternative to Saul. - "Beloved brother Saul," so Shimei spoke, + "Belovéd brother Saul," so Shimei spoke, "_I_ mourned at Stephen's funeral to-day. Not loud, you know, but deep, my mourning was; Not loud, for I am modest, and my wish @@ -6050,7 +6018,7 @@ SAUL AND HIRANI. How failed the hand of brute authority Against this strange faith of the Nazarene. Thine undertaking I less disapproved - After our hearing of the Galilaeans. + After our hearing of the Galilæans. Something perceived in them, or through them felt, Disturbed me with a strange solicitude, Which the ill fortune of thine own assay @@ -6547,7 +6515,7 @@ SAUL AND HIRANI. Instead of Saul, to accuse the prisoner. With plausible glib mendacity, he said: "Not only is this fellow heretic - After the manner of those Galilaeans, + After the manner of those Galilæans, But myself saw with mine own eyes just now How he the idlers in the street stirred up To most unseemly act of violence @@ -6623,7 +6591,7 @@ SAUL AND HIRANI. Saul, in his secret mind with anguish torn, Gazed at the man forsworn against, maligned, And almost envied him. A look of peace - Was on him like a light of fixed stars, + Was on him like a light of fixéd stars, So constant, and so inaccessible Of change through jar, through stain, so clear, so fair! He listened to the voices round him loud, @@ -6653,7 +6621,7 @@ SAUL AND HIRANI. And sun and moon and stars for me ordained. I praise Him as the Lord of life and light, And Giver of light and life to dead and blind. - All glory to His ever-blessed Name!" + All glory to His ever-blesséd Name!" The simple ecstasy from which he spoke, Illuminated, and the holy power @@ -6704,7 +6672,7 @@ SAUL AND HIRANI. He loves his blasphemy, give him his fill, Whet him his appetite, make him blaspheme His own Lord God, the man of Nazareth. - For that thrice damned name require from him, + For that thrice damnéd name require from him, At every lash, an imprecation loud, On pain of instant death should one curse fail!" @@ -6731,7 +6699,7 @@ SAUL AND HIRANI. In linen pure and fine, and laid away In secret, not unwept or unbewailed Of such as loved him for the love he bore, - Quenchless by death, to the Beloved Name. + Quenchless by death, to the Belovéd Name. @@ -6750,7 +6718,7 @@ After a long, deep slumber there, he resolves on undertaking what he dreamed that Shimei proposed, namely, the arrest of the apostles. His men fail him at the pinch, and Saul bitterly upbraids them, declaring strongly that their renegade behavior only determines him -the more sternly to root utterly out the pestilent Galilaean heresy, +the more sternly to root utterly out the pestilent Galilæan heresy, at whatever cost of exertion and blood and tears. SAUL AND THE APOSTLES. @@ -6953,10 +6921,10 @@ SAUL AND THE APOSTLES. As, gradually, Saul with his retinue Drew near the spot, so large a following - Of armed men, led by a chief whose fame + Of arméd men, led by a chief whose fame Was rife now through Jerusalem for deeds And purposes of uttermost revenge - Against the Galilaean heresy, + Against the Galilæan heresy, Gathered about their course a growing crowd, Who, urged by various thought and feeling, watched What might that minatory march intend. @@ -7036,7 +7004,7 @@ SAUL AND THE APOSTLES. Within you, and, from hands through fear relaxed, Harmless will drop those miscreant stones which now, With your poltroonery, ye invoke to fall - In well-deserved doom upon your heads!" + In well-deservéd doom upon your heads!" Upbraided thus, they, by that spokesman, said: "Stoning may lightly be despised by men @@ -7129,7 +7097,7 @@ SAUL AND THE APOSTLES. Saul, in the light of luminous wrath, foresaw Nigh, and saluted, that career, which thence, - After Judaean cities overrun + After Judæan cities overrun With havoc at his hand to Jesus' name, Will bear him ravening on Damascus road! @@ -7141,7 +7109,7 @@ BOOK XIII. SAUL AND SERGIUS. -After further persecution accomplished by him in Judaea, Saul, with +After further persecution accomplished by him in Judæa, Saul, with spirits recovered, sets out for Damascus to carry thither the persecuting sword. Pausing on the brow of hill Scopus to survey Jerusalem just left, he soliloquizes. At the same moment, there rides @@ -7167,7 +7135,7 @@ SAUL AND SERGIUS. Not yet his fill of slaughter supped, though forth Afar the timorous flock of Jesus now Were from before his restless, ravening, fierce, - Rapacious sword out of Judaea fled + Rapacious sword out of Judæa fled To alien lands remote, beyond the heights Of Hermon with their everlasting snows, And farther to the islands of the sea-- @@ -7207,7 +7175,7 @@ SAUL AND SERGIUS. The acclivity surmounted of a hill, Whence downward dipped his road, declining north, And farewell glimpse gave of Jerusalem, - Saul rein drew on his foamy-flanked steed, + Saul rein drew on his foamy-flankéd steed, And, about winding him, paused, looking back. His retinue, far otherwise than he Mounted, part even on foot, with sumpter beasts @@ -7274,14 +7242,14 @@ SAUL AND SERGIUS. A turm of horse, large not, but formidable, Caparison and armor gleaming bright, And with a nameless air forerunning them - Of wide-renowned might invincible + Of wide-renownéd might invincible Expressed in that momentous rhythmic tread Four-footed, underneath which from afar With pulse on pulse now rock to iron rang. The cavalcade, by slow degrees more slow, Moved up the acclivity till, reached the brow, Sank to a walk their pace, when Saul perceived - An armed escort was convoying one + An arméd escort was convoying one Thereby betokened an ambassador, Somewhither posting on affair of state, Or haply citizen of high degree @@ -7395,7 +7363,7 @@ SAUL AND SERGIUS. "With his Ionic strain mellifluous Of wonder-loving artless narrative"; Thucydides, the soul of energy; - AEschylus, Titan; happy Sophocles; + Æschylus, Titan; happy Sophocles; With soft Euripides unfortunate; Then Socrates, "Who wrote no books," said Saul, "Or wrote most living books in living men; @@ -7621,7 +7589,7 @@ SAUL AND SERGIUS. "The Hebrew spirit is severe and says, 'The fool it is who in his secret heart, Rebelling, wills no God.' 'The Hebrew spirit,' - Said I? Forget those unadvised words; + Said I? Forget those unadviséd words; For to speak so is not the Hebrew spirit. God is a jealous God; His glory He Will to another not divide; and God @@ -7762,7 +7730,7 @@ SAUL AND SERGIUS. 'To generation, following hard the line 'Of such as hate Me, endless mercy shown 'To such as love Me and observe My law. - 'Cursed be he who dares to disobey'; + 'Curséd be he who dares to disobey'; And Ebal, with its countless multitude, Thundered to Gerizim a loud 'Amen!' While heaven above and the wide world around @@ -7801,8 +7769,8 @@ SAUL AND SERGIUS. A city here the tetrarch Philip built, Or raised to more magnificent, which then, In honor of dishonorable name - Imperial, Tiberius Caesar, he - Called Caesarea, and Philippi too + Imperial, Tiberius Cæsar, he + Called Cæsarea, and Philippi too Eponymous therewith for surname joined; But Paneas, earlier name, clung to the place, As to this day it clings in Banias. @@ -7815,7 +7783,7 @@ BOOK XIV. FOR DAMASCUS. -Coming together again at Caesarea Philippi (Paneas, Banias) after an +Coming together again at Cæsarea Philippi (Paneas, Banias) after an interval of days, Saul and Sergius cross the southern spur of Hermon. A violent thunderstorm comes slowly up during the afternoon, which gives Sergius occasion, by way of mask to his own secret disquietude, @@ -8104,7 +8072,7 @@ FOR DAMASCUS. And land that Moses never was to see, Save as afar in prospect from the mount, Because unworthy judged to enter there, - Who unadvised words in haste let slip, + Who unadviséd words in haste let slip, Unworthy judged, and meekly by himself Recorded judged unworthy--such a man, To such a people, so long led by him, @@ -8361,7 +8329,7 @@ SAUL AND JESUS. Without the limits of this earthly sphere, Immeasurable distances beyond - The region of the utmost fixed stars, + The region of the utmost fixéd stars, Nay, high above all height, transcending space, Transcending time, subsists a different world, Invisible, inapprehensible @@ -8409,7 +8377,7 @@ SAUL AND JESUS. Than yesterday, forever, through more fair Disclosure, dawn on dawn, eternally Made of the glory of the face of Him - In whom to His beloved God still shines. + In whom to His belovéd God still shines. Morn such had risen once more in Paradise, When there a group elect together drawn, @@ -8685,7 +8653,7 @@ SAUL AND JESUS. Will kindle the dark earth with many a ray, Never to be extinguished, of heaven's light Caught from the torch that this world-wandering man, - This flying angel fledged with winged feet + This flying angel fledged with wingéd feet Tireless, this heart of love unquenchable, Has borne abroad, when, now the good fight fought, Finished his course, the faith full kept, he, last, @@ -8789,361 +8757,4 @@ retained except in obvious cases of typographical error. 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Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm -concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared -with anyone. For forty years, he produced and distributed Project -Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. -unless a copyright notice is included. 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You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org - - -Title: The Epic of Saul - -Author: William Cleaver Wilkinson - -Release Date: July 18, 2013 [EBook #43247] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EPIC OF SAUL *** - - - - -Produced by David Edwards and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - - -[Illustration: Titlepage] - - -_BY THE SAME AUTHOR_ - -THE EPIC OF PAUL - -A SEQUEL TO "THE EPIC OF SAUL" - -The action of THE EPIC OF PAUL begins with that conspiracy formed at -Jerusalem against the life of the apostle, which in the sequel led -to a prolonged suspension of his free missionary career. It embraces -the incidents of his removal from Jerusalem to Cæsarea, of his -imprisonment at the latter place, of his journey to Rome for trial -before Cæsar, and of his final martyrdom. The design of the poem as a -whole is to present through conduct on Paul's part and through speech -from him, a living portrait of the man that he was, together with -a reflex of his most central and most characteristic teaching. Its -descriptions are vivid, and it brings the reader's mind into close -touch with the great spirit of Paul. It is a poem in which dignity, -beauty, and power are commingled with a rare charm. - - "Paul, the new man, retrieved from perished Saul, - Unequaled good and fair, from such unfair, - Such evil, orient miracle unguessed!-- - Both what himself he was and what he taught-- - This marvel in meet words to fashion forth - And make it live an image to the mind - Forever, blooming in celestial youth."--_From the Proem._ - - -_AN APPRECIATIVE CRITICISM._ - - "Noble as was Dr. Wilkinson's 'Epic of Saul,' his 'Epic of - Paul' is even nobler. The kingliness of its range; the majesty - of its principal figure; the fascination of its subordinate - figures; the subtlety of its characterizations; the pathos of - its interviews; the intricate consistency of its plot; the - conscientiousness of its exegesis and allusions; the splendor of - its imaginations; the nobility of its ethics; the stateliness of - its rhythm; the grandeur of its evolution--these are some of the - characteristics which make 'The Epic of Paul' another necessary - volume in the library of every clergyman, philosopher, and - litterateur." - - --REV. GEORGE DANA BOARDMAN, D.D. - - -_8vo, Cloth, Gilt top, 722 pp. Price, $2.00, post-free._ - -_Both books together, $3.00._ - -FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY, Publishers, New York - - - - - THE EPIC OF SAUL - - BY - - WILLIAM CLEAVER WILKINSON - - AUTHOR OF "THE EPIC OF PAUL" - - FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY - NEW YORK AND LONDON - 1898 - - COPYRIGHT, 1891, - BY FUNK & WAGNALLS; - 1898, - BY FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY. - - [Registered at Stationers' Hall, London, Eng.] - - PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. - - - - -CONTENTS. - - - PAGE - - Book I. SAUL AND GAMALIEL, 5 - - Book II. SAUL AND THE SANHEDRIM, 37 - - Book III. SAUL AGAINST STEPHEN, 59 - - Book IV. STEPHEN AGAINST SAUL, 87 - - Book V. SAUL AND SHIMEI, 113 - - Book VI. SAUL AND RACHEL, 139 - - Book VII. STEPHEN AND RUTH, 159 - - Book VIII. STEPHEN MARTYR, 183 - - Book IX. RUTH AND RACHEL, 209 - - Book X. SAUL AT BETHANY, 235 - - Book XI. SAUL AND HIRANI, 265 - - Book XII. SAUL AND THE APOSTLES, 299 - - Book XIII. SAUL AND SERGIUS, 317 - - Book XIV. FOR DAMASCUS, 347 - - Book XV. SAUL AND JESUS, 371 - - - - -THE EPIC OF SAUL. - - -Saul of Tarsus, brought up at Jerusalem a pupil of Gamaliel, the -most celebrated Rabbi of his time, from setting out as eager but -pacific controversialist in public dispute against the preachers of -the Gospel, changes into a virulent, bloody persecutor of Christians, -and ends by abruptly becoming himself a Christian and a teacher of -Christianity. THE EPIC OF SAUL tells the story of this. - - -PROEM. - - Saul saw the prophet face of Stephen shine - As it had been an angel's, but his heart - To the august theophany was blind-- - Blinded by hatred of the fervent saint, - And hatred of the Lord who in him shone. - What blindfold hatred such could work of ill - In nature meant for utter nobleness, - Then, how the hatred could to love be turned, - The proud wrong will to lowly right be brought, - And Paul the "servant" spring from rebel Saul-- - This, ye who love in man the good and fair, - And joy to hail retrieved the good and fair - From the unfair and evil, hearken all - And speed me with your wishes, while I sing. - - - - -BOOK I. - -SAUL AND GAMALIEL. - - -Saul visits Gamaliel to submit a forming purpose conceived by him of -entering into public dispute with the Christian preachers. Gamaliel -disapproves; informing Saul that the Jewish rulers are about to -apply against those preachers the penalties of the law. These men -accordingly arrested and arraigned, the Sanhedrim hold a council on -their case, at which Caiaphas advises accusing them to the Romans -as seditious; Mattathias urges stoning them out of hand; Shimei -recommends pursuing against them a policy of guile. - -THE EPIC OF SAUL. - -SAUL AND GAMALIEL. - - Gamaliel sat at evening on his roof - And deeply mused the meaning of the law. - The holy city round about him lay - Magnificent, encircled with her hills. - Beyond the torrent Kedron, sunken deep - Within his winding valley, Olivet - Leaned long his shaded ridge against the east, - Distinct in every olive to the sun. - Nearer, amid the city, chief to see, - The glory of the temple of the Lord! - The seat was noble for a noble pile: - The summit of Moriah, levelled large, - Spread larger yet, outbuilt on masonry - Cyclopean, or more huge, pillar and arch - Fast-founded like the basis of a world. - A world of architecture rested there-- - Temple, and court, and long-drawn colonnade - On terrace above terrace ranged around, - Cloister, and porch, and pendent gallery, - Height, depth, length, space, and splendor, without end, - Glittering its stones of lustre purest white, - And stately portals rich with gems and gold: - The setting sun now smote it that it blazed. - The sight was torment to Gamaliel's pride, - Torment with pleasure mixed, but torment more, - As there he sat upon his roof alone. - - Tall, and erect in port, unbent his form - With all that weight of venerable years, - His head with almond-blossom glory-crowned, - And bosom overstreamed with silver beard, - Gamaliel stood before his countrymen - Their stay, their solace, and their ornament, - One upright pillar in a fallen state. - Fallen, for Rome had pushed her foaming wave - Of conquest far into the East, and laid - Judæa under deluge, quiet now, - But deep, of domination absolute-- - A weight as of the sea upon her breast. - Jerusalem was glorious to behold, - Girdled with guardian mountains round about, - And sunlit with her temple in the midst. - Alas, but more her glory, more her shame! - For all her glory was the Roman's now, - The queen a vassal at a tyrant's feet, - She Cæsar serving who should serve but God. - And, worse disgrace than heathen servitude, - There recreant Jews were found, and more and more, - Who their hearts sold to their captivity, - And abjectly gave up the ancient hope - And promise, dawning-star of prophecy, - That yet to captive Israel should arise - Messiah, King of kings and Lord of lords, - To break the yoke from off His people's neck - And gift them with the empire of the earth-- - This crown of Israel's hope gave up, to choose, - Instead, for captain and deliverer, one - Base-born, from Galilee, consorting friend - With publicans and sinners, hung at last - Convicted malefactor on the cross! - - Such thoughts and tortures exercised the mind - Of grave Gamaliel on his roof that eve. - He felt the burden of his name and fame - Weigh heavy, his renown of sanctity, - With wisdom, rife so wide, and holy zeal. - His head declined upon his bosom, there - Amid the evening cool unheeded, he, - Gray reverend teacher of the law, sat mute, - Rapt over the writ parchment on his knees, - And read, or thought, or thought and read, and prayed. - The veil was on the old man's heart; he saw - Unseeing, for the sense from him was sealed. - - In words like these his prayer and plaint he poured: - "Hath God forgotten to be gracious? Will - Jehovah cast us off forevermore? - We groan, O Lord, Thy people groan, beneath - The yoke of the oppressor. It is time, - Lo, bow Thy heavens and come avenging down! - Appear Thou for Thy people! Visit us! - Not only the uncircumcised are come, - And heathen, into Thine inheritance, - But of Thy chosen seed are risen up - False children unto Abraham, to vex - Our nation's peace and shame us to our foes. - The son of Joseph suffered his desert, - Accurséd, on the tree, pretender vile, - Who out of Nazareth came forth to claim - Messiahship, the gift of David's line, - And trailed a glorious banner in the dust, - The banner of the hope of Israel. - That day, too long expected, yet shall dawn - And true Messiah, girded on His thigh - His sword athirst for alien blood, shall ride - Conquering and to conquer over all - The necks of these His enemies and ours. - How long, Lord God of Sabaoth, how long? - For now that hated false Messiah's name - Is preached, the dead for re-arisen to life, - The crucified for glorified, to men, - And ICHABOD is written everywhere - On all that was the boast of Israel. - O Thou that overthrewest the harrying horde - Of Pharaoh whelmed beneath the entombing sea, - Rise, overwhelm Thine enemies, restore - The glory and the kingdom to Thine own!" - - Gamaliel prayed, and knew not that his prayer - Found voice and smote at least an earthly ear. - "Amen!" Gamaliel started as he heard - The voice of Saul responding fervently. - Saul had been pupil to Gamaliel, - Loyal and loving, and he now was friend - Familiar, whom, as guest, unbidden oft - And unannounced, that famous Pharisee - Welcomed to share his most seclusive hours. - "My son!" "Rabboni!" mutually they said. - - The younger to the elder now had come, - A thought to purpose quickening in his breast. - He too was Hebrew patriot, and he yearned - With anguish like his master's, yet at once - Sharper than his, and more accessible - To hope, as well his livelier youth became - And native blood more nimble in his veins-- - Saul also, with Gamaliel, yearned and burned, - Beholding prone his country in the dust, - Under the grinding heel of Roman power-- - And Messianic glory turned to shame! - Saul's first wish was to bring his brethren back - Stung to their pristine, proud, prophetic hope - Of a Messiah born to regal robes, - Swaying a sceptre, seated on a throne, - Crowned with a crown of myriad diadems, - Symbol of lordship that should myriad tribes - Mass in one mighty empire of mankind. - He felt the soul of eloquence astir - Within him, and he longed to be at war, - In words that flamed like lightning and that smote - Like thunder-stones, against those grovelling men - Who Israel taught to grovel at the feet - Of Galilæan Jesus crucified, - Accepted for the Christ, forsooth, of God! - Such wish, becoming purpose, Saul has brought - This evening to Gamaliel, with high hope, - Hope high, but vain, to disappointment doomed, - Of grateful gratulant words to hearten him, - Approving and applauding his desire, - Won from the wisest in Jerusalem. - - Thus minded, Saul, blithe, eager, sanguine, bold, - With yet a grace of filial in his mien, - As toward a master had in love and fear, - Said: - "Teacher, what I came to learn from thee, - Already, having marked thy prayer, I know. - God hear thee out of Zion in thy prayer! - God bring to naught the counsels of His foes! - Now know I, and rejoice to know, that thou, - My teacher in the blessed law, wilt say, - 'God speed thee, son,' in what I seek to do. - For, lo, I seek to serve the suffering cause - Of truth wounded and bleeding in the street. - Love of my country burns me as with flame - Imprisoned and living in my very bones-- - My country, and my countrymen. This land - To me is lovely like a bride beloved-- - Beloved the more, unutterably wronged! - Her trodden dust is dear to me. Not I, - As do my brethren on her bosom born, - Equably love her with composed and calm - Affection sweet. That homesick longing bred - With boyhood in Cilicia haunts me yet, - To heighten love with anguish, and more dear - Make the dear soil of this my fatherland. - A passion, not a fondness, is my love; - And for my countrymen to die, were sweet-- - Such blind abandonment of love usurps - My being for my kinsmen in the flesh. - Would God I might in very deed pour out - This blood, no vain oblation, to redeem - My bondmen brethren and to purge this land!" - - In speech no farther--though in passionate tears - The strong man vented still his else choked heart. - Gamaliel, with wise senior sympathy, - Sat silent, waiting till that burst were past. - Then gravely: - "Yea, my son, I know thy zeal, - And praise it. Such as thou, in number more, - Might somewhat; such as thou, alas, are few." - - His master's praise Saul took as check and chill, - Uttered with that insinuated sense - Of sage discountenance to his youthful zeal. - He shrank, but braced himself, and gently said: - "But, father, not by many or by few - Is our God bound to working. Many or few - To Him is one. Nay, were there none save me, - Were I alone among my brethren, I, - Alone among my brethren, yet would dare." - - Against the vernal aspiration warm - Of Saul's young blood and tropic temperament - Gamaliel's aged, wise, sententious phlegm, - And magisterial manner though benign, - Abode unmoved, inert, insensible; - Like an ice-Alp that freezes on its cheek - A breath of spring soft blowing from the south. - With viscid slow demur the old man spoke, - And downcast heavily shook his hoary head: - "To dare is cheap and common with our race, - We are few dastards; did not Judas dare? - And Theudas? But their daring came to naught. - Wisdom with daring, fortitude to wait, - We need, son Saul; the daring that must do, - And cannot wait, has wrought us sumless ill." - - Damped, but remonstrant, Saul still plied his plea: - "And yet but now, 'How long,' I heard thee cry, - 'How long, Lord God of Sabaoth, how long?'" - - "Yea," said Gamaliel, "that I daily cry." - - "Thy counsel and thy praying how agree?" - - "Men I bid wait; wait not, I pray my God." - - "Were this not well, O master calmly wise, - In trust that God will rouse him at my cry, - To rouse myself and strongly side with God? - I cannot rest in peace; I hear the woe - Denounced for such as safely sit at ease - In Zion. Let me do as well as pray." - - Saul's rising zeal once more the master checked: - "Praying is doing, likewise waiting works; - But what, son Saul, is in thine heart to do? - I cherished better dreams, my son, for thee, - Than to behold thee leading to their doom - One helpless, hopeless, hapless company more, - Insurgent out of season against Rome, - Confederate sons of folly and of crime!" - - Rebuke like this Saul brooked it ill to hear; - With filial sweet resentment he replied: - "And cherish other dreams, I pray thee, father! - No man-at-arms am I to challenge Rome; - Though not even Rome should daunt me, called of God - To front her with but pebble from the brook, - Like David, in her plenitude of power. - Rome rules us, and I grieve, but I rejoice: - I grieve that we are such as must be ruled, - And cannot rule ourselves; but I rejoice, - Since such we are, that we are ruled by Rome. - The strongest and the wisest is the best - To serve, if one must serve. Alas, my country! - Her face is in the dust because her heart - Grovels, and therefore on her neck the heel. - So, not to rid us of the Roman, I - Labor with this desire, but to erect - The dustward spirit of my countrymen. - This people knowing not the law are cursed!" - - By instinct wise of policy unmeant, - Saul, in his last half-maledictory words - Of vehement passion edged with bitterness, - Had struck a chord that answered in the breast - Of the habitual teacher of the law. - "Yea," said Gamaliel, "now art thou true son - And utterest wisdom. Make them know the law. - With both my hands I bless thee speaking thus. - The law shall save them, if they know the law." - - Saul knew it was Gamaliel's wont that spoke, - His life-long wont of reverence for the law - And trust in its omnipotence to serve - Whatever need befell his nation--this, - Rather than any fresh, fair-springing sense - Of hope in him auxiliar to his own. - Yet, in despair of better heartening now, - And self-impelled to ease his laboring mind, - He, fixed and faltering both, with courteous phrase - Premised of teachable assent sincere - To smooth somewhat thereto his doubtful way, - Frankly a hearing for his counsel sought: - "I ever heard thee, father, teaching that, - And I believe it wholly, mind and heart; - But something now I did not learn from thee, - Hearken, I pray, and weigh if it be wise." - - But less like one who hearkened as to weigh - A counsel shown, Gamaliel now to Saul - Seemed, than like one who sat behind a shield - In opposition, a broad shield of brow - Immobile, placid, large circumference, - And orb of diamond proof, between them hung - There on the housetop still in dim twilight, - Ready to quench in darkness any ray - Of word or sign from him that should aspire - To reach an understanding guarded so-- - Such to Saul seemed Gamaliel now, while yet, - Despite, repressed but irrepressible, - That strenuous strong spirit thus went on: - "Deeply I have desired to know my time - And not to waste my strength beating the air. - Are not men's needs other with other times? - No more perhaps in peaceful shelters now - Sacred to sacred studies, synagogue - Retirements, where our doctors of the law - Propose in turn their sage conclusions, heard - By questioning disciples--here perhaps - No more is truth most truly taught to men. - Some, it may be, might well go forth to stand - Even at the corners of the streets and cry. - Folly amain preaches to gaping crowds, - And shall not wisdom cry? My heart is hot, - Amid the multitude they make their prey, - To meet these false proclaimers to their face, - And stop their mouths, with Moses and with all - The prophets and the Psalms, from uttering lies." - - Gamaliel heard, and like a lion stood, - That shakes his dewy mane from slumber roused; - The old man loomed in action nobly tall, - As thus, with weighty gesture, in a voice - Solid with will, he gently, sternly spoke: - "Nay, Saul, my son, thy zeal misguides thee now-- - Thy zeal, and peradventure some conceit - Of wisdom wiser than thine elders. Thou, - Consenting thus to parley with the fool - According to his folly, like becomest. - This is a time to answer otherwise - Than with the wind of words against their words - Of wind, as equal against equal matched. - Those wresters of the law must feel the law - Smiting their mouths shut with the heavy hand. - With blows, not words, vain fools like these are taught. - Go thou thy way, to-morrow shalt thou see - Hap other far than that thou hast devised - Befall those evil men of Galilee. - Our chiefly prudent, watchful for our weal, - Will stop their mouths profane and make an end." - - Saul chode his tongue to silence, but his heart - Set stern in resolution touched with pride, - As, after decent pause, he took farewell. - - The master and the pupil parted thus, - And both were blind to that which was to be; - For both would change, but change in converse ways - Gamaliel gentle grow, and Saul grow hard. - - That morrow, Peter with his brethren all, - Apostle preachers of the Gospel, felt - The heavy hand Gamaliel shadowed fall - Indeed upon them into dungeon thrown. - But thence by night the angel of the Lord, - Opening the doors, delivered them, and bade - Boldly into the temple take their way - And there preach Christ to all the worshippers. - With the first flush of morning, their swift feet - Shod with the sandals of obedience, - They hasten to fulfil the angelic word. - Meanwhile the Sanhedrim for counsel met - Concerning those their prisoners, and the state, - The vexed state, of the Hebrew commonwealth, - Sent pursuivants to fetch them from their cells - And station them in presence to be judged. - But those despatched to bring them came and said, - "We found, indeed, the prison safely shut - And all the keepers keeping watch and ward - Without before the doors; but entering in - To find our prisoners, prisoner found we none." - - The captain of the temple, the high-priest, - And all that council mused in maze and doubt-- - Gamaliel most, guessing the finger of God. - - But now comes one who brings a fresh report, - "Behold," said he, "the men ye put in bond - Are standing in the temple teaching there." - Forthwith the captain of the temple goes, - His band attending, and, no violence shown-- - For fear was on them of the people, lest - They stone them--leads the Galilæans in. - - Robed venerably each in rich array - Of purple, and fine linen, glistering white - And broidered fair, their flowing garments fringed - With large expanse of border and with cords - Of blue adorned, broad their phylacteries, - The council of the seventy sat severe - Within their council-hall in solemn state. - A semi-orb they sat, or crescent-wise, - And in the midst, between the horns, were placed, - Under their beetling frown, the prisoners. - Awful these felt the presence of the place, - And, while the high-priest of their nation, throned - Middle and chief among the councillors, - Denouncing asked: "Did we not straitly bid - Forbear to teach in this accurséd name? - And, lo, ye fill Jerusalem with bruit, - And seek to bring on us this person's blood!"-- - While thus, sternly, he spoke, those simple men - Felt the heart fail within them and the tongue - Cleave to the mouth's dry roof. He ceasing, back - Their spirit came, and Spirit not their own, - The Holy Ghost of God, flooded their souls, - As when into a bay the ocean pours. - Then Peter and his brethren boldly spoke: - "Fathers and brethren, hearken to our words: - God needs must we, rather than men, obey. - That Jesus whom ye crucified and slew, - Him did the Lord God of our sires raise up, - And at His own right hand exalt to be - Both prince and saviour, to bestow on us - Repentance and forgiveness of our sins. - Of these things all we stand here witnesses; - Nor we alone, for with us witnesseth - God's Spirit bestowed on whoso Him obeys." - - Something not earthly in those prisoners' mien - A tone of more than human in their words, - A majesty, as of omnipotence - Patient within them, ready to break forth, - But patient still, to brook how much was need-- - So much, no more!--this awed one watchful heart - Prepared amid that council now to heed; - Gamaliel inly pondered, 'Is it God?' - The clear simplicity, the perfect faith, - The steady, prompt obedience, the serene - Courage that dared, without defying, all - The terrors brandished by the Sanhedrim-- - This spirit, strange in those despiséd men, - As with a soft and subtle atmosphere - Enfolding and suffusing him, subdued - The solid temper of his mind, the strong - Set of his resolution grim relaxed, - Undid the hard contortions of his nerves, - And supple made the will so firm before. - His steadfast poise of confidence perturbed, - Gamaliel trembled with uncertainty. - - Otherwise Saul; he, merged in different thought, - Eluded quite that penetrative spell. - Unconscious of the Holy Ghost, he strove - Blindly against Him, like the rest, though not - Yet, like the rest, with zeal of violence - To do the prisoners harm or shed their blood; - With such zeal not, but with ambitious pride - Of wisdom unawares puffed up to show - His prowess in the Scriptures, and to earn - A high degree surpassing all his peers. - His fellow-councillors concerting how - To quench this propagandist fire in blood, - Saul said within his heart: - 'Nay, nay, instead, - Might I but once these bold presumers face - Amid the idling crowds they feed with lies, - How, from the law itself, whereof, untaught - Therein, they prate, would I, in open test - Of argument, confute them to their teeth! - Their own ill-wielded weapons from their hands - Seen wrenched and turned against them, surely then - Not only would these brawlers cease, but all - Would laud and magnify the glorious Word - Of God, thus shown, well wielded, capable - Of wreaking its own vengeance on its foes.' - - These twain such counsel in their secret breast - Held diverse, while that strife of words went on. - - Not what, in present need, behooved to do-- - A full and fell accord conjoined them there!-- - Was doubt or question to the Sanhedrim; - But in what chosen way their chosen goal, - The doom of death for those accurséd men, - With safe sure speed, most prudently, to reach-- - This doubt embroiled a vehement debate. - - One argued thus his sentence and advice-- - Caiaphas he, high-priest that lately was, - Reputed statesman politic and wise: - "We are a subject nation; government - Is for this present slipped from out our hands. - Chafe how we may, how will it otherwise, - Ours is a state of vassalage to Rome. - Death in our hearts and death upon our tongues, - Denounced amain against our enemies, - Is futile--thunder bare of thunderbolt. - We make ourselves a laughter--unless we - Warp toward our end with wisdom; who is weak - Well needs be wise, to win--wisdom is power. - To kill and keep alive, by process due - Of law, no longer appertains to us, - That right being forfeit to our conqueror; this - Must we not let our honorable pride, - Justly indignant, and our holy zeal - Incensed for God, bribe us to blink. But slave, - If wise, may make a foolish master serve. - Break we proud Rome to do our task for us. - True triumph, when we wield the tyrant power - Itself of domination over us - A weapon in our hands to work our will! - - "I counsel that we seek and find firm ground - Of mortal accusation, before those - Who rule us, against these audacious men, - As teachers of seditious doctrine meant - To undermine allegiance, and at length - Prompt insurrection and a state of war. - Rome then will stamp our troublers out of life, - And we, well rid of them without annoy, - Besides shall safely reap from her the praise, - Ill-merited, of fealty to her right-- - Praise that sometime hereafter may be gain - Of vantage, if sometime hereafter come - Fit season to fling off her hated yoke." - - Such words of weight spoke Caiaphas, and ceased - Those words, not idle, fell as falls the steel - Smiting the flint; a sparkle keen of fire - Flew forth, found tinder ready, and flashed up - In instant flame. A patriot malcontent, - Fiercely, irreconcilably, a Jew, - Was Mattathias; Mattathias said: - "Yoke by whom hated? Surely not by him - Who tamely brooks to talk of earning praise - For loyalty from Rome! Nor more by those - Who patient sit to hear such counsel broached! - Nay, men my brethren, that I did not hear! - Sure, son of Abraham never have I heard - Own himself slave, and meekly speak of Rome, - As of a master! This I will not hear! - I could not hear it! Speech of such a strain - Were like a river of molten metal poured - Red-hot into my ear to quench the sense! - Stone-deaf am I to craven treachery - From one of my own fellow-councillors here! - I only heard my brother say, 'Let us - Arise and stand for God!' Lo, I arise - And stand, with him, with all! There is a law, - Ancient and unrepealed, wholesome and good, - To stone for blasphemy. Blasphemers these, - What wait we? We have hands, and there are stones, - Let us this instant forth and stone them, stone - Unto the death!" - The clenched hands, and the fierce - Menace of husky tones, half-choked, and teeth - Gnashing, and brow braided with swollen knots, - Were more than words to speak the murderous will. - - The prisoners listened with suspended breath; - They deemed a dreadful doom indeed was nigh. - Instinctive instant fear, forestalling faith, - With sudden loud alarum startled them, - And for one moment violently shook, - In them, all save the basis of the soul-- - One moment--then they sped themselves with prayer, - Ran to the shelter of the promises, - And were at peace! In that secure retreat - Withdrawn, the secret place of the Most High, - The angel of the Lord encamping round, - Composédly at leisure they looked out - And saw the wicked plot against the just, - Vainly, and gnash upon him with his teeth! - Within their hearts they knew his day would come. - - The speaker still stood leaning imminent, - His posture instigation, while a hiss - Of hot adhesion ran increasing round-- - But skipped Gamaliel, skipped the musing Saul - With one beside, scarce daring to be dumb-- - When, in his place, slowly, by soft degrees, - With furtive look and gesture, to his feet - Stealing, half stood, half crouched, a speaker new. - This was one Shimei, an abject man, - Abject in spirit, though in wit not dull, - And capable of long malevolence - Fed on resentments such as abjects feel. - Saul listened, but Gamaliel bowed in prayer, - As Shimei thus, obliquely, sneering, spoke: - "Stoning is pleasant, doubtless, when, as now, - One's sense of righteousness is much engaged. - The reflex satisfaction to be had - From accurately casting a choice stone - To break the teeth of the ungodly, is - Superlative, perhaps the very highest - Relish attainable to mortals here. - The consciousness of sympathy with God - Always exhilarates delightfully; - But in particular if the sympathy - Be exercised in such a case as this, - Where the most glorious of God's attributes, - His justice, is involved. Borne far above - Pity, or any weakness of the sense, - You only feel a rapture of divine - Approval of the law you execute. - So subtly strong and sweet possesses you - The instinct to indulge your appetite - For righteousness, you might almost mistake - Your pleasure for the pleasure of revenge. - - "But let revenge be for the heathen, who - Know not Jehovah and His law contemn. - Jehovah's chosen we, our sentiment - Purged of all personal bias of mere hate, - We simply wash our feet in wicked blood - With pleasure--pleasure naturally enhanced, - If we have spilled said wicked blood ourselves. - - "Yea, stoning gratifies the pious mind - Profoundly--grant the stoning be by you; - By you, not to you; being stoned, I judge, - Is less satisfactory. On this point who doubt - Or differ, have their opportunity - To clear their minds by prompt experiment-- - They need but act upon the last advice; - For--grant our gracious masters smiled and pleased - To let us play a prank of self-misrule, - This once, wilful, but harmless, in their view, - Which might even turn out comedy for them-- - Yet, stoning these, we should ourselves get stoned, - With expedition--past all chance of doubt. - Our friend, the vehement adviser here, - Might peradventure go himself as blithe - To be stoned by the people, as to stone - These pestilent fellows--for the glory of God. - But, then, more clearly how the glory of God - Would be subserved thereby, the rest of us, - Colder in heart perhaps, but certainly - Cooler in head, would wish to be advised, - Before we take our lives into our hands - To wreak the righteous judgment of the law - On favorites of a fierce and fickle mob - Whose palms, unless I much misread the signs, - Already itch for stones to throw at us, - While we sit here and talk of throwing stones - At whom they love and honor. - "Give them line - This wild Jerusalem mob, and they will change - Their mood. Remember how it chanced but late - With Jesus Nazarene. Hailed yesterday - Messiah, King of kings and Lord of lords, - Ovation of hosannas greeting him - From thousand times a thousand throats--to-day, - A malefactor hooted through the streets, - With 'Crucify him! Crucify him!' cried - In multitudinous chorus like one voice-- - The mouths to-day and yesterday the same. - Their second tune indeed we set for them - And sang precentors--but how well they joined! - In due time pitch them the like tune again, - And doubt not they will sing it with full breath. - - "Not that I hence advise to wait remiss; - My counsel is no less from sloth removed - Than hostile to crude, hasty violence. - Only, shun public note; with proper quest, - Ways may be found, ways pregnant too, that make - No noise. The nail that went so shrewdly through - Sisera's temples made no noise. It sped - Softly, but sped surely, and found the quick - Secret of life. Are there not Jaels yet? - You have guessed what I advise. The end you seek - Is holy; holy hold whatever means - Shall lead thereto. Let us commit this thing - To those the wisest found among us, few - Better than many, charging them to choose - Some suitable silent means of silencing - These praters, without stir or scandal made, - Likest the ways of nature, hint, perhaps, - Conveyed of overruling providence - At work through nature for revenging crime. - - "For me, I seek no honor at your hands: - I do not court responsibility; - I am least wise among you; yet a trust - Imposed were duty sacred in mine eyes." - - As, should along a living bosom warm - With youthful life-blood coursing joyously, - A deadly serpent, with protracted, cold - Belly incumbent, glide, beneath that touch - And creep the conscious flesh would creeping shrink, - And all the genial current in the veins - Curdle; so now, at Shimei's words, much more - At signs in him that spoke beyond his words, - The accent of the voice, the look, the port - Of figure, sinister suggestion couched - In action or grimace, there came a chill, - A shudder, of reaction and collapse - Over the council late with zeal aglow. - Even Mattathias, who, in attitude - Of menace, after Shimei arose, - Some space still stood--he, too, while Shimei - Was speaking, felt the evil spell and sank - Into his seat. With one accord they all, - When Shimei ceased, a gloomy silence kept. - Gamaliel did not lift his head, but groaned - Audibly now, though gently, in his prayer. - - From such a source such sound made seem yet more - Ominous the spell which hushed that council-hall. - - - - -BOOK II. - -SAUL AND THE SANHEDRIM. - - -The Sanhedrim still in session on the apostles' case, Saul speaks; -first scornfully repudiating for himself Shimei's proposal of guile, -and then impressively announcing his own purpose, now fully mature, -to controvert the Christian preachers in open argument before the -people. After a pause following Saul's speech, Gamaliel speaks in -favor of letting the prisoners go free. Other councillors express -their sentiments. A scourging of the utmost severity being proposed, -Nicodemus, with bated breath, deprecates first a cruel infliction, -and then any infliction at all. Release after scourging is finally -resolved upon. - -SAUL AND THE SANHEDRIM. - - Dumb-struck and stirless long the Sanhedrim-- - Instinctively abhorrent from the part - Of that base councillor--at last there rose - A new assessor in the midst to speak. - - A young man he, who, in the general thought, - Wherever moving, round about him wore - A golden halo of uncertain hope - And prophecy of bright futures. Aspect clear - And pure; straight stature; foothold firm and free; - The bloom of youth just ripening to the hue - Of perfect manhood upon cheek and brow; - Lip mobile, but not lax--capacity - Expressed of exquisite emotion, will - Elastic and resilient, tempered true - To bend, not break, and ultimately strong; - Glances of lightning latent in the eye, - But lightning liable to be quenched in tears; - The pride of every Hebrew, such was Saul. - - A stir of expectation broke the hush - Of that strange silence, ere his opening words: - "That I, the youngest of this order, thus - Should rise for speech--and that beloved gray head - Before me bowed, unready yet--might seem - Unseemly. But to speak after he speaks, - My own reveréd guide, the guide of all, - Would be, should I then speak to differ, more - Unseemly still. And what I have to say, - Being my thought, burns in me to be said, - Approve, condemn, who will; God bids me speak." - - Gamaliel raised his head and looked at Saul. - Saul felt the look, and hardened his will, but not - His heart, to meet it. Turning so, he saw, - Not what he inly braced himself to bear, - Warning, rebuke, anger to overawe, - Reproach, appeal, dissuasion, pain confessed - At filial separation, grasp of will - At old authority elapsed--of these, - Naught; only a pathos of perplexity, - A broken, anguished, groping childlikeness, - Desire of any help, and hope of none-- - Saul will hereafter understand it all; - He simply marks it now compassionately - In wonder, pausing not, and thus, with loth - Allusion to the last advice, proceeds: - "But other speech my lips refuse, until - I purge my conscience by protesting here, - For me, I spurn, scorn, hate, loathe utterly - The devil and devilish lies. I have no qualms - At blood, but I love truth, and qualms I own - At falsehood, practised in whatever name; - Damnable ever, then thrice damnable, - Damning a holy cause it feigns to serve!" - - A flush of warm revival in the breasts - Of some that listened answered to such words. - But one there was, that vile adviser, felt - A gripe of mortal hatred at his heart. - He, by Gamaliel's eye not unobserved, - Behind a black malignant scowl which, like - That murk emission of the cuttle-fish, - Flushed from his heart his face to overspread - And hide his thought, sat fostering the wound - Of Saul's disdainful noble words--a wound - To rankle long in the obscene recess - Of that bad bosom, and therein to breed - At last an issue foul of fell revenge; - In purpose fell, though in fulfilment foiled. - - But Saul, magnanimously heedless, deigned - Nor glance at him nor thought of consequence. - Elate with the elixir of his youth, - And buoyed with confidence exultant now - By the rebound of his beginning, buoyed - Besides with sympathy, he passed along, - Yet, master he, not mastered, of his mood, - Curbed strongly his strong passion and delight - Of power, and, calm with self-possessing will, - Force in him to have sped a thunderbolt - Stayed back from sudden waste, to be sent on - In fine diffusive throb--as farther thus: - "Enough of that; I did but purify - My soul with words. I feared some inward stain - From only listening, if I listened only, - And did not speak, when base was proffered me. - - "Hear now what I propose. What I propose - Is not advice; advice I neither give - Nor ask. I do not ask it, for my heart - Is fixed; duress of conscience presses me, - With flesh and blood forbidding to confer. - I must do what I shall, in man's or devil's - Despite. I trust I speak not thus in pride. - Not therefore that the census of your yeas - Or nays may guide me, but that ye may weigh - What force my purpose now unfolded owns - To sway your present counsels, hear and judge. - - "Ye know, and all Jerusalem, that Saul - Has counted nothing worthy to be prized - Beside the learning of the law of God. - For this, a boy, from yon Cilician lands - I came; for this, I have consumed my youth. - What envied gains of knowledge I have made, - Sitting a student at Gamaliel's feet, - Befits me not to vaunt; these, small or large, - Belong to God and to my nation, being mine - Only to use for Him and them. I see - Plainly how I must use my trust from God. - Wherefore are we assembled? Wherefore, save - Because these sciolists pervert the law, - Deceived perhaps, deceiving certainly?" - - Scarce waved a careless hand in sign at them-- - Toward the apostles, still in presence there, - Saul deigned not to divert his scornful eyes: - "Shame is it if I, knowing the law indeed, - Am less than match for these untutored minds, - Amid the flocking fools they lead astray, - To controvert their hateful heresies. - Herewith then I proclaim my ripe resolve - To undertake, against the preaching liars, - On their own terms, a warfare for the truth. - Let it be seen which cause, in open list, - Is stronger, truth from heaven or lie from hell! - - "Brethren and fathers, as ye will, consult; - The youngest has his purpose thus divulged." - - As when a palm diversely blown upon - In a strong tempest of opponent winds, - Now this way, and now that, obedient - To each prevailing present urgency, - Leans to all quarters of the firmament - By turns, but quickly, let a lull succeed, - Upright again, shows every leaf composed; - So now the council, long enough between - Opinion and opinion buffeted, - While Saul was speaking took a little ease, - No new advice proposed, to breathe again, - Steady itself, and come to equipoise. - - Some thought that Saul had spoken proudly; some, - That pride became his worth; some held that he - Would make his vaunting good; some feared his plan - Savored of youth and rashness; others deemed - Public dispute mistaken precedent - Teeming with various mischief--sure to breed - Insufferable pretensions in the crowd, - So taught to count themselves fit arbiters - On Scriptural or traditional points of moot, - And, by close consequence, a serious breach - Endanger in their own authority; - Yet others felt, whatever fruit beside - Was borne of Saul's proposed experiment, - Two things at least were safe to reckon on-- - In its own dignity, the Sanhedrim - Must needs incur immedicable hurt, - So plainly scandalous a spectacle - Exhibiting, a councillor enrolled - Of their own number stooping to debate - On equal terms with ignorant fishermen; - Then, on their side, those flattered fishermen, - Far from indulging proper gratitude - For being publicly confounded quite - At such illustrious hands, would be instead - Inflated out of measure, nigh to burst, - With added pride at complaisance so new - From their superiors, while the common herd - Would give them greater heed accordingly. - - Such things diverse they thought, and silence kept, - Saul's colleagues in the Sanhedrim; they all - Together felt that Saul in any wise - Would go Saul's way; they therefore silence kept. - - One man alone, by age and gravity, - And reverence his in ample revenue, - Was easy master of the Sanhedrim: - On him the council rested and revolved, - As on a fixéd centre and support. - And now 'Gamaliel! let us hear at last - Gamaliel's word' was suddenly the sole, - The simultaneous, silent thought to all. - The eyes of all concentred instantly - Upon Gamaliel found that saint esteemed - And sage already stirring as to rise. - Their readiness to hear, with his to speak, - Timed so in perfect reciprocity - And exquisite accord responsive, marked - That fleet meet moment for the orator, - Which, conscious half, but half unconscious, he, - Gamaliel, wielded by the Holy Ghost, - Was now to seize and use for God so well. - - The hoary head, the mien of majesty, - The associative power of ancient fame, - His habit and tradition of command, - Their instinct, grown inveterate, to obey, - Always, wherever he arose to speak - Among his brethren, won Gamaliel heed. - But now, a certain gentle winsomeness, - Born of a certain wavering wistfulness, - Qualified so a new solemnity - Of manner, like a prophet's, felt in him, - That awe came on his hearers as from God. - Gamaliel first bade put the prisoners forth, - In keeping, out of audience, and then said: - "My brethren: Saul my brother--son no more - I name him, since he parts himself from me - In counsel--yet I love him not the less--" - - A tremor of sensation fluttered through - The council, with these words, and at Saul's heart - Pausing, infixed, then healed, a subtle pang - Of sweet remorse and gracious tenderness-- - "Yea, not the less for this love I my son, - My brother, while I honor him the more. - Yea, and not wholly does he part himself - From me; in deepest counsel we are one. - Saul seeks to honor God obeying Him, - The same seek I; are we not deeply one? - And ever I have taught obedience - To God as the prime thing and paramount; - Disciple therefore still to me, and son, - Is Saul, even in this act and article - Of his secession from his master's part; - Saul and Gamaliel both, and all of us, - I pray my God to save from self-deceit! - I shudder while I pray, 'Deliver me, - O Lord, deliver, from the secret sin - Of false supposed obedience masking pride!' - - "Late, I was sure, as Saul is sure to-day. - I thought, and doubted not, we ought to do - Even what ye now are bent to bring to pass. - My way was not Saul's way, but rather yours; - To me it seemed plainly, as seems to you, - Wiser to save the body by some loss, - If loss were need, of limb. Unfalteringly, - The knife would I myself with mine own hand - Have wielded to cut off these members, judged - Unsound and harmful to the general health, - Forever from the congregation. Now, - I feel less sure, Gamaliel feels less sure. - I wish--brethren, I think I wish--to be - Obedient; though deceitful is the heart - Above all things and wicked desperately-- - What man can know it?--yet I think I will - Obedience. That was a pure word--the mouth - However far from pure that uttered it-- - 'To God rather than men must we obey.' - Saul was true son of mine to turn from me - To God--if haply he to God indeed - Have turned from me, and not from me to Saul, - Not knowing! Might I also turn, even I, - Gamaliel from Gamaliel, unto God! - I dread to trust myself, lest I, myself - Obeying, misdeem myself obeying God. - - "Hearken, my children. These accuséd men - Unlikely, most unlikely, choice of Heaven - To be His prophets, seemed, and seem, to me. - I look at them and find no prophet mien; - I listen and their Galilæan speech - Offends me; and far more the scandal is - To think what message they propound to us. - Their person and their message I reject-- - Reject, or if reject not, not receive. - And yet, my brethren, yet, I counsel you, - Beware! What ye intend, accomplished once, - Were once for all accomplished, not to be - Undone forever. Ye consult to slay, - And find your purpose hard to come by. How, - If, having slain, to your repentance, ye - Consulted to bring back to life again? - Were that not harder yet? Wherefore take heed, - Ye men of Israel. Remember how, - A generation gone, Theudas arose, - Proud boaster and asserter of himself, - Who drew his hundreds to his standard; he - Was slain, and all his followers came to naught. - Some space thereafter, out of Galilee - Judas arose and mustered to his side - Many adherents; but he perished too, - And all that clave to him were far dispersed. - - "This therefore as to these is my advice: - Refrain your hands from them; let them alone. - Know, if their deed and counsel be of men, - Its doom is certain, it will come to naught; - But if it be of God, strive how ye may, - Ye cannot overthrow it. Well take heed, - Lest haply ye be found to fight against - God. For myself, when close upon the heels - Of what was wrought mysterious in the escape - Of these our prisoners from that warded keep - Fast-barred, I heard their answer to our sharp - Inquest and blame, I felt as felt of old - That prophet chanting his majestic strain, - 'The Lord is in His holy temple, let - The earth, let the whole earth, before Him keep - Silence.' My soul kept silence and still keeps. - And silence keep, all ye, before the Lord! - For the Lord cometh, lo, He cometh swift - To judge the earth! And who of us shall bide - The day of His approach? Not surely he - Then found in arms against God and His Christ!" - - Gamaliel spoke and ceased; but, while he spoke, - His speaking was like silence audible, - Rather than sound of voice; and when he ceased, - His silence was as eloquence prolonged. - - Awhile the council sat as in a trance, - Unable or unwilling to bestir - Themselves for speech or motion. But not all - Are capable of awe. Some present there, - Either through sad defect of nature proof, - Or through long worldly habit seared and sealed, - Against the access of heavenly influence, - Bode unaware of anything divine - Descended near them--carnal minds, immersed - In sense, from shocks of spirit insulate, - Calm, discomposure none from things unseen, - The faculty for such experience lost, - Pitiably self-possessed! and God Himself - So nigh to have possessed them! - These a space - Waited to let the power a little pass, - Wrought by Gamaliel on the council; then - With tentative preamble, one of them - Said that Gamaliel's words were words of weight, - Weight well derived from character like his-- - Whereat the speaker paused, with crafty eye - Cast round from countenance to countenance, - To read how much he safely might detract, - By open difference or by sly demur, - From the just value and authority - Of mild Gamaliel's sentence. But small sign - Saw he to hearten him in hope of ebb - To the strong tide still standing at full flood - That set in favor of the prisoners. - He feebly closed with wish expressed--and wish - It was, not hope--of hope no grounds he saw-- - That some means might be found to save the shocked - And staggering dignity--a dignity - Ancient and sacred--of the Sanhedrim - From sheer shipwreck. - Some slight responsive stir - Under such spur to pride emboldened one - To trust they should at least sharply rebuke - The prisoners, and take bond of word from them - Not further to disturb the city's peace. - Another following said, that had been tried - Already once, with what result accrued - Was plain to see. And now the Sanhedrim, - Through various such suggestion commonplace, - Relaxed somewhat from their late mood so tense, - Grew readier to approve his voice who said: - "The first offence we deemed condignly met - With reprimand from us, and interdict. - Those gentle means the prisoners once have scorned, - And to our face assure us they will scorn. - Now let such contumacious insolence - Toward just authority too meek, be met, - If not with death deserved, at least with stripes - So heavy they shall wish it had been death." - - Such truculence renewed provoked a new - Reaction. This, that councillor less stern - Noted--who, with Gamaliel and with Saul, - Refrained, when all the others hissed applause - To Mattathias--noted, and with thrift - Converted into opportunity. - - A wary spirit Nicodemus was, - With impulses toward good, but weak in will, - And selfish as the timid are. His heart - Was a divided empire in his breast, - Half firm for God, but half to self seduced. - His fellows trusted him accordingly; - Hate him they could not, but they did not love. - Some guessed him guilty of discipleship - To Jesus, secretly indulged through fear. - This their suspicion the suspect in turn - Suspected, and the uneasy consciousness - Made him more curious than his wont to move - By indirection toward his present aim. - What he wished was, to serve the prisoners - And not disserve himself--a double end, - Rendering his counsels double; but as such - Could speak, now Nicodemus rising spoke. - With sinuous slow approach winning his way - Devious whither he wished to go, like those - Creatures that backward facing forward creep - And seem retiring still while they advance, - So Nicodemus wound him toward his goal, - Well-chosen, as he said: - "Let us be wise; - Beyond our purpose were not well to go, - Were foolish. Cruelty is not, I trust, - Our spirit; God is just, but cruel not. - Let us, God's sons, be just indeed, like God, - But then, like God, also not cruel. Stripes - Are heavy, howsoever lightly laid - On freeborn men. The shame is punishment; - A wounded spirit who can bear? Through flesh - You smite the smarting spirit, every blow. - Remember too that lacerated flesh - Has lips to plead with, makes its mute appeal - To pity--eloquence incapable - Of being answered, charging cruelty; - Whereas the bleeding spirit, bleeding hid, - No cruelty imputes, reports no pain, - But, pith of self-respect clean gone from one, - Glazes the eye, dejects the countenance, - Changes the voice to hollow, takes the spring - Out of the step, and leaves the man a wretch - To suffer on an object of contempt - More than compassion--hopelessly bereft - Of power to captivate the public ear, - Which ever itches to be caught the prey - Of orator full-blooded, iron lungs, - Brass front, a lusty human animal. - Such make of men, through shame of public stripes, - Transformed to eunuchs--this, sure, were enough; - Nay, for our purpose, more than more would be. - And even so much as this, yea, lightest stripe, - Drawing a sequel such as I have said-- - Brethren, for me, my soul revolts from it; - I feel it cruel, fear it impious. - Behooves we ponder well Gamaliel's word; - And, if to slay were haply against God - To be found fighting, why not, then, to scourge?" - - "Such fine-spun sentiment," another now, - Concurring, though sarcastically, said, - "In pity of the victim of the scourge - For suffering inwardly endured through shame, - Supposes that your victim is endowed - With some small faculty for feeling shame, - Which in the present case asks evidence. - - "Still, I too take the clement part, and say, - If only for Saul's sake, let these go free - Of any but the lightest punishment. - Saul will desire for foemen hearts as strong - As may be, to call out that strength in him - Which we well know, for their discomfiture. - Even thus, he may prefer some other foe - Than men disparaged by the brand of blows - Upon their backs, some fairer, fresher fame, - His gage of battle to take up, and be - By him immortalized through overthrow - Experienced, such as never yet was worse." - - Divergent so in view or motive, they - Agreed at last to let the prisoners go - With stripes inflicted, and a charge severe - Imposed to speak in Jesus' name no more. - These so released departed thence with joy, - Rejoicing to have been accounted meet - For Jesus' sake to suffer shame. Nor ceased - Those faithful men to preach and teach as erst, - Both in the temple and from house to house, - Daily still sounding forth Jesus as Christ. - - But Saul withdrew deep pondering in his mind - How he might best his plan divulged fulfill. - - - - -BOOK III. - -SAUL AGAINST STEPHEN. - - -Stephen, as a Christian preacher of brilliant genius and of growing -fame, is selected by Saul to be his antagonist in the controversy -resolved upon by him. To a vast concourse of people assembled in -expectation of hearing Stephen preach, Saul takes the opportunity to -address an impassioned and elaborate appeal, with argument, against -Stephen's doctrine. His hearers are powerfully affected; among them, -he not knowing it, Saul's own beloved sister Rachel. - -SAUL AGAINST STEPHEN. - - Like a wise soldier on some task intent - Of moment and of hazard, who, at heart - Secure of prospering, yet no caution counts, - No pains, unworthy, but with wary feet - Explores his ground about him every rood, - All elements of chance forecalculates, - Draws to his part each doubtful circumstance; - Never too much provided, point by point - Equips himself superfluously strong, - That he prevailing may with might prevail, - And overcome with bounteous victory; - So Saul, firm in resolve and confident, - And inly stung with conscience and with zeal - Not to postpone his weighty work proposed, - Would not be hasty found, nor rash, to fail - Of any circumspection that his sure - Triumph might make more sure, or wider stretch - Its margin, certain to be wide. - Some days - After the council, he, with forecast sage - And prudence to prepare, refrained himself - From word or deed in public; while, at home, - Not moody, but not genial as his use, - His gracious use, was, self-absorbed, retired - In deep and absent muse, he nigh might seem - A stranger to his sister well-beloved, - Wont to be sharer of his inmost mind. - - Inmost, save one reserve. He never yet - Had shown to any, scarce himself had seen, - The true deep master motive of his soul, - That fountain darkling in the depths of self - Whence into light all streams of being flowed. - Saul daily, nightly, waking, sleeping, dreamed - Of a new nation, his belovéd own, - Resurgent from the dust consummate fair, - And, for chief corner-stone, with shoutings reared - To station in the stately edifice-- - Whom but himself? Who worthier than Saul? - - This beckoning image bright of things to be-- - Audacious-lovelier far than might be shown - To any, yea, than he himself dared look, - With his own eyes, steadfast and frank upon-- - Was interblent so closely in his mind - With what should be the fortune and effect - Of his intended controversy nigh, - That, though his settled purpose to dispute - He had for public reasons publicly - Declared, he yet in private, of that strife, - Still future, everywhere to speak abstained, - Abiding even unto his sister dumb. - - Rachel from Tarsus to Jerusalem - Had borne her brother company, her heart - One heart with his to cheer him toward the goal - Of his high purpose, which she knew, to be - Beyond his equals master in the law. - Alone they dwelt together, their abode - Between Gamaliel's and the synagogue - Of the Cilicians. Beautiful and bright - His home she made to him, with housewife ways - Neat-handed, and with fair companionship. - - The sister, with that quick intelligence - The woman's, first divined, for secret cause - Of this her brother's travailing silentness, - That he some pregnant enterprise revolved; - Then, having, with the woman's wit, found means - To advise herself what enterprise it was, - She, with the woman's tact of sympathy, - In watchful quiet reverent of his mood, - Strove with him and strove for him, in her thought, - Her wish, her hope, her prayer; nor failed sometimes - A word to drop, unconsciously as seemed, - By lucky chance, that might perhaps convey - A timely help of apt suggestion wise - To Saul her brother for his purpose, he - All undisturbed to guess that aught was meant. - - At home, abroad, reserved, Saul not the less - All places of men's frequence and resort - Still visited, and mixed with crowds to catch - The whisper of the people; active not, - But not supine, observing unobserved - As if alone amid the multitude. - The brave apostles of the Nazarene - He heard proclaim their master Lord and Christ, - And marked their method in the Scriptures; not - With open mind obedient toward the truth, - But ever only with shut heart and hard, - Intent on knowing how to contradict. - - Meanwhile the novel doctrines spread, and found - New converts day by day, and day by day - Proclaimers new. Of these more eminent - Was none than Stephen, flaming prophet he, - Quenchless in spirit, full of faith and power. - Him oft Saul heard, to listening throngs that hung - Upon the herald's lips with eager ear, - The claim of Jesus to Messiahship - Assert, and from the psalms and prophets prove. - - In guise a seraph rapt, with love aflame - And all aflame with knowledge, like the bush - That burned with God in Horeb unconsumed, - The fervent pure apostle Stephen stood, - In ardors from celestial altars caught - Kindling to incandescence--stood and forged, - With ringing blow on blow, his argument, - A vivid weapon edged and tempered so, - And in those hands so wielded, that its stroke - No mortal might abide and bide upright. - Stephen is such as Saul erelong will be - Risen from the baptism of the Holy Ghost! - - Saul felt the breath of human power that blew - Round Stephen like a morning wind, he felt - The light that lifted and transfigured him - And glorified, that bright auroral ray - Of genius which forever makes the brow - It strikes on from its fountain far in God - Shine like the sunrise-smitten mountain peak-- - Saul felt these things in Stephen by his tie - With Stephen in the fellowship of power; - Kindred to kindred answered and rejoiced. - But that in Stephen which was more and higher - Than Stephen at his native most and highest, - The inhabitation of the Holy Ghost-- - This, Saul had yet no sense to apprehend. - The Spirit of God, only the Spirit of God - Can know; the natural man to Him is deaf - And blind. Saul, therefore, seeing did not see, - And hearing heard not. But no less his heart, - In seeing and in hearing Stephen speak, - Leapt up with recognition of a peer - In power to be his meet antagonist - And task him to his uttermost to foil. - Beyond Saul's uttermost it was to be, - That task! though this of Stephen not, but God. - - Still goaded day by day with such desire - As nobler spirits know, to feel the strain - And wrestle of antagonistic thews - Tempting his might and stirring up his mind, - Saul felt, besides, the motion and ferment - And great dilation of a patriot soul, - Magnanimous, laboring for his country's cause. - He thought the doctrines of the Nazarene - Pernicious to the Jewish commonwealth, - Not less than was his person base, his life - Unseemly, and opprobrious his death. - He saw, or deemed he saw, in what was taught - From Jesus, only deep disparagement - Disloyally implied of everything - Nearest and dearest to the Hebrew heart. - The gospel was high treason in Saul's eyes; - Suppose it but established in success, - The temple then would be no more what erst - It was, the daily sacrifice would cease, - The holy places would with heathen feet - Be trodden and profaned, the middle wall - Of old partition between Jew and Greek - Would topple undermined, the ritual law - Of Moses would be obsolete and void, - Common would be the oracles of God, - To all divulged, peculiar once to Jews-- - Of Jewish name and nation what were left? - Such thoughts, that seemed of liberal scope, were Saul's, - Commingled, he not knowing, with some thoughts, - Less noble, of his own aggrandizement. - - It came at length to pass that on a day - The spacious temple-court is thronged with those - Come from all quarters to Jerusalem, - Or dwellers of the city, fain to hear - Once more the preacher suddenly so famed. - Present is Saul, but not as heretofore - To hearken only and observe; the hour - Has struck when his own voice he must uplift, - To make it heard abroad. - He dreamed it not, - But Rachel too was there, his sister. She - Had, from sure signs observed, aright surmised - That the ripe time to speak was come to Saul. - In her glad loyalty, she doubted not - That he, that day, would, out of a full mind, - Pressed overfull with affluence from the heart, - Pour forth a stream of generous eloquence-- - Stream, nay, slope torrent, steep sheer cataract, - Of reason and of passion intermixed-- - For such she proudly felt her brother's power-- - Which down should rush upon his adversaries - And carry them away as with a flood, - Astonished, overwhelmed, and whirled afar; - Rescued at least the ruins of the state! - So glorying in her high vicarious hope - For Saul her brother, Rachel came that morn - Betimes and chose her out a safe recess - For easy audience, nigh, and yet retired, - Between the pillars of a stately porch, - Where she might see and not by him be seen. - - Thence Rachel watched all eagerly; when now - The multitude, expecting Stephen, saw - A different man stand forth with beckoning hand - As if to speak. The act and attitude - Commanded audience, for a king of men - Stood there, and a great silence fell on all. - Some knew the face of the young Pharisee, - These whispered round his name; Saul's name and fame - To all were known, and, ere the speaker spoke, - Won him a deepening heed. - Rachel the hush - Felt with a secret sympathetic awe, - And for one breath her beating heart stood still; - It leapt again to hear her brother's voice - Pealing out bold in joyous sense of power. - That noble voice, redounding like a surge - Pushed by the tide, on swept before the wind, - And all the ocean shouldering at its back, - Which seeks out every inlet of the shore - To brim it flush and level from the brine-- - Such Saul's voice swelled, as from a plenteous sea, - And, wave on wave of pure elastic tone, - Rejoicing ran through every gallery, - And every echoing endless colonnade, - And every far-retreating least recess - Of building round about that temple-court, - And filled the temple-court with silver sound-- - As thus, with haughty summons, he began: - "Ye men of Israel, sojourners from far - Or dwellers in Jerusalem, give heed. - The lines are fallen to us in evil times: - Opinions run abroad perverse and strange, - Divergent from the faith our fathers held. - A day is come, brethren, and fallen on us-- - On us, this living generation, big - With promise, or with threat, of mighty doom. - Which will ye have it? Threat, or promise, which? - Yours is the choosing--choose ye may, ye must. - - "Abolish Moses, if ye will; destroy - The great traditions of your fathers; say - Abraham was naught, naught Isaac, Jacob, all - The patriarchs, heroes, martyrs, prophets, kings; - That Seed of Abraham naught, our nation's Hope, - Foretold to be an universal King; - Make one wide blank and void, an emptied page, - Of all the awful glories of our past-- - Deliverance out of Egypt, miracle - On miracle wrought dreadfully for us - Against our foes, path cloven through the sea, - Jehovah in the pillar of cloud and fire, - And host of Pharaoh mightily overthrown; - The law proclaimed on Sinai amid sound - And light insufferable and angels nigh - Attending; manna in the wilderness; - The rock that lived and moved and followed them, - Our fathers, flowing water in the waste-- - Obliterate at a stroke whatever sets - The seal of God upon you as His own, - And marks you different from the heathen round-- - Shekinah fixed between the cherubim, - The vacant Holy of Holies filled with God, - The morning and the evening sacrifice, - Priest, altar, incense, choral hymn and psalm, - Confused melodious noise of instruments - Together sounding the high praise of God; - All this, with more I will not stay to tell, - This temple itself with its magnificence, - The hope of Him foreshown, the Messenger - Of that eternal covenant wherein - Your souls delight themselves, Who suddenly - One day shall come unto His temple--blot, - Expunge, erase, efface, consent to be - No more a people, mix and merge yourselves - With aliens, blood that in your veins flows pure - All the long way one stream continuous down - From Abraham called the friend of God--such blood - Adulterate in the idolatrous, corrupt - Pool of the Gentiles--men of Israel! - Or are ye men? and are ye Israel? - I stand in doubt of you--I stand in doubt - Of kinsmen mine supposed that bide to hear - Such things as seems that ye with pleasure hear! - - "Say, know ye not they mean to take away - Your place and name? Are ye so blind? Or are - Ye only base poor creatures caring not - Though knowing well? Oft have ye seen the fat - Of lambs upon the flaming altar fume - One instant and in fume consume away; - So swiftly and so utterly shall pass, - In vapor of smoke, the glorious excellency, - The pomp, the pride, nay, but the being itself, - Of this our nation from beneath the sun, - Let once the hideous doctrine of a Christ - Condemned and crucified usurp the place - In Hebrew hearts of that undying hope - We cherish of Messiah yet to reign - In power and glory more than Solomon's, - From sunrise round to sunrise without end, - And tread the Gentiles underneath our feet." - - Indignant patriot spirit in the breast - Of Rachel mixed itself with kindred pride - And gladness for her brother gleaming so - Before her in a kind of fulgurous scorn - Which made his hearers quail while they admired; - She could not stay a sudden gush of tears. - - But Saul's voice now took on a winning change, - As, deprecating gently, thus he spoke: - "Forgive, my brethren, I have used hot words - Freely and frankly, as great love may speak. - But that I love you, trust you, hope of you - The best, the noblest, when once more you are - Yourselves, and feel the spirit of your past - Come back, I had not cared to speak at all. - I simply should have hung my head in shame, - Worn sackcloth, gone with ashes on my brow, - And sealed my hand upon my lips for you - Forever. Love does not despair, but hopes - Forever. And I love you far too well - To dream despair of you. Bethink yourselves, - My brethren! Me, as if I were the voice - Of your own ancient aspiration, hear. - Bear with me, let me chide, say not that love - Lured me to over-confidence of you. - - "Be patient now, my brethren, while I go, - So briefly as I may, through argument - That well might ask the leisure of long hours, - To show from Scripture, from authority, - From reason and from nature too not less, - Why we should hold to our ancestral faith, - And not the low fanatic creed admit - Of such as preach for Christ one crucified. - Be patient--I myself must patient be, - Tutoring down my heart to let my tongue - Speak calmly, as in doubtful argument, - Where I am fixed and confident to scorn." - - As when Gennesaret, in his circling hills, - By wing of wind down swooping suddenly - Is into tempest wrought that, to his depths - Astir, he rouses, and on high his waves - Uplifts like mountains snowy-capped with foam; - So, smitten with the vehement impact - And passion of Saul's rash, abrupt - Beginning, that mercurial multitude - Had answered with commotion such as seemed - Menace of instant act of violence: - But, as when haply there succeeds a lull - To tempest, then the waves of Galilee - Sink from their swelling and smooth down to plane - Yet deep will roll awhile from shore to shore - That long slow undulation following storm; - So, when, with wise self-recollection, Saul, - In mid-career of passionate appeal, - Stayed, and those gusts of stormy eloquence - Impetuous poured no longer on the sea - Of audience underneath him, but, instead, - Proposed a sober task of argument, - The surging throng surceased its turbulence, - And settled from commotion into calm; - Yet so as still to feel the rock and sway - Of central agitation at its heart, - While thus that master of its moods went on: - "What said Jehovah to the serpent vile - Which tempted Eve? Did he not speak of One, - Offspring to her seduced, Who should arise - To crush the offending head? No hint, I trow, - Of meekness and obedience unto death - Found there at least, death on the shameful tree, - Forsooth, to be the character and doom - Of that foretokened Champion of his kind, - That haughty Trampler upon Satan's head! - - "To Abraham our father was of God - Foretold, 'In thee shall all the families - Of the earth be blessed.' What blessing, pray, could come - Abroad upon mankind through Abraham's seed, - Messiah, should Messiah, Abraham's seed, - Prove to be such as now is preached to you, - A shame, a jest, a byword, a reproach, - A hissing and a wagging of the head, - A gazing-stock and mark for tongues shot out-- - Burlesque and travesty of our brave hopes - And of our vaunts, shown vain, rife everywhere - Among the nations, that erelong a prince - Should from the stem of Jesse spring, to sway - An universal sceptre through the world? - - "Did God mock Abraham? Did He mean, perchance, - That all the families of the earth should find - Peculiar blessedness in triumphing - Over that puissant nation promised him, - His progeny, to match the stars of heaven - For multitude, and be as on the shore - The sands, innumerable? Was such the sense - Of promise and of prophecy? Behooves, - Then, we be glad and thankful, we, on whom - The fullness of the time now falls, to be - This blessing to the Gentiles. But ye halt, - Beloved. Slack and slow seem ye to greet - The honor fixed on you. Why, hearken! Ye, - Ye, out of all the generations, ye - Fallen on the times of Jesus crucified, - May count yourselves elect and called of God - To bless the Gentiles, in affording them - Unquenchable amusement to behold - Your wretched plight and broken pride! Now clap - Your hands, ye chosen! Let your mouth be filled - With laughter, and your tongue with singing filled! - - "Nay, sons of Abraham, nay. No mocking words - Spake He who cannot lie, Lord God of truth - And grace. He meant that Abraham's race should reign - From sea to sea while sun and moon endure. - And ever a blessing true it is to men - To bend the neck beneath an equal yoke - Of ruler strong and wise and just to rule. - Then will at last the Gentiles blesséd be - In Abraham, when, from Abraham's loins derived - Through David, God's Anointed shall begin, - In David's city, His long government - Of the wide world, and every heathen name - Shall kiss the rod and own Messiah king. - - "Our father Jacob, touched with prophecy, - Spake of a sceptre that should not depart - From Judah until Shiloh came, to Whom - The obedience of the peoples was to be; - A sceptre, symbol of authority - And rule, law-giving attribute, resort - Of subject nations speeding to a yoke-- - Such ever everywhere in Holy Writ - The image and the character impressed - On God's Messiah, hope of Israel. - - "What need I more? Wherefore to ears like yours, - Well used to hear them in the temple chants - Resounded with responsive voice to voice, - Rehearse those triumphs and antiphonies - Wherein Jehovah Father to His Son - Messiah speaks: 'Ask Thou of Me, and I - To Thee the heathen for inheritance - Will give, and for possession the extreme - Parts of the earth. Thou shalt with rod of iron - Break them, yea, shatter them shalt Thou in shards, - Like a clay vessel from the potters hand. - Be wise now, therefore, O ye kings, be ye - Instructed, judges of the earth. Kiss ye - The Son, lest He be angry, and His wrath, - Full soon to be enkindled, you devour.' - Tell me, which mood of prophecy is that, - The meek or the heroic? Craven he, - Or king, to whom Jehovah deigns such speech, - Concerning whom such counsel recommends? - - "'Gird Thou upon Thy thigh Thy sword, O Thou - Most Mighty,'--so once more the psalmist, rapt - Prophetical as to a martial rage, - Breaks forth, Jehovah to Messiah speaking-- - 'Gird on Thy glory and Thy majesty; - And in Thy majesty ride prosperously, - And Thy right hand shall teach Thee terrible things. - Sharp in the heart of the king's enemies - Thine arrows are, whereby the peoples fall - Beneath Thee.' Such Messiah is, a man - Of war and captain of the host of God. - Nay, now it mounts to a deific strain, - The prophet exultation of the psalm: - 'Thy throne, O God' it sings--advancing Him, - Messiah, to the unequalled dignity - And lonely glory of the ONE I AM, - Audacious figure--close on blasphemy, - Were it not God who speaks--to represent - The dazzling splendors of Messiahship. - - "Let us erect our spirits from the dust, - My brethren, and, as sons of God, nay, gods - Pronounced--unless we grovel and below - Our birthright due, unfilial and unfit, - Sink self-depressed--let us, I pray you, rise, - Buoyed upward from within by sense of worth - Incapable to be extinguished, rise, - Found equal to the will of God for us, - And know the true Messiah when He comes. - Be sure that when He comes, His high degree - Will shine illustrious, like the sun in heaven, - Not feebly flicker for your fishermen - From Galilee to point it out to you - With their illiterate 'Lo, here!' 'Lo, there!'" - - At this increasing burst of scorn from Saul, - Exultant like the pæan and the cry - That rises through the palpitating air - When storming warriors take the citadel, - Once more from Rachel's fixéd eyes the tears - Of sympathetic exultation flowed-- - The sister with the brother, as in strife - Before the battle striving equally, - Now equally in triumph triumphing. - - But Saul, his triumph, felt to be secure, - Securer still will make with new appeal: - "If so, as we have seen, the Scriptures trend, - Not less the current of tradition too-- - No counter-current, eddy none--one stress, - Steady and full, from Adam down to you, - Runs strong the self-same way. Out of the past - What voice is heard in contradiction? None. - - "Turn round and ask the present; you shall hear - One answer still the same from every mouth - Of scribe or master versed in Holy Writ. - Tradition and authority in this - Agree with Scripture, teaching to await - For our deliverer an anointed king. - What ruler of our people has believed - In Jesus, him of Nazareth, Joseph's son, - As Christ of God? If any, then some soul - Self-judged unworthy of his rulership, - Secret disciple, shunning to avow - His faith, and justly therefore counted naught-- - Ruler in name, in nature rather slave. - - "And now I bid you look within your breast - And answer, Does not your own heart rebel - Against the gospel of the Nazarene? - 'Gospel,' forsooth! Has God, who made your heart, - Provided you for gospel what your heart - Rejects with loathing? Likely seems it, pray, - Becoming, fit, that He Who, on the mount - Of Sinai once the law promulging, there - Displayed His glory more than mortal eye - Could bear to look upon or ear to hear-- - Who in the temple hid behind the veil - Shekinah blazed between the cherubim-- - Nay, tell me, seems it tolerable even - To you, that your Jehovah God should choose, - Lover of splendor as He is, and power, - To represent Himself among mankind - Not merely naked of magnificence, - But outright squalid in the mean estate - And person of a carpenter, to die - At last apparent felon crucified? - Reason and nature outraged cry aloud, - 'For shame! For shame!' at blasphemy like this." - - A strange ungentle impulse moved the heart - Of Rachel to a mood like mutiny, - And almost she "For shame!" herself cried out - In echo to her brother's vehemence; - While murmur as of wind rousing to storm - Ran through the assembly at such words from Saul, - The passion of the speaker so prevailed - To stir responsive passion in their breasts. - This Saul perceiving said, in scornful pride, - Fallaciously foretasting triumph won: - "Ye men of Israel, gladly I perceive - Some embers of the ancient fire remain, - If smouldering, not extinguished, in your breasts. - I will not further chafe your noble rage. - You are, if I mistake not, now prepared - To hear more safely, if less patiently, - The eloquence I keep you from too long. - Let me bespeak for Stephen your best heed." - - And Saul, as if in gesture of surcease, - A pace retiring, waved around his hand - Toward Stephen, opposite not far, the while - His nostril he dispread, and mobile lip - Curled, in the height of contumelious scorn; - And Rachel, where she stood, unconsciously, - The transport of her sympathy was such, - Repeated with her features what she saw. - - - - -BOOK IV. - -STEPHEN AGAINST SAUL. - - -Stephen, following Saul, turns the tide of feeling overwhelmingly in -the opposite direction. Saul, however, but he almost alone--for even -his sister Rachel has been converted--stands out defiant against the -manifest power of God. Shimei appears as an auditor watching with -sinister motive the course of the controversy. - -STEPHEN AGAINST SAUL. - - The tumult grew a tempest when Saul ceased: - No single voice of mortal man might hope, - Though clear like clarion and like trumpet loud, - To live in that possessed demoniac sea - Of vast vociferation whelming all, - Or ride the surges of the wild uproar. - What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thy mad mind - So suddenly was soothed? Did 'Peace, be still!' - Dropping, an unction from the Holy One, - Softly as erst on stormy Galilee, - Wide overspread the summits of the waves - And sway their swelling down to glassy calm? - Stephen stood forth to speak, and all was still. - - Before he spoke, already Rachel felt - A different power of silence there, and sense, - Within, other than sympathetic awe; - This felt she, though she knew it not, nor dreamed - It was the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven! - - "Brethren"--so Stephen spoke, beyond his wont - Now, under awe of grave occasion, calmed - From God with power--"God's thoughts are not our thoughts, - Neither our ways His ways; for as the heavens - Are than the earth more high, so than our ways - More high are His, and His thoughts than our thoughts. - Our valued wisdom folly is to God - Full oft; then most, when folly seems to us - God's wisdom. Have ye yet to learn that God - Rejoices to confound the vain conceit - Of man? The Scriptures, then, search ye with eyes - Blinded so thick? It is Isaiah's word: - 'Jehovah, yea, hath poured upon you all - The spirit of deep sleep, and hath your eyes, - Those prophets of the soul that might be, closed, - Also your heads, meant to be seers, hath veiled; - And vision all is now to you become - Even as the words of a shut book and sealed. - Therefore Jehovah saith, For that this people - Draw nigh to Me in worship with their mouth, - But have their heart removed from Me afar, - While all their fear of Me is empty form - Enjoined of men, and idly learned by rote-- - Behold, a thing of wonder will I do - Among this people, wonder passing thought, - And perish shall the wisdom of their wise - And prudence of their prudent come to nought!' - - "Brethren, that was man's wisdom which just now - Ye heard, and were well pleased to hear, from Saul. - Hearken again, and hear what God will speak." - - At the first word that fell from Stephen's lips, - An overshadowing of the Holy Ghost - Hung like a heaven above the multitude; - With every word that followed, slow and full, - That awful cope seemed ever hovering down - Impendent nearer, as when, fold to fold, - Droops lower and lower a dark and thunderous sky. - The speaker used no arts of oratory; - Only a still small voice, not wholly his, - Nor wholly human, issuing from his lips, - Only a voice, but eloquence was shamed. - And Stephen thus his theme premised pursues: - "Rightly and wrongly, both at once, have ye - This day been taught of God's Messiah; King - He is, as Saul has said, but in a sense, - And with a highth and depth and length and breadth - And reach immense of meaning, that nor Saul, - Nor ye, nor any by the Holy Ghost - Untaught, have yet conceived. Not of this world - His kingdom is. The pageant and the pomp, - State visible, and splendor to the eye, - Are of this world that vanishes away, - And of the princes of this world that come - To naught. His glory whose the kingdom is - Whereof I speak, no eye hath seen, no eye - Can see. That vision is for naked soul. - - "The lordship and authority which craves - Obeisance of the knee, the lip, the hand, - And the neck breaks to an unwelcome yoke, - But traitor leaves the hidden heart within, - Rebel the will insurgent, infidel - The mind, the critic reason dissident, - And violated conscience enemy-- - Such rule is but the hollow show of rule, - A husk of vain pretence, the kernel gone. - - "No earthly kingdom such, Messiah's is, - Of nations hating and yet serving Him-- - Trampled into the dust beneath His feet, - And either cringing or else gnashing rage. - A kingdom here on earth of heaven to found, - From heaven to earth God's true Messiah comes; - A kingdom built of meek and lowly hearts - By Monarch meek and lowly to be ruled; - A world-wide kingdom and a time-long reign. - This kingdom new of heaven on earth commenced - Will gather Jew and Gentile both in one, - Whereso, of high or low, of rich or poor, - Heart ready to receive it shall be found, - In time or clime however hence afar. - For hear Him speak, the High and Lofty One - Who maketh His abode eternity: - 'Lo, in the high and holy place dwell I, - Likewise with him of meek and contrite mind.' - - "In those words were foreshown the things which are, - Brethren, and kingdom which we preach to you, - Messiah here indeed, His reign begun, - Invisible but glorious, on the earth. - He that hath ears to hear, lo, let him hear, - And hail the one right Ruler come at last; - Who rules not nations, masses of mankind - Only, with indiscriminate wide sway - Imperfect though to view magnificent, - By many an individual will unfelt; - But seeks His subjects singly, soul by soul, - And over each, through all within him, reigns. - Jew must with Gentile, heart by heart, submit - To own Messiah thus his Lord and King, - Throning Him sovereign in the realm of self, - The empire of a humble, contrite mind. - - "No other rule is real than rule like this, - The true Messiah's rule, which well within - The flying scouts and outposts of the man, - Wins to the midmost seat and citadel - Of being, where the soul itself resides, - And tames the master captive to its thrall. - Then sings the soul unto herself and says, - 'Bless thou, Jehovah, O my soul, and all - That is within me, bless His holy name!' - Filled is the hidden part with melody. - For joyfully the reason then consents, - The mind is full of light to see, and says - 'Amen!' the will resolves the opposite - Of its old self, won by the heart, which, more - Than mere obedience, loves; conscience the while - Delightedly infusing all delight, - And Holy Spirit breathing benison. - - "Such subjugation is a state of peace; - But peace, stagnation not, nor death. You live - And move and have your being evermore - Fresher and deeper, purer and more full, - Drawn in an ether and an element - Instinct and vivid with God. The appetites - Are subject servitors to will, the will - Hearkens to reason and regards its voice-- - Reason which is the will of Him who reigns, - Your reason and His will insensibly - Blending to grow incorporate in one. - Such is the kingdom of the Christ of God. - You easily miss it--for it cometh not - With observation; you must look within - To find it--pray that you may find it so." - - A mien of something more than majesty - In Stephen as he spoke, transfiguring him; - Conscious authority loftier than pride; - Deep calm which made intensity seem weak; - Slow weight more insupportable than speed; - Passion so pure that its effect was peace, - Beatifying his face; betokened power - Beneath him that supported him, behind - Him that impelled, above him and within - That steadied him immovable, supplied - As from a fountain of omnipotence; - An air breathed round him of prophetic rapt - Solemnity oppressive beyond words - And dread communication from the throne, - Moved near, of the Most High, which only not - Thundered and lightened, as from the touched top - Of Sinai once in witness of the law-- - Such might, not Stephen's, wrought with Stephen there - And laid his hearers subject at his feet. - - Saul saw the grasp secure that he had laid - Upon his brethren's minds and hearts--to hold, - He proudly, confidently deemed, against - Whatever counter force of eloquence-- - This tenure his he saw relaxed, dissolved, - Evanishéd, as it had never been. - Perplexed, astonished, but impenetrable, - Though dashed and damped in spirit and in hope, - Angry he stood, recoiled upon himself. - - But Rachel had a different history. - She felt her inmost conscience searched and known; - Sharper than any sword of double edge, - The Word of God through Stephen pierced her heart, - And there asunder clove her self and self. - She heeded Stephen's warning words; she looked - Within, she pressed her hand upon her heart - And prayed, "O God, my God, my fathers' God, - Thy kingdom--grant that _I_ may find it _here_!" - So praying she listened while farther Stephen spoke: - "That such a Ruler should be such as He - Whom we proclaim, the Man of Nazareth, - The Carpenter, the Man of Calvary, - Affronts your reason, tempts to disbelief-- - Doubtless; but all the more shown absolute - His sovereignty, transcendent, passing quite - Limit of precedent or parallel, - As nothing in Him outwardly appears - To soothe your pride in yielding to His claim. - Always the more offended pride rebels, - Is proved his triumph greater who subdues. - Deep is our human heart, and versatile - Exceedingly, ingenious past our ken, - Inventive of contrivances to save - Fond pride from hurt. But here is no escape; - Pride must be hurt and bleed, unsalved her wounds. - She may not conquer crouching, she must crouch - Conquered; nor only so, she must be glad - To be the conquered, not the conqueror; - Thus deeply must the heart abjure itself, - Thus deeply own the mastership of Christ. - Christ will not practise on your self-conceit - And lure you to obey illusively. - Obedience is not obedience - Save as, obeying, you love, loving, obey-- - The chief of all obediences, love." - - Such serene counter to his own superb - Disdain of Jesus wrought on Saul effect - Diverse from that meanwhile in Rachel wrought. - She yielded to exchange her standing-ground, - And ceased to hold her centre in herself. - Centred in God, she all things new beheld - Translated by the mighty parallax. - Open she threw the portals of her soul - And gave the keys up to her new-found King. - - But Saul more stubbornly than ever clamped - His feet to keep them standing where they stood. - Haughty, erect, rebuffing--he alone-- - He still stared on at Stephen, who Saul's scorn - Felt subtly like a fierce oppugnant force - Resistlessly attractive to his aim, - As, suddenly soon borne into a swift - Involuntary swerving of his speech-- - Himself, with Saul, surprising--he went on: - "Such lord, requiring such obedience, - In Him of Nazareth, a man approved - Of God by many mighty works through Him - Among you done, this day I preach to you, - My brethren all--my brother Saul, to thee!" - - Therewith full round on Saul the speaker turned; - That self-same instant, the seraphic sheen - Brightened to dazzling upon Stephen's face; - Saul standing there, transfixed to listen, blenched, - As if a lightning-flash had blinded him. - Then, prophet-wise, like Nathan come before - King David sinner, Stephen, his right hand - And fixed forefinger flickering forth at Saul, - An intense moment centred upon him, - Sole, the converging ardors of his speech-- - As who, with lens of cunning convex, draws - Into one focus all the solar rays - Collected to engender burning heat. - - Rachel, who saw Saul blench, and full well knew - What pangs on pangs his pride could force him bear-- - He smiling blithely while he inly bled-- - Watched, with a heart divided in sore pain - Between the sister's pity of his case - And sympathy against him for his sake, - As Stephen thus his speech to Saul addressed: - "Yea, to thee, Saul my brother, in thy flush - And prime of youth and youthful hope, thy joy, - Thy pride, of all-accomplished intellect, - And sense of self-sufficing righteousness-- - To thee, thou pupil of Gamaliel, thee, - Thou Hebrew of the Hebrews, Pharisee, - Against the gust and fury of thy zeal, - And in the teeth of thy repellent scorn, - Jesus the crucified I preach _thy_ lord. - Blindly with bitter hate thou ragest now - Against Him; but hereafter, and not long - Hereafter, thou, despite, shalt lie prostrate - Before Him and beneath Him in the dust, - Astonished with His glory sudden shown - Beyond thy power with open eye to see. - Lo, by the Holy Spirit bidden, I - This day plant pricks for thee to kick against. - Cruel shall be the torture in thy breast, - And unto cruel deeds thou didst not dream - The torture in thy breast will madden thee-- - The anguish of a mind at strife with good, - A will self-blinded not to cease from sin. - Nevertheless at length I see thee mild-- - Broken thy pride, thy wisdom brought to naught, - To thyself hateful thy self righteousness, - Worshipping at His feet whom late thou didst - Persecute in His members, persecute - In me. Lo, with an everlasting love - I long for thee, O Saul, and draw thee, love - Born of that love wherewith the Lord loved me - And gave Himself for me to bitter death." - - Rachel her prayer and love and longing joins, - With tears, to Stephen's, for her brother, who, - Conscious of many eyes upon him fixed, - Far other thought, the while, and feeling, broods. - - As captain, on the foremost imminent edge - Of battle, leading there a storming van - Of soldiers in some perilous attack, - Pregnant with fate to empire, if he feel - Pierce to a vital part within his frame - Wound of invisible missile from the foe, - Will hide his deadly hurt with mask of smile, - That he damp not his followers' gallant cheer; - Thus, though with motive other, chiefly pride, - Saul, rallying sharply from that first surprise, - Sternly shut up within his secret breast - A poignant pang conceived from Stephen's words, - Resentment fated to bear bitter fruit, - But melt at last in gracious shame and tears. - - With fixéd look impassible, he gazed - At Stephen, while, in altered phase, that pure - Effulgence of apostleship burned on: - "Nor, brethren, let this word of mine become - Scandal before your feet to stumble you - Headlong to ruin--'gave Himself for me - To bitter death'--implying it the Christ's - To suffer death in sacrifice for sin. - This is that thing of wonder prophesied, - Confounding to the wisdom of the wise; - A suffering Saviour, a Messiah shamed, - Monarch arrayed in purple robes of scorn, - With diadem of thorns pressed on His brow, - And in His hand for sceptre thrust a reed-- - The Lord of life and glory crucified! - - "Dim saw perhaps our father Abraham this, - Through symbol and through prophecy contained - In smoking furnace and in blazing torch - Beheld, that evening, when the sun went down - And it was dark. The smoking furnace meant - The mystery of the Messiah's shame - To go before His glory typified - In the clear shining of the torch ablaze. - - "Of the same mystery of agony - In sorrow, shame, and death, forerunning dark - The bright and brightening sequel without end - Of the Messiah's work, Isaiah spake, - When he foresaw His coming day from far. - The eagle vision of that seer was dimmed - With tears, like Jeremiah's, to behold - What he beheld--Messiah's visage so - Marred more than any man's, and so His form - More than befell the sons of men. He read, - Within the mirror of his prophecy, - Astonishment depicted in the eyes - Of many--in the eyes of which of you, - My brethren?--at a spectacle so strange. - The melancholy prophet saw a gloom - Of unbelief darken the world. 'What soul,' - Wails he, 'is found to credit our report? - To whom has been revealed Jehovah's arm - In such a wise outstretched to save?' Heart-sick - At what, too clearly for his peace, he sees, - Isaiah, turning from his vision, cries - In pain--consider, brethren, whether ye - Unwittingly fulfil what he portrays!-- - 'He was despised, rejected was of men, - A man of sorrows and acquainted well - With grief; as one from whom men hide their face, - Despised was He, and we esteemed Him not.' - - "Now our own gospel hear Isaiah preach, - The good news that such sufferings borne by Him, - Messiah, were for you, for us, for all: - 'Surely our griefs they were Messiah bore, - He carried sorrows that were due to us. - Yet we, alas, of Him as stricken thought, - Smitten of God, and for affliction marked!' - - "Would God, my brethren, ye who hear these things, - This day, were minded as the prophet was - Who thus from God reported them to you! - He but foresaw them, and he saw them; ye - Saw them, and did not see! And yet, even yet, - Look back, as forward he; lo, touch your eyes - With eyesalve that ye be not blind, but see! - See, with Isaiah, how Messiah was - 'Wounded for your transgressions, bruised so sore - For your iniquities, how chastisement - On Him was laid that peace should bring to you, - How stripes whereby He bled to you were health.' - - "Meekly and thankfully Isaiah sinks - Himself, one drop, into the human sea, - And says 'we,' 'our,' and 'us'--do ye the same. - O brethren, if this day ye hear His voice, - A whisper only in your ear from heaven, - I pray you, harden not your heart. Confess - Your fault, and say with your own prophet, 'We, - All we, like sheep, have gone astray, astray, - And God on Him hath laid the sin of all.'" - - At such expostulation and appeal - Ineffable, found hidden in the words - Of prophecy, Rachel her heart felt fail - Into a pathos of repentance sweet - With love and soft sense of forgiveness, bought - For her at cost so dear!--and she dissolved - In sobs and tears of sorrow exquisite, - Better than joy, and uncontrollable. - The mastership of Jesus now to her - Merged in the sweetness of His saviorship; - The duty of obedience to a Lord - All taken up, transfigured, glorified, - In the transcendent privilege of love. - Never such grief in joy, such joy in grief, - Was hers before--for self was wholly slain - And her whole life grew love unutterable. - - Yet longed she, with a hope that half was pain, - For Saul, while Stephen brokenly went on: - "O ye to whom for the last time I speak, - My heart is large for you, it breaks for you, - And melts to tears within me while I plead. - I pray you, I beseech you, in Christ's stead, - Be reconciled to God. Hearken this once - And answer, Were it set your task, in choice - Few words to frame the image and the lot - Of Jesus whom ye slew, how otherwise - More fitly could ye do it than was done - Aforetime by Isaiah when he wrote - Prophetically thus of Christ to be: - 'Oppressed He was, yet He abased Himself - And opened not His mouth; even as a lamb - Led to the slaughter, as a sheep before - Her shearers speechless, so He opened not - His mouth. His grave they with the wicked made, - And with the rich they laid Him in His death.' - Say, brethren, was not Jesus very Christ? - - "But, that ye err not, Messianic woe - Is not the end; a glorious change succeeds. - Isaiah chanted it in sequel glad - And contrast of the sorrow-laden strain - That mourned Messiah's sufferings; hear the song: - 'When thou, Jehovah, shalt His soul have made - An offering for sin, Messiah then - The endless issue of His pain shall see; - Still on and on He shall His days prolong, - And in His hand the pleasure of the Lord - Shall prosper; of the travail of His soul - He shall see fruit and shall be satisfied.' - So, with rejoicing too serenely full - For exultation, sang Isaiah then - Of Messianic glory following shame. - - "And now, concerning Jesus whom ye slew, - Know, brethren, that He burst the bands of death, - Which could not hold the Lord of life in thrall. - Know that He, having risen, rose again, - Ascending far above all height, and led - Captive captivity; attended so - With retinue of deliverance numberless, - He entered heaven a Conqueror and a King; - Before Him lifted up their heads the gates, - The everlasting doors admitted Him. - There sits He now associate by the side - Of His Almighty Father, Lord of all. - For to Him every knee shall bow, in heaven, - On earth, and every tongue confess that He, - Jesus, is Lord; Jehovah wills it so. - - "Fall, brethren, I adjure you, haste to fall - Betimes upon this stone and bruise your pride; - Wait but too long, this stone will fall on you: - Not then your pride, but you, not bruised will be, - But ground to undistinguishable dust." - - So Stephen spoke; and ceased, as loth to cease. - - The moments of his speaking had been like - A slow and dreadful imminence of storm. - With those august and awful opening words - Of his, which were not his, but God's, it was - As when an altered elemental mood - Usurps the atmosphere; the winds are laid, - Clouds gather, mass to mass, anon perchance - Roll back, disclosing spaces of clear sky, - But close again, deeper and darker, full - Of thunder, silent yet, of lightning, leashed - From leaping forth, but watchful for its prey. - Such had been Stephen's speaking, boded storm; - His ceasing was the tempest burst at last-- - A silent tempest, silent and unseen, - Rending the elements of the world of soul! - - Meanwhile the angels in attendance there, - Watching with eyes that see the invisible - Things of the spirit of man within his breast, - The posture and behavior of the mind, - Had seen exhibited amidst that late - Motionless multitude of souls suspense - With supernatural awe, a spectacle - Of consternation and precipitate flight - To covert, such as sometimes is beheld - In nature, when a mighty tempest lowers, - And man, beast, bird, each conscious living thing, - Shuddering, hies to hiding from the wrack. - With wild inaudible outcry heard in heaven, - That shattered congregation, soul by soul, - Each soul its several way, fled, to find shroud - From spiritual tempest hurtling on the head, - Intolerably, hailstones and coals of fire. - - But one excepted spirit stood aloof, - Scorning to join the fellowship of flight. - Like a tall pine by whirlwind lonely left - Upon his mountain, forest abject round, - This man dared lift, though sole, a helmless brow - Of stubborn hardihood to take the storm. - Others, dismayed, might flee to refuge; Saul, - Not undismayed, fronted the wrath of God. - - Shimei alone there neither stood nor fell; - By habit grovelling, on his belly prone, - Already prostrate he had thither come. - Incapable of awe from good inspired, - He, abject, but without humility, - Ever, by force of reptile nature, crawled; - And now had crawled, as, dusty demon's-heart - And vitreous eye of basilisk, he still-- - With equal, though with different, enmity, - Devising death for Stephen in his mind, - And studying slow prolonged revenge for Saul-- - Watched all, whatever chanced to either there; - But most, malignantly delighted, watched - Deepen the settled shadow on Saul's face - Cast from the darkness of his inner mood. - - - - -BOOK V. - -SAUL AND SHIMEI. - - -Saul, sullen, gloomy, and chagrined, over his discomfiture recently -experienced, is visited, in his self-imposed seclusion at home, -by Shimei, who, always by nature antipathetic to Saul, hates him -virulently now for the affront from him received publicly in the -late council. Shimei exasperates Saul with sneering, pretended -sympathy for him over his defeat at Stephen's hands; at the same time -disclosing the plot he has himself concocted, involving subornation -of perjury, with alleged connivance on the part of the Sanhedrim -in general, for the stoning of Stephen. Shimei gone, Saul, in the -open court of his dwelling, sits solitary, brooding in the depths of -dejection over the fallen state of his fortunes. - -SAUL AND SHIMEI. - - As if one, from some poise of prospect high, - Should overlook below a plain outspread - And see a bright embattled host, in close - Array of antique chivalry, supposed - Invincible, advancing, panoplied, - Horseman and horse, in steel, and with delight - Of battle pricked to speed, he--while that host, - Swift, like one man, across the field of war, - With pennons gay astream upon the wind, - And arms and armor flashing in the sun, - Moved to the sound of martial music brave-- - Might ask, "What strength set counter could withstand - The multiplied momentum of such blow?" - And yet, as, let a rock-built citadel - Upspring before them in their conquering way, - And, through embrasures in the frowning wall, - Let enginery of carnage new and strange, - Vomiting smoke and flame from hellish mouths-- - Let cannon, with their noise like thunder, belch, - Volleying, their bolts like thunderbolts amain - Among those gallant columns, then would be - Amazement seen, and ruinous overthrow; - So, late, to Saul's superbly confident - Assay of onset all seemed nigh to yield, - Till that the wisdom of the Holy Ghost, - Through Stephen speaking, made the utmost might - Of eloquence ridiculous and vain, - So was the duel all unequal, joined - By Saul with Stephen on that fateful day. - Though not ill matched the champions' native force - And spirit, and not far from even their skill, - Equipment disparate of weaponry-- - Human against Divine, infinite odds!-- - Made the conclusion of the strife foregone. - Had mortal prowess against prowess been - Between those twain the naked issue tried, - Saul, with his sanguine dash of onset, might - Perchance have won the day--through sheer surprise - Of sudden and impetuous movement swift - Beyond the other's readiness to oppose - An instantaneous rally of quick thought - And lightning-like alertness of stanch will - Mustering and mastering his collected might. - But the event and fortune of that hour - Resolved no doubt which combatant excelled - In wit or will or strength or exercise. - Stephen was fortressed round impregnably, - Saul stood in open field obvious to wound; - Saul wielded weapons of the present world, - Celestial weapons furnished Stephen--nay, - Weapon himself, the Almighty wielded him. - - Saul knew himself defeated, overwhelmed. - By how much he had purposed in his heart, - And buoyantly expected, beyond doubt - Or possible peradventure, to prevail, - More than prevail, triumph, abound, redound, - And overflow, with ample surplusage - Of prosperous fortune far transcending all - Public conjecture of his hoped success; - By so much now he found himself instead - Buried beneath discomfiture immense - And boundless inundation of defeat. - For multitudes of new believers won - To Stephen's side from Saul's thronged to the Way, - Storming the kingdom of heaven with violence. - It was a nation hastening to be born, - Like Israel out of Egypt, in a day. - As Israel out of Egypt were baptized - To Moses in the cloud and in the sea, - So Israel out of Israel Saul now saw - Baptized obedient into Jesus' name. - Dissolving round about him seemed to Saul - The earth itself with its inhabitants, - And, to bear up the pillars of it, he - A broken reed that could not stand alone! - - But, while thus worsted Saul forlornly felt - Himself, he by whom worsted missed to know. - His challenge was to Stephen; how should he - Guess that in Stephen God would answer him? - Unconsciously with God at enmity, - But with God's servant Stephen consciously, - Saul chafed and raged in proud and blindfold hate; - Half yet, the while, despising too himself, - Detected hating thus, by his own heart - Detected hating, his antagonist, - For the sole blame of visiting on him - The fortune he had purposed to inflict. - - Saul in such mood of rancor and remorse - Commingled--both unhappy sentiments - Still mutually exasperating each - The other--Shimei came to him. - Now Saul - And Shimei were two opposites intense - In nature, never toward each other drawn, - But violently ever sent asunder; - Yet chiefly by repulsion lodged in Saul, - Spurning off Shimei, as the good the evil; - For Saul instinctively was noble, frank, - And true, as Shimei instinctively - Was false, profound in guile, to base inclined. - But strangely, since that council wherein Saul - Fulmined his shame on Shimei's proffer vile, - Shimei had felt the other's scorn of him - A force importunate to tempt him nigh-- - Perverse attraction in repulsion found!-- - As evil ever struggles toward the good, - Not to be leavened with virtue issuing thence, - But leaven instead to likeness with itself. - So Shimei came to Saul, as knowing Saul - Spurned him avaunt with loathing; in degree - Attracted as he was intensely spurned. - He fain would feast his malice on the pride, - Seen writhing, fain would make it writhe the more, - Of Saul in his discomfiture. - With mien - Demure of hypocritic sympathy, - The nauseating vehicle of sneer, - Malignly studied to exacerbate - The galled and angry feeling in Saul's mind, - He thus addressed that haughty Pharisee: - "The outcome of your effort, brother Saul, - To vindicate the cause of truth and God-- - And therewithal justly advance somewhat - Your individual profit and esteem - As rising bulwark of the Jewish state, - Whereby so much the better you might hope - Hereafter to promote the general weal-- - This spirited attempt, I say, of yours - Has in its issue disappointed you, - You, and your friends no less, who, all of us, - Together with yourself, refused to dream - Aught but the most felicitous event - To enterprise with so much stateliness - Of dignity impressively announced - By you, and show of lofty confidence. - By the way, Saul, the grand air suits your style - Astonishingly well; I should advise - Your cultivation of it. Why, at times, - When you display that absolutely frank - And unaffected lack of modesty - Which marks you, really, now, the effect on me, - Even me, is almost irresistible; - I find myself well-nigh imposed upon - To call it an effect of majesty. - - "But, to sustain the impression, Saul, it needs, - Quite needs, that you somehow contrive to shun - These awkward misadventures; the grand air - Is less impressive in a man well known - To have made a bad miscarriage, such as yours. - For in fact you--with sincere pain I say it-- - But served to Stephen as a sort of foil - To set his talent off and heighten it. - You must yourself feel this to be the case; - For never since that windy Pentecost - In which we thought we saw the top and turn - To this delirium of delusion touched, - Never, I say, till now were seen so many - New perverts to the Nazarene as seems - You two, between you, you and Stephen, Saul, - Managed, that memorable day, to make. - It is a pity, and I grieve with you. - Still, Saul, let us consider that your case, - Undoubtedly unfortunate, presents - This one alleviating circumstance, - At least, that your defeat demonstrates past - Gainsaying what an arduous attempt - Yours was, and thereby glorifies the more - That admirable headiness of yours - Which egged you on to venture unadvised. - For my own part, I like prodigiously - To see your young man overflow with spirit; - Age will bring wisdom fast enough; but spirit, - Like yours, Saul, comes, when come it does at all, - Born with the man. Never regret that you - Dared nobly; rather hug yourself for that - With pride; pride greater, since, through proof, aware - You really dared more nobly than you knew. - - "Some increment too of wisdom you have won - From your experience; not to be despised, - Though ornament rather of age than youth. - I may presume you now less indisposed - Than late you were, to reinforce, support, - And supplement mere obstinacy--fine, - Of course, as I have said, yet attribute - Common to man with beast--by counsel ripe - And scheme of well-considered policy, - Adapted to secure your end with ease. - Economy of effort well befits - Man, the express image and counterpart - Of God, who always works with parsimony, - Compassing greatest ends with smallest means, - To waste no particle of omnipotence. - - "Count now that you have rendered plain enough - What single-eyed, straightforward stubbornness - Can, and cannot, effect in this behalf; - So much is gained; now be our conscience clear - To cast about and find some other means, - Than mere main strength in public controversy, - Of dealing with these raw recalcitrants. - They lacked the grace to be discomfited - In honorable combat fairly joined, - Let them now look to it how much their gross - Effrontery in overthrowing you - Shall profit them at last. I have a scheme"-- - - "Your scheme,"--so, from the depths of his chagrin - And anguish at the contact of the man, - Spoke Saul, unwilling longer to endure - The friction and abrasion of his words-- - "Your scheme, whatever it may be, cannot - Concern my knowing; nothing you should plan - Were likely to conciliate in me - Either my judgment, or my taste, or please - My sense of what becoming is and right. - I pray you spare yourself the pains to unfold - Further to me your thought; your work were waste." - - But Shimei, naught abashed, nay, rather more - Set on, imagining that he touched in Saul - The quick of suffering sensibility - Replied: - "Yea, brother Saul, I did not fail - In our late session to observe what you - Hinted of your unreadiness to accord - Your valuable support to my advice, - Advanced on that occasion loyally - However far outrunning what the most - Were then prepared frankly to act upon. - We weaker, Saul, who may not hope to be - Athletes like you, whose sole resource must lie - In studying more profoundly than the rest, - Are liable to be misunderstood - Not seldom, when, through meditation deep - And painful, we arrive to see somewhat - Beyond the common, and propound advice - Startling, because some stages in advance - Of the conclusions less laborious minds - Reach and stop at contented--for a while, - But which mere halting-places on the road - Prove in the end, and not the final goal. - You probably remember, when I told - The council that some good judicious guile - Was what was needed, not one voice spoke up - To second my suggestion. Very well, - The lagging rear of wisdom has since then - Moved bravely up to step with me, and now - We walk along abreast harmoniously - Upon the very road I pointed out; - 'Guile' is the word with all the Sanhedrim. - - "But stay, you may perhaps not be apprised - Exactly of the current state of things-- - You have kept yourself, you know, a bit retired - These few days past, a natural thing to do, - Under the circumstances, all admit-- - Well, we have made some progress; I myself, - To imitate your lack of modesty - And don the egotistic, I myself - Have not been idle; all in fact is now - Adjusted on a plan of compromise, - My own invention, everybody pleased. - We shall dispose of Stephen for you, Saul: - Council; Stephen arrested and arraigned; - Production of effective testimony; - A hearing of the accused; commotion raised, - While he is speaking, to help on his zeal; - Then, at the proper point, some heated phrase - Of his let slip, a sudden rush of all - Upon him with a cry of 'Blasphemy!'-- - Impulse of passionate enthusiasm, - You know, premeditated with much care-- - And he is stoned; which makes an end of _him_. - Such is the outline; not precisely what - I could have wished, a little too much noise, - The Mattathias tinge in it too strong-- - Still, everything considered, fairly good. - The moment favors; for the very fume - And fury of the popular caprice - Has put it out of breath; nay, for the nonce, - The wind sits, such at least my hope is, veered - And shifted points enough about to bear - A touch of generous violence from us; - Then, as for those our rulers, they connive. - - "You see I have been open to admit - Ideas the very opposite of my own. - I am not one to haggle for a point - Simply because it happened to be mine. - The end, the end, is what we seek; the means - Signifies nothing to the wise. 'Let us - Be wise,' as our friend Nicodemus said, - That day, with so much gnomic wisdom couched - In affable cohortative, as who - Should say encouragingly, 'Go to, good friends, - Let us be gods'; wisdom and godship come, - As everybody knows, with equal ease - Indifferently, through simple conative, - 'Let us,' and so forth, and the thing is done." - - This voluble and festive cynicism, - Taking fresh head again and yet again, - At intervals, to flow an endless stream, - From Shimei's mouth, of bitter pleasantry; - His vulgarly-presumed familiar airs - And leer of mutual understanding, felt - Rather than seen, upon his countenance; - The gurgling glee of self-complacency - That purred, one long susurrus, through his talk; - The insufferable assumption tacitly - Implied that human virtue was a jest - At which the wise between themselves might grin - Nor hide their grin with a decorous veil; - These things in his unwelcome guest, traits all - Inseparably adhering to the man, - Or fibre of his nature, Saul recoiled - From, and revolted at, habitually: - They rendered Shimei's very neighborhood - An insupportable disgust to him. - Still did some fascination Shimei owned, - Perhaps a show of wit in mockery, - Playing upon a momentary mood - Of uncharacteristic helplessness in Saul - (A humor too of wilfulness and spite - Against himself displacent with himself - That made him hold his sore and quivering pride - Hard to the goad that hurt it) keep him mute, - If listless, while thus Shimei streamed on: - - "Well, as I said, friend Saul, I had no pride - To carry an opinion of my own; - The scheme I brooded was a compromise. - I plume myself upon a certain skill - I have, knack I should call it, in this line. - I like a pretty piece of joinery - In plot, such match of motley odds and ends - As tickles you with sense of happy hit, - And here you have it. See, I take a bit - Of magisterial statesmanship to start - With--go to Rome, as Caiaphas advised, - Though not quite on his errand; Rome agrees - To wink, while we indulge ourselves in what - To us will be self-rule resumed, to her, - A spasm of our Judæan savagery. - Thus is the way made eligibly clear - For brother Mattathias with those stones - He raves about on all occasions--rubbed - Smooth, they must be, as David's from the brook, - With constant wear in Mattathias' hands! - Was it not grim to hear him talk that day? - His dream of Maccabæan blood aboil - Within his veins has been too much for him, - Made him a monomaniac on this point; - He sees before him visionary stones, - Imponderable stones torment his hands; - Give him his chance, have him at last let fly - A real stone, a hard one, at somebody, - Who knows? it might bring Mattathias round. - Stephen at any rate shall be his man, - His _corpus vile_, as our masters say-- - Fair game of turn and turn about for him, - Dog, to have handled you so roughly, Saul! - Trick of Beelzebub, no manner of doubt. - - "But here I loiter, while you burn of course - To hear what figure you yourself may cut - In my brave patchwork scheme of compromise. - I modestly adjoin myself to Saul, - And so we two go in together, paired-- - A little of your logic let into - A little of my guile, and a fine fit." - - Shimei had counted for a master stroke - Of disagreeable humor sure to tell - On Saul, the piecing of himself on him - In plan, conscious of Saul's antipathy. - But Shimei still misapprehended Saul, - Lacking the standard in himself wherewith - To measure or assay the sentiment - Of such as Saul for such as Shimei. - Saul simply and serenely so despised - Shimei, that nothing he should do or say - Could change Saul's sentiment to more, or less, - Or other, than it constantly abode, - The absolute zero of indifference. - Half absently, through fits of alien thought, - And half with unconfessed concern to know - What passed among his fellow-councillors - Abroad, a little curious too withal - Wondering how any artifice of fraud - Could Saul with Shimei combine, to make - Such twain seem partners of one policy-- - So minded, Saul gave ear, while Shimei thus - The acrid juices of his humor spilled: - - "Here is the method of the joinery. - You know you put it strongly that the end - Of that pretended gospel which they preach, - Would be to overturn the Jewish state, - Abolishing Moses, and extinguishing - The glory of the temple, and all that-- - Really sonorous rhetoric it was, - That passage, Saul, and it deserved to win; - But who can win against Beelzebub? - Logic turned rhetoric is my idea - Of eloquence, and my idea you - Realized; but Stephen, without eloquence, - Bore off from you the fruit of eloquence: - Never mind, Saul, it was Beelzebub. - Let rhetoric now go back to logic; you - Demonstrated so inexpugnably - The necessary inference contained - In Stephen's doctrine, hardly were it guile-- - Though doubtless you will call it such, you have - Your sublimated notions on these points-- - To say outright that Stephen taught the things - You proved implicit in the things he taught; - At all events, guile or no guile--in fact, - Guile _and_ no guile it is, if closely scanned-- - Here is the scheme:--We find some blunderheads, - Who, primed with method for their blundering, - Will misremember and transfer from you - To Stephen what you stated on this point. - These worthies then shall roundly testify - Before our honorable body met - To give the fellow his fair hearing ere - His sentence--said fair hearing not of course - Eventually to affect said sentence due-- - Shall, I say, swear that they distinctly heard - Stephen set forth that Jesus Nazarene - Was going to destroy this place and change - The customs Moses gave us; bring about - In brief precisely what, with so much force, - You showed would surely happen"-- - "Shimei"-- - Saul interrupted Shimei again, - Surprised into expression by the shock - To hear himself mixed up in any way, - Of indirection even, in fraud like this-- - "Shimei, I thought that nothing you could say - Would further tempt me into speech to you; - But you have broken my bond of self-restraint. - Suborning perjury! That well accords - With what you slanted at in council once, - And what I trusted I had then and there - Made clear my scorn of. Shimei, hear--I set - My heel upon this thing and once for all - Grind it into the dust." - "In figure, of course," - Promptly leered Shimei, interrupting Saul; - "The thing goes forward just the same; you set - It under foot--in your rhetorical way; - I, in my practical way, set it on foot; - No mutual interference, each well pleased. - - "But, seriously, Saul, you overwork - The idea of conscience. What is conscience? Mere - Self-will assuming virtuous airs. A term - Cajoles you into making it a point - Of moral obligation to be stiff. - Limber up, Saul, and be adjustable. - Capacity of taking several points - Of view at will is good. For instance, now, - Probably Stephen may, at various times, - Himself have stated quite explicitly - What your rhetorical logic showed to be - Inextricably held as inference - In his harangues. Take it so, Saul, if so - Render your conscience easier; I myself - Highly enjoy my easy conscience. Still, - Nothing could be more natural than that some, - Hearers non-critical, you know, should mix - What you said with what Stephen said, and so - Quite honestly swear falsely--to the gain - Of truth. And to whose loss? Stephen's, perhaps, - But other's, none. So, salve your conscience, Saul-- - Which somehow you must learn, and soon, to do; - Unless you mean to play obstructionist, - Instead of coadjutor, in the work - You, with good motive, but with scurvy luck, - Set about doing late so lustily. - Conscience itself is to be sacrificed, - At need, to serve the cause of righteousness. - What is it but egregious egotism - To obtrude, forsooth, a point of conscience, when - You jeopard general interests thereby? - One's conscience is a private matter; let - Your conscience wince a little, if need be, - In order that the public good be served. - That is true generosity. 'Let us - Be just,' said Nicodemus; good, say I, - But in this matter of our consciences, - Let us go further and be generous." - - As one who turns a stopcock and arrests - A flow of water that need never cease, - So Shimei left off speaking, not less full - Of matter than at first that might be speech. - With indescribable smirk, and cynic sneer - Conveyed, sirocco breath of blight to faith - In virtue and in good, he went away, - Cheering himself that he had somewhat chilled - Within the breast of that young Pharisee - The ardor of conviction, and of hope - Fed by conviction,--but still more that he - Had probed and hurt the festering wounds of pride. - - Saul's first relief to be alone again, - Rid of that nauseous presence, presently - Was followed by depression and relapse - From his instinctive tension to resist - The unnerving spell of Shimei's influence. - Saul found that in the teeth of his contempt - For Shimei, absolute in measure, nay, - By reason of that contempt, he had conceived - Shame and chagrin beyond his strength to bear. - That Shimei, such as Shimei, should have dared - To visit Saul, and drill and drill his ears, - With indefatigable screw of tongue - Sinking a shaft through which to drench and drown - His soul with spew from out a source so vile-- - This argued fall indeed for him from what - He lately was, from what he hoped to be, - Far more, in popular repute. The sting - That Shimei purposed subtly to infix, - With that malicious irony and taunt - Recurrent, the intentional affront, - All of it, failed, blunted and turned in point - Against the safe impenetrable mail - Of Saul's contempt for Shimei. But that - Which Shimei meant not, nor dreamed, but was, - Went through and through Saul's double panoply, - Found permeable now, of pride and scorn, - And wilted him with self-disparagement. - - He marvelled at himself how he had not, - At first forthputting of that impudence, - Stormed the wretch dumb, with hurricane outburst - Of passionate scorn; a quick revulsion then, - And Saul was chafing that he had so far - Grace of rebuff vouchsafed, and honest heat, - To creature lacking natural sense to feel - Repudiation. Comfort none he found, - No refuge from the persecuting though - Of his own fall. He tried to brace himself - With thinking, "If I failed, I failed at least - Not for myself, but God; I strove for God." - But, ceaselessly, the image of himself, - Humiliated, swam between to blur - His vision of God. He could not cease to see - Saul ever, in the mirror of his mind, - And ever Stephen shadowing Saul's fair fame. - - - - -BOOK VI. - -SAUL AND RACHEL. - - -To Saul, wrapt in his gloomy contemplations, Rachel unobtrusively -presents herself. Conversation ensues between them, and Saul confides -to his sister his own most secret purposes and hopes, dashed now -so cruelly. The fact, however, at length comes out that Rachel was -herself converted to Christianity as a result of Stephen's reply -to Saul. Saul instantly hereon experiences a violent revulsion of -feeling. He breaks away from Rachel, spurning her, and breathing out -threatening and slaughter against the Christian church. - -SAUL AND RACHEL. - - Saul thus forlorn, a voice smote on his ear, - Voice other than of Shimei, clear and sweet; - The very sound was balsam to his pain. - Rachel's the voice was, who, with deep distaste, - As jealous for her brother, had perceived - The entering in to Saul of his late guest - Ill-favored, and through all his stay had still, - Impatiently awaiting, wished him sped. - He now some moments gone, she issued forth - From out her curtained chamber glimpsing gay - Behind her, through the hangings, as she passed, - With color--stuff of scarlet, linen fine - Embroidered, weft of purple tapestry, - Her handiwork--and sending after her - Sweet scent of herb and flower, her husbandry-- - Forth issued, and across the inner court - Open to heaven--small close of paradise, - A tall palm by a fountain, bloomy shrubs, - And vines that clad with green the enclosing walls-- - Stepped lightly to Saul's side. Saul sat beneath - A tent-cloth canopy outspread, his own - Tent-making skill--the high noon of the sun - To fend, if place perchance one then might wish - In which free air to breathe safe from the heat-- - There sat relapsed, deep brooding gloomy thoughts, - When now his sister pausing stood by him. - A lovely vision! Moving, or at rest, - Ever a rapture Rachel seemed of grace - Which but that moment that felicity - Of posture or of gesture had attained, - By accident, yet kept it, through all change, - Inalienably hers, by right divine - Of inward rhythm that swayed her heart in tune. - - The sister had, with love's observance, watched - Some days the phases of her brother's mood, - Biding her time to speak; and now she spoke. - "Brother," she murmured softly, "thou art sad. - Thy brow is written over like a scroll - With lines of trouble that I try to read. - Unbind thy heart, I pray, to me, who grieve - To see thee grieve, and fain at least would share - Such brother's sorrow as I may not soothe." - - This suave appeal of sister's sympathy - Won upon Saul to wean him from himself-- - A moment, and that moment he partook - Comfort of love, nepenthe to his pain, - While thus he answered Rachel: - "Nay, but thou, - My sister, thou thyself art to me rest - And solace. Sit thee down, I pray, beside - Thy brother. But to have thee nigh as now - Refreshes like the dew. I bathe my heart - In thee as in a fountain. Ask me not - To ease its aching otherwise than so. - Pillow me on thy love and let me rest - In silence from the sound of my own voice. - I hate myself, Rachel." - "But I love thee, - My own dear, noble brother," Rachel said; - "I love thee, and I will not let thee hate - Thyself. Brother and sister should be one - In love and hate. Hate what I hate, and what - I love, love thou--that is true brotherhood." - - "Safe law of brotherhood indeed for me, - With thee for sister, Rachel," Saul replied, - With fondness and self-pity, as he kissed - The pure young brow upturned toward him; "but me, - Thou dost not know me as I know myself." - - "O nay, but better, brother," Rachel said; - "Right hate is good, as good as love. So, hate, - But not thyself, Saul. Shall I tell thee one - To hate? I hate him, and I counsel thee, - Hate, Saul, that evil man I saw but now - Steal from his too long privilege at thine ear." - - "Him, Rachel," Saul replied, "I cannot hate; - Hatred is made impossible by scorn." - - "Thou scornest him," she said, "but not too much - To have been disturbed by him. The cloudy brow, - So unlike my brother--I have brought it back, - I see, dear Saul, by only mentioning him. - Hate him well, Saul, and be at peace again. - To hate is safer, better, than to scorn. - We scorn with pride, we must with conscience hate, - Such hating as I mean. Thou art too proud, Saul." - - Saul answered, "For my pride I hate myself." - - But she: "Were it not wiselier done to hate - One's pride, than for one's pride to hate one's self? - Whoever hates himself for his own pride - Still keeps the pride for which he hates himself. - Hate and abjure thy pride, and love thyself." - - "Easy to say, O Rachel, hard to do," - Sighed Saul,--"at least for such as I, who am - Too proud, too proud! Thou seest that after all - Thou and myself know Saul alike, too proud, - Albeit the too proud man we treat unlike, - Thou loving and I hating him." - - "O Saul," - Thus spoke she, gazing steadfastly at him, - But sudden-starting tears swam in her eyes, - "O Saul, Saul, Saul, my brother, whence is this? - Thou wert not wont to talk thus. Changed art thou - Since when I heard thee speak in that dispute - With Stephen--" - - "Thou heard'st me?" asked Saul. - - "Yea, Saul," - Rachel replied, "I heard both thee and him." - (Saul proudly hid an answering hurt of pride.) - "I heard thee, brother, and was proud for thee; - I never knew more masterful high speech - Fall from thy lips. My heart leaped up for joy - To listen. When those men of Israel - Shouted, I shouted with them, silently, - Louder than all. God heard the secret noise, - Like thunder, of the beating of my heart - In sister's pride for brother's victory. - I crowned thee, I anointed thee my king, - So glorious wast thou in thy conquering might! - And that effulgent pride upon thy brow!" - - "But when," said Saul, forestalling ruefully - The expected and the dreaded change and fall - From such a chanted pæan to his praise-- - "But when"-- - - "But when, O Saul," she said, "when he, - Stephen, stood forth to answer thee, there was-- - Didst thou not feel it?--" - - "Sister, yea, I felt, - More than my sister even could feel, that I - Was baffled, put to shame." - - "Nay, nay," she said; - "Not that, O Saul, dear Saul, it was not that." - - "What, then? For I felt nothing else," said Saul; - "That feeling filled me, as sometimes the sound - And stir of whirlwind fill the firmament. - My mind was one mad vortex swallowing up - All other thought than this, 'Saul, thou art shamed!'" - - "Why, Saul," cried she, "what canst thou mean? Thou shamed? - How shamed?" - - "Rachel, I lost, and Stephen won." - - "What didst thou lose?" said Rachel, wonderingly; - "And what did Stephen win, that also thou - Won'st not? I cannot understand thee, Saul." - - Such crystal clearness of simplicity - Became a mirror, wherein gazing, Saul - Beheld himself a double-minded man. - How should he deal with questioner like this? - - "Why, Rachel, canst thou then not understand," - He said, "how I should wish to conquer?" - - "Yea," - Said she, "for truth's sake, Saul. And still, if truth - Conquered, though not by thee, thou wouldst be glad, - Wouldst thou not, Saul? Here sad I see thee now, - As if truth's cause were fallen--which could not be, - Since truth is God's--and yet thou sayest not that, - But, 'Saul is shamed!' and, 'Saul has lost!' Not truth, - But Saul. I cannot understand. Thou hadst - Perhaps, unknown to me, some other end - Than only truth, which also thou wouldst gain?" - - It was his sister's single-heartedness - That helped her see so true and aim so fair. - Saul was too noble not to meet her trust - In him with trust in her as absolute. - - "Rachel," he said, his reverence almost awe, - "Never did burnished metal give me back - Myself more truly, outer face and form, - Than the pure tranquil mirror of thy soul - Shows me the image of my inner self. - The truth I see by thee is justly thine, - And thou likewise shalt see it all in all. - - "The law of God was ever my delight, - As thou knowest, sister, who hast seen me pore - Daily from boyhood on the sacred scroll - Of Scripture, eager to transfer it whole - Unto the living tablets of my heart. - And I have sought, how earnestly thou knowest - To make my life a copy of the law. - No jot or tittle of it was too small - For me to heed with scruple and obey. - With all my heart was I a Pharisee, - Born such, bred such, and such by deep belief. - - "But more, my sister. Musing on the world, - I saw one nation among nations, one - Alone, no fellow, worshipper of God, - The True, the Only, and by Him elect - To be His people and receive His law; - That nation was my nation. My heart burned, - Beholding in the visions of my head, - The glory that should be, and was not, ours. - Think of it, sister, God Himself our King, - And bondmen we of the uncircumcised! - I brooded on the shame and mystery - With anguish in the silences of night. - I saw the image of a mighty state - Loom possible before me. Her august - And beautiful proportions, builded tall - And noble, rested on foundation-stones - Of sapphire, and in colors fair they rose; - Her pinnacles were rubies, and her gates - Carbuncles--I beheld Jerusalem, - The city of Isaiah's prophecy; - Her borders round about were pleasant stones. - She sat the queen and empress of the earth; - The tributary nations, of their store, - Poured wealth into her lap, and vassal kings - Hasted in long procession to her feet. - The throne and majesty of God in her - Held capital seat, or his vicegerent Christ - Reigned with reflected splendor scarce less bright. - Such, sister, was the dream in which I lived, - Dream call it, but it is the will of God, - More solid than the pillared firmament. - - "Was it a fault of foolish pride in me, - Did I aspire audaciously, to hope - That I, by doing and by daring much, - Beyond my equals, might beyond them share - Fulfilments such as these? I heard a voice - Saying, 'Prepare the Lord His way.' I thought - The Lord was near, and what I could, I would - Do to make wide and smooth and straight His way - Before Him, ere He came. I trusted Him - That, when He came, He in His hands would bring - Large recompense for servants faithful found, - And not forget even Saul, should haply Saul - Not utterly in vain prove to have striven, - Removing from the path of His approach - The stone of stumbling. - "Sister, these are thoughts - Such as men have, but cherish secretly, - Even from themselves, and never speak aloud - To any; I have now not spoken these - To thee; thou hast but heard a few heart-beats - Rendered articulate breath by grace of right - Thine own to know the truth, who hast the truth - Revealed to me. - "O other conscience mine, - Wherein have I gone wrong? I felt the power, - Asleep within me, stirring half awake, - To take possession of the minds of men - And sway their wills; the world was not too wide - To be the empire I could rule aright, - As chiefest minister, were such His will, - Of God's Messiah. Some one needs must sit - At His right hand to hear and execute - His pleasure--why not Saul? Who worthier? - But now, alas! less worthy who, or who - Less likely? I am fallen, am shamed--past hope, - Past hope! I who aspired to greatest things - Am to least things by proof unequal found! - How shall I _not_ hate Stephen, who has wrought - On me this great despite--besides what he - Wrought on the suffering cause of truth divine?" - - Rachel's heart heaved, but in what words to speak - She did not find. Saul into his dark mood - Retired, and sat in silence for a while. - Returning, then, for torture of himself, - To that which Rachel brokenly began - To say, and left unsaid, Saul asked of her: - "What was it, sister, thou beganst to tell, - When, not thy brother, but thy brother's spleen, - Broke thy words off with interruption rude? - Something it seemed of how, at Stephen's words, - A change fell on thee, from thy first applause - Of me--" - - "O Saul! A chasm of difference," - So to her brother, Rachel sad burst forth, - "Yawns betwixt thee and me this day, how wide, - How wide! I feel the bond of sisterhood, - Stretching across, not strained to break--for that - Shall never, never be, in any world, - O brother, truest, noblest, best beloved!-- - But strained to draw thee to me where I am - From where thou art, far off, albeit so near!" - - "A tragic riddle which I fail to read, - Rachel," said Saul, perplexed; "solve thou it me." - - "Brother, I fear I cannot," Rachel said; - "But loyally I will try. When Stephen stood - To answer thee that day, a power not he - Oppressed my spirit with a sense of weight, - Gentle but insupportable, which grew - Instantly greater and greater, until it seemed - Ready to crush, unless I yielded; Saul, - I yielded, and that weight became as might - Which passed to underneath me and upbore." - - "Rachel, be simpler," Saul severely said; - "My soul refuses to be teased with words. - Meanest thou this, that Stephen mastered thee?" - - "Nay, Saul, my brother," meekly Rachel said, - Meekly and firmly; "Stephen not, but God. - No man could master me away from Saul. - Proudly I was thy vassal sister, Saul, - Until God summoned me with voice that I - Might not resist; God's vassal am I now, - But sister still to thee, and loyal, Saul, - Beyond all measure of that loyalty - I held before, which made me proud of thee, - And glad of thee, and spurred me on to praise - My brother as the paragon of men. - O Saul--" - - "Nay, Rachel," Saul said, with a tone - Repressive more than the repressive words, - "I will not hear thee further in this vein. - Thou art a woman, and I must not blame - Thy weakness; sister too to me thou art, - And I will not misdoubt thy love; but thou - Hast added the last drop of bitterness - To the crowned cup of grief and shame poured out - For me to drink. Go, Rachel, muse on this: - A brother leaned an aching, aching heart - Upon a sister's bosom to be eased, - And that one pillow out of all the world - To me, that trusted downy softness, hid - The cruelest subtle unsuspected thorn. - Saul's sister a disciple and a dupe - Of those that preach the son of Joseph, Christ! - And this, forsooth, the fruit that was to be - Of Saul's aspiring trust to strike the stroke - That in one day should crush the wretched creed! - Rachel, methinks thou mightst have spared me this! - But nay, my sister, better is it so. - Haply no barb less keen had stung me back - To my old self and made me Saul again-- - The weakling that I was, to pule and weep, - As if the cause were lost and all were lost! - I thank thee, sister, thou hast done me good, - Like medicine--like bitter medicine! - Tell me true, Rachel, thou didst feign me this, - To rouse me from my late unmanly swoon. - That is past now; I rise refreshed and strong, - I see my path before me, stretching straight, - I enter it to tread it to the end. - Doubt not but I shall feel the wholesome hurt - Of the shrewd spur my sister, with wise heart - Of hardness, plunged full deep into my side - Betimes, when I was drooping nigh to sink. - Peace to thee, sister, cheer thee with this thought, - 'I saved my brother from the last disgrace - By a disgrace next to the last--it was - A hard way, but the only, and it sped!'" - - Such cruel irony from her brother cut - The tender heart of Rachel like a knife. - But more for Saul she grieved than for herself; - She knew that naught but anguish of chagrin - The sharpest could have tortured out from him, - So noble and so gentle, any taunt. - From sheer compassion of his misery, - She wept, and said: - - "O Saul, Saul, Saul--" - - But he: - "Rachel, no more; already deep enough, - I judge, for present use, the iron has gone; - I shall not falter; thou mayst safely spare - To drive it deeper now--it rankles home. - And surely, if hereafter I should feel, - At some weak woman's moment, any touch - Of foolish tenderness to make me pause - Relaxing and relenting from my course-- - A sad course, Rachel, traced in blood and tears!-- - Should ever such a softness steal on me, - Surely I should but need remember thee, - Thou younger playmate of my boyhood! thee, - Mirror, that was, of saintly sisterhood! - Loveliest among the daughters of thy race - Once, to thy brother! fountain flowing free - Of gladness, never sadness, unto him!-- - Never of sadness until now, but now-- - O Rachel, Rachel, sister, changed this day - From all thou wert to what I will not name-- - Surely I shall but need bring back this hour, - And let the image of my sister pass-- - O broken image of all loveliness, - Distained and broken!--pass before my eyes, - As here I see her, separate from me - Forever, and outcast from God--that thought, - That image, shall make brass the heart of Saul, - And his nerve iron, to smite and smite again, - Until no wily Stephen shall remain - For any silly Rachel to obey!" - - Fierce so outbreathing threat and slaughter, Saul - In bitterness of spirit broke away. - - - - -BOOK VII. - -STEPHEN AND RUTH. - - -Rachel in dismay soliloquizes. She at length resolves on conveying to -Stephen, through Ruth, his wife, a warning of his danger. Ruth, not -a Christian, expostulates with her husband, attempting to dissuade -him from his course--a course certain, she says, to end fatally for -him. After a gentle, long, anguished effort on his part to bring Ruth -to sympathy with himself in his Christian faith, Stephen parts from -her with presentiment that it is never to return. Under the power of -the Holy Spirit, he takes his way from Bethany, where his home is, to -Jerusalem. His friends. Martha and Mary, with their brother Lazarus, -see him going, and follow. - -STEPHEN AND RUTH. - - Rudely thus parted from his sister, Saul - Straightway sought certain of his synagogue-- - The synagogue of the Cilicians--men - Less alien from himself than Shimei was - In spirit, while compatriot too by birth - As was not Shimei, an Asian he-- - And these made privy to his changed resolve. - They, glad of such adhesion, opened free - Their counsel to him, telling, with grimace - Added, and shrug of shoulder, to attest - Their scorn of Shimei, Shimei's scheme, which they - Sourly, as from compulsion, now took up. - Saul, swallowing a great throe of innermost - Revolt that well-nigh mastered him, subscribed - Himself, by silence, partner of their deed. - - Rachel, spurned from him by her brother, sat - Moveless a while, the image of dismay, - Her two ears caves of roaring sound, her mind - A whirling void of sheer astonishment. - When presently the storm a little calmed - Within her, and she knew herself once more, - She cleared her thought by settling it in words-- - Words which through fluent mood and mood changed swift - From passionate soliloquy to prayer, - And from prayer back to soft soliloquy: - "My brother shall not excommunicate - His sister! While I love him he is mine, - And I shall _not_ be 'separate' from him - 'Forever'--let him hate me as he will, - Who hates himself, and otherwise amiss - Hates liberally. Why did I let him go? - I should have held him, should have told him I - Am of one blood with him, as high as he - In spirit; though a 'woman,' not to be - Put down; he gave me right, with speech like that, - To equal him in stinging word for word. - I could have done it. Woman am I? Yea, - And Deborah was a woman, Miriam too. - I feel my blood a-tingle in my veins - With lust to have him back, and make him know - The lion with the lamb lies down in me - Together; and I showed him but the lamb! - The lion rouses late, occasion gone! - Did he cow me? So tamely I endured - His contumely! Anger none till now, - Nor shame not to be angry at such speech - From him; but now--anger with burning shame - Turns inward and incenses me like fire. - I scorn myself for that, reed-like, my head - I bowed before the tempest of his scorn, - When blast for blast I should have blown him back - His tempest." - - Rachel's indignation so - Like a sea wrought and was tempestuous. - But the recoil of her own violent speech - First gave her pause, then pierced her with remorse. - Daily, from when she, hearing Stephen speak, - Heard God through Stephen speaking, and obeyed, - Rachel, first having in baptism testified - Her death to sin, her birth to righteousness-- - Never her absent brother dreaming it-- - Gladsome had broken bread of fellowship - With the disciples of the Lord, and learned, - Both from their lips and from their lives beheld, - Deep lessons in the lore of Jesus, apt - By the tuition of the Holy Ghost. - The better spirit, for a moment lost, - So lately made her own, came back to her. - Sadly she mused, recalling her hot words - Of passion: - "'Tempest'? Tempest sure just now - Hummed in me. 'Scorn myself'? What word was that? - Rachel forsooth forbade Saul saying, 'I hate - Myself'--and scorn herself does she, yea, here - Sit impotently brooding scorn for scorn - To rival him? Surely I missed my way. - 'Scorn,' 'hate,' one spirit both these speak, such scorn - Such hate, in him, in me. One spirit both, - And that the spirit of this world, not His, - Not Christ's, no spirit of Thine, O Crucified, - Thou meek and lowly holy Lamb of God! - Forgive, forgive me, from Thy cross of shame - And passion, O Thou suffering Son of God! - Once prayedst Thou thence for those that murdered Thee, - 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what - They do.' I knew not what I did when so - I crucified Thee afresh through shameful pride. - My heart breaks with my sorrow for my sin, - A broken and a contrite heart, O Lord, - Thou never wilt despise. - "And now yet more - My heart breaks with forgiveness poured on me. - O sweet and blessed flood, pour on me still! - Deliciously I tremble and rejoice. - To be thus broken is bliss more to me - Than to be whole. I love to lie dissolved, - Dissolving, under this soft fall of peace - Distilled like dew from out Thy bleeding heart! - Lo, here I wholly, wholly, wholly yield - To Thee, O Christ, am fluid utterly, - To take whatever shape Thee best may please. - Remake me after Thine own image, Lord! - - "I pray Thee for my brother. Suffer not - That he act out his purposed madness. Save, - O save him from that dreadful sin he means - Against Thee and against Thy holy cause. - I cannot bear it, that my brother rage - Against Thee like the heathen. Thou art strong, - O Christ! I pray Thee--Thee I pray, O Christ, - Thee only, for none other can--meet Thou - And master Saul! His sister pleads with Thee; - I plead for his sake, he being dear to me, - But more for Thine own name and glory's sake, - And for Thy suffering cause! - I thank Thee, Lord, - With joyful tears, I thank Thee, gracious Lord, - That Thou restrainedst me dumb with silence then - When Saul spake evil of me--for Thy sake. - Through Thee, Who, when reviled, reviledst not - Again, through Thee, through Thee, I, also I, - Proud foolish Rachel, then refrained from words! - No taunt retorted, no reproach, no blame, - Stung him from me to sin; I thank Thee, Lord, - For that! - "Now is there naught that I may do? - May I not warn that prophet Stephen? Saul - Wildly foreshadowed harm himself might wreak - On him; and what meant Shimei's visit here? - Mischief, no doubt of that; collusion strange, - Incredible, impossible, such twain, - That Shimei and my brother! I will go - And talk with Stephen's wife, her, what I can, - Without disloyalty to Saul, stir up - To fear for Stephen's safety; he need not, - Surely, dauntless high prophet of the Lord - Although he be, still ready-girt to die, - Rush blindfold into danger unforewarned." - - So to the house of Stephen Rachel went - With haste, and there, in darkened words to Ruth, - Perturbed her woman's breast with vague alarms: - 'Her husband must of stratagem beware, - And even of violence, aimed against his life.' - Stephen, by Ruth his wife, of all advised, - Armed him his heart to face what must befall. - - Ruth shook him to the centre of his soul - With storms of wife's complaints and love and tears: - "Nay, Stephen, many a time, bear witness thou, - My heart before she came misgave me sore; - But now, since Rachel's words, no peace I find - Concerning thee, in this thy wilful way - Wherein thou goest--whither, I know not, whence, - Too well I know, for from a home thou goest - Once happy, ere this madness came on thee!" - Sharply so Stephen's wife upbraided him. - Gravely and gently he admonished her: - "Name it not madness, woman, lest thereby - Thou sin that sin against the Holy Ghost. - No madness is it when the soul of man - Is sovereignly usurped by the Most High - To be the organ of Almighty Will. - I yield myself, nay, Ruth, I join myself, - To God--no blind unsharing instrument, - But joyful partner of His purposes." - - Solemnly chided so, Ruth quick replied: - "And what if of His purposes one be - To let thee plunge, as headstrong, so headlong, - Thy way to bloody death, thou stiff-necked man? - Thou hearest what Rachel brings us, doubtful hint - Indeed, but therefore in itself to me - Only more fearful; and how fearful joined - To what thyself confessest thou of late, - With thine own ears, hast, from the public mouth, - Heard--instigated whisper, Shimei's brew, - Accusing thee of treason to the hope - Of Israel, and purpose to destroy - The temple, and the customs do away - Which Moses left us! Stephen, all these signs - Singly, much more together, point one way-- - They threaten death to thee, if thou persist - To preach things hateful to the wise and good." - - Ruth intermitted, and her husband said: - "The danger, Ruth, I know, but I must not, - For danger, slack obedience to my Lord." - - Then Ruth said: - "But I only ask that thou - Now, for a little, prudently abide - In hiding till this storm be overpast." - - He, with a glance of irony, replied: - "And always run to covert at the first - Bluster of opposition? Yea, to some - That is permitted; but to other some, - Whereof am I, only to stand foursquare - And take the buffet of whatever storm. - And the best prudence is obeying, Ruth." - - High answered Stephen thus, but Ruth rejoined: - "Stephen, thou ever wert a stubborn will, - And overweening of the wisdom thine, - Hard-hearted and unloving never yet, - Never, till now. How canst thou bide thus calm, - And I, thine erst loved wife, beheld by thee - So tossed with tempest and not comforted?" - - Wherewith self-pity broke her words to sobs: - She fell on Stephen's neck and wept aloud. - With both his arms he folded her about, - While his heart, hugely swelling in his breast, - Forced to his eye the slow, large, rounding tear. - It was as if a cloud that wished to rain - Strongly held back its drooping weight of shower. - His melting voice at last he fixed in words: - "What meanest thou to weep and break my heart, - O thou, mine own, most loving and most loved - Of women? Flesh cries out to flesh in me - Against the purpose of my spirit set - To crucify the flesh with its desires!" - - Ruth caught her sobs and held them while she spoke: - "Flesh of thy flesh am I; thou slayest me - In slaying thyself; I will not have it so. - Not ready yet am I to die in thee; - And thee God surely needs alive, not dead: - The dead cannot praise God nor serve His cause. - Who will so preach that gospel that thou lovest - When thou art gone? Who then will silence Saul? - I tell thee, Stephen, this is Satan's guile-- - To get thee slain--and overmatch mightst thou - The arch-deceiver, easily, if thou wouldst, - So easily--only live." - - Conclusive seemed - Her argument to Ruth and stanched her tears. - She gently disengaged the fond embrace - That held her to her husband's heart, and, drawn - A little backward from his face her face, - She smiled on him like sunshine after rain. - Smiling pathetically back, he kissed, - With kisses that she felt like sacraments, - Then, and forever after till she died, - His wife's brow beautiful with hope, and said: - "Ruth, thou hast said; it is, be sure, his guile, - Satan's, whereby I presently shall die; - If so to die indeed be mine, who feel - Too young still, and too strong, too full of hope, - Too full of--shall I name it, Ruth?--too full - Of God Himself, the Holy Ghost, to die! - For He within me lives such life and power, - Death seems impossible, all weakness seems - Far off, an alien thing, and not for me; - I am immortal and omnipotent. - That, Ruth, is when I stand to speak for God, - Preaching to men the gospel of His Son. - - "But when, as now, I sit with thee and talk, - Or when my children cluster round my knees, - And I hear husband, father, from fond lips - Pressed to these lips so oft, and with such joy, - When all the dearness that is meant by home, - And all the drawing lodged in kindred blood, - And all that sense, unutterably deep, - Of oneness, soul in soul, with those we love-- - O Ruth!--but, Ruth, our tears commingled flow, - 'Tis our hearts flow together in those tears! - O wife and life, when all that I have said, - And that far more which never tongue could say, - Surges upon me, surge on surge of thought - And feeling, like an overflowing flood, - Belovéd, then, how weak I am, how frail, - How low and like to die! I lean toward thee, - As if the oak should lean upon his vine." - - Ruth took his word from him and made reply: - "So lean on me, my love, and be at rest; - Lean, and make proof how vines at need are strong. - In me no faltering purpose weakens will. - Thou speakest of flesh within thee crying out - To flesh against the spirit--warfare strange - Of elements that dwell in me at one. - My nature moves straightforward all one way. - Rebellion none, no mutiny, I find - Only resolve to thwart thy mad resolve, - Thy half resolve, say rather, half and mad-- - So proved by these compunctious visitings - Thou hast, these gracious sweet remorses wise, - Relentings toward thy children and toward me; - Divine presages, Stephen, scorn them not, - Sent to forewarn thee ere it be too late! - - "Bethink thee, Stephen, when didst thou before, - Ever, thus will and straight unwill, thus halt, - Thus parley with thyself, thus stand in doubt - Like a reed shaken with the wind, as now - I see thee here? Thou art not like thyself; - Not like that Stephen, ready, combative, - Thy stature still elastically tall - To tower and overtop and overfrown - Whatever front of menace challenged thee. - By thy changed state, I pray thee, be advised. - God teaches thee hereby. He does not wish - Thy will with thy desire to be at war. - Give up thy heady will, and let desire, - Divinely wise, the wisdom of the heart, - Guide thee; her ways are ways of pleasantness, - And all her paths are peace." - - Again well pleased - With her own argument, Ruth tearful smiled - A smile that, tenfold tender through those tears, - Was argument to Stephen more than words. - From deep within he heaved a sigh and said: - "Oh! Woman! Woman! Ruth, thou teachest me - How Adam could, by Eve's enticement drawn, - Be even beguiled to die. And now, to live, - Not die, my Eve entices me. O Ruth, - I feel, I feel, doubt not but that I feel, - The sweet, the subtly sweet, dissolving spell - Of wish infused by thee, with thee to live, - With thee and for thee, nay, in thee, as thou - In me--this twain one life, how dear, how dear! - O wife, what is there that I could not bear - And dare of hard and high, wert thou, with smiles - And tears and love, for Christ but eloquent, - As all too well I feel thee eloquent - For our sweet selves?" - - Ruth's heart sank, but she said: - "O Stephen, for our children!" Then she threw - Her head upon his bosom, there in tears, - With passionate sobs and throbs, poured out her heart. - - He mightily a mighty swell that yearned - To be a storm within him, ruled, and said: - "Nay, Ruth, but we forget. Life beyond life - Remains to us and to our children. We, - Forgetfully, desire and hope and fear - As if death bounded all. A little while - And Christ will come again. Then they that sleep - In Him will wake to Him, and they that still - Wake when He comes, but love Him, will, with those - Late sleeping in Him now awake, ascend - To meet the Lord descending, in the air: - Thenceforward all that love Him, loved of Him, - Will be forever with Him where He is, - Beholding there His glory. Blessed state! - No tears, no fears, no hearts that break, no hearts - That will not break, although they ache the more, - Perhaps, God knows, not breaking--naught of these, - And naught of any ill, but only peace, - Joy, love, security of peace and joy - And love, and fellowship in peace and joy - And love, forever, perfect, more and more, - With vision beatific still of Him - Who washed us in His blood and made us kings - And priests to God. Ruth, here is hope indeed - For us that will not make ashamed." - - But Ruth - Unhearing heard and was not comforted. - She raised her head from Stephen's breast, with act - As if to part herself in hope from him, - And, with regard made almost alien, said: - "Hug thou thy hope, thy hope is not for me. - He could not save himself, thy Christ, but died - As the fool dieth--and as die wilt thou, - If thou despise my counsel! Stephen, I - Would rather take my lot a little less, - Less large, less perfect, and less durable, - Than that thou figurest in thy fantasy, - So I might have it something different - From that, real, substantial, palpable - To sense, something whereof one could be sure. - I am no visionary. Take, say I, - With thanks the good God gives us now and here; - Not spurn His bounty back into His face, - And reach out emptied hands of wanton greed - To grasp at more He has not offered us. - We have no right to throw our life away!-- - In hope of life hereafter, only ours - Then when with patience our appointed time-- - '_All_' our appointed time, Stephen--we wait, - Till our change come." - - Ruth's chill repellent tone, - Her mask of manner hard, could not deceive - Her husband, who, through such disguise with pain - Put on, well recognized a new device - Of wife's love, versatile as resolute, - Constraining tenderness to play severe. - Yet not the less for that, more rather, he - Felt at her words a dull weight of despair - Oppress his spirit; he could only pray, - In silent sorrow not to be expressed, - "O Holy Ghost of God, pity and save!" - A hundred times so praying for his wife, - In anguished iteration o'er and o'er, - Stephen not speaking sat, and speechless she. - - At last, as if one bound with green withes rose - Rending the withes to rise, rose Stephen, sweat - Of supreme agony victorious - At dreadful cost dewing his brow; he took - His wife's hand solemnly and tenderly, - His port majestical compelling awe, - And, with tense speech, in tones that strangely mixed - The husband with the prophet, slowly said: - "Farewell, Ruth, for the hour is fully come - That I must hence. The burden of the Lord - Is instant and oppresses me. I go, - Whither I know not, but He knows, to bear - Witness once more to His most worthy name. - I thought that I should never preach again - His gospel in those temple courts, but now - Perhaps He wills even that; whatever be - His purpose, unforeshown, I welcome it. - - "Lo, Ruth, this is the last time, for full well - I know I never shall come back to thee! - Come thou to me, I charge thee that, and bring - Our children to their father. Always think - Hereafter, 'He, that last time, charged me that!' - I think my God in this has heard my prayer, - And I go hence in comfort of some hope. - Our children! Oh! My children! God in heaven, - Have mercy! How a father pitieth - His children, think of that, and pity me! - A father lays them on a Father's heart; - Father, I charge Thee, by Thy father's-heart, - Not one be plucked from out His Father's hand! - Lord Christ, see Thou to this, in session there - Forever, interceding for Thine own! - - "Ruth, give their father's blessing to our babes; - I trust that they will cheer their mother well, - When I am gone, and cheer thee to the end. - Their sweet unconscious voices now I hear - In laugh and prattle of pathetic glee! - I fain would see their faces once again, - Kiss them once more, and take a last caress! - But nay, I spare myself one pang; sweet babes, - They are too young to know! But by and by, - When they are older and will understand, - Then tell them thou what I now cannot, say, - 'Your father loved you, loves you, and will love - Forever--that was his last word to me - For you.' So, Ruth, farewell!" - - With first his hands, - Both, placed in solemn blessing on her head, - She kneeling by his knees, forth from his house - Therewith went Stephen all as in a trance. - With open eyes that saw not, yet with steps - Guided--how, he well knew, but whither not-- - In simple rapt obedience, he his way - Took absently like one that walks in sleep. - - Stephen his home had fixed in Bethany-- - Sequestered hamlet on the slope behind - The Mount of Olives from Jerusalem. - Mary and Martha, here, and Lazarus, - He knew and loved; and with them oft, their guest, - Held converse sweet of what He said and did, - And was, the Friend Who wept when Lazarus died, - The Lord of life through Whom he lived again: - But Ruth, self-sundered from this fellowship, - Abode apart, or only with them bound - In bonds of kindly common neighborhood. - These marked when Stephen, marking not, passed by, - That day, steps toward the holy city bent, - And to each other said: 'He goes once more - Bound in the spirit to Jerusalem - To preach the gospel of the grace of God. - Behold the lit look on the forward face! - Behold the gait half-buoyed as if with wings! - It is like Jesus hastening to His cross! - Lo, let us follow!' and they followed him. - But he went ever onward, slacking not - His steps, nor heeding when the brow he reached - Of Olivet and thence, across the deep - Ravine of Kedron worn with rushing floods, - Before him and beneath him saw outspread - The city of David with its palaces. - - - - -BOOK VIII. - -STEPHEN MARTYR. - - -As Stephen approaches the temple, he is suddenly arrested and brought -before the Sanhedrim. There making his defence, he is interrupted -with hostile demonstrations, instigated by Shimei. On this, he bursts -out with noble indignation, which furnishes the desired occasion -for a cry against him of "Blasphemy!" from all, and for a violent -hurrying forth of the prisoner without the walls to be stoned. A -file of Roman soldiers confronts and stays the tumultuous crowd; -but, after parley conducted by Shimei with the centurion, their -leader, the rout is suffered to proceed. Meantime, however, a little -company of sympathizing Christians, including Rachel with the three -from Bethany, have gathered round Stephen and listened to cheerful, -tranquillizing words from him. After the stoning, these friends carry -the body of Stephen for laving to the pool of Siloam, whence by -moonlight up Olivet to Bethany. Here they lay it in a room of Martha -and Mary's house until morning. - -STEPHEN MARTYR. - - The sun of Syrian afternoon, declined - Half-way betwixt the zenith and the west, - Burned blinding in the cloudless blue of heaven - And fired a conflagration in the copes - Of beaten gold hung over the august - House of Jehovah, whither Stephen now - Tended unconsciously with wonted feet. - That spectacle of splendor he, agaze - With holden unbeholding eyes, saw not, - Or, as but with his heart beholding, saw - Only as goal of his obedience due. - Down the abrupt declivity with speed, - The westward-slanting slope of Olivet, - Descending by a path stony and steep-- - The same whereon full often to and fro - Had fared the Blessed Feet, between the dust - And din and fever of Jerusalem, - And the sweet purity and peace, the cool, - The quiet, of that home in Bethany, - His refuge!--so descending, Stephen passed - On his right hand Gethsemane, that moved - Muse of the Master's agony for men, - Crossed Kedron, and thence upward pressing gained - Gate Susan, whence the temple nigh in view. - 'Perhaps,' thought he, 'perhaps, once more, against - My expectation, I am thither brought - To preach as when I answered Saul that day. - The Lord will show me, in full time, alike - What I must speak, and when, and where.' - - So wrapt - In welcome of the will unknown of God, - And full of faith and of the Holy Ghost, - Stephen with no amazement was afraid - When, suddenly and rudely, in the street, - A band in service of the Sanhedrim - Set on him, and, by their authority, - Seized him and brought him prisoner accused - Of blasphemy before their council, there - To be examined for his words and deeds. - Captive in body, he in soul was free, - Exulting in that glorious liberty, - The sense of sonship to Almighty God. - - False witnesses, by Shimei suborned, - And well their lesson taught by Shimei, - Stood forth, who, to the teeth of Stephen, swore: - "This person never ceases speaking words - Against this holy place and Moses' law; - We heard him say that Jesus Nazarene - Is going to destroy this place, and change - The customs Moses handed down to us." - - All the assessors in the Sanhedrim, - Fastening their eyes on Stephen, saw his face, - As it had been an angel's, kindling shine. - Saul marked it, and remembered how that day - The lightning of that face had blinded him! - - The high priest now, accosting Stephen, asked, - "Are these things so?" and Stephen thus replied: - "Brethren and fathers, hearken to my words. - With ears that tingle to the echoes yet, - Perchance, of that high passionate harangue - Which late from Saul ye heard concerning wounds - Intended to this Jewish commonwealth, - Ye now have heard forsooth again from these-- - How temple, law, and well-belovéd ways - Bequeathed us by our fathers from of old - Are threatened in the message that I preach. - - "But, brethren, he mistakes who deems that God - Is to one place, one race, one time, one clime, - One mode of showing forth Himself, shut up. - Consider through what phases manifold - Has passed already heretofore God's way - With men; thence learn how lightly reckons God - Of place or method. - "Unto Abraham first - Before he came to Charan, while he yet - Dwelt in the land between the rivers, God - Appeared. Nor in a place thus holy made, - And glorious, by theophany, was he, - Our father, suffered to abide. 'Arise,' - Jehovah said, 'and get thee hence and come - Into the land which I will show thee.' Then - To Charan that obedient pilgrim passed. - Nor there found he a settled rest. Again - He journeyed and in Canaan, this fair land - Wherein ye dwell, a sojourner became; - For here God gave him no inheritance, - Promising only that in after times - That childless father's children here should dwell. - - "Meanwhile another change, and now what seems - A long postponement of the purposed grace. - Four hundred years should Abraham's seed sojourn - As strangers in an alien land where they - Should suffer bondage and an evil lot: - Delivered thence with judgment on their foes, - They then should hither come and here serve God. - - "Yet when the ripeness of the time was full, - And Moses offered to deliver them, - Our fathers doubted and refused his hand: - But Moses notwithstanding led them out. - And that same Moses prophesied of One - To follow him as Prophet Whom must all - Obey. Yet Moses, mouth of God to men, - Obeyed our fathers not, but, in their hearts - Gone back to Egypt, spurned him far aloof - From them. Then followed that apostasy - To idols, by Jehovah God chastised, - On those offending, with captivity - Which beyond Babylon carried them away. - - "Albeit Jehovah gave to Moses such - Honor as never yet to man was given, - Still much that Moses wrought was cast aside. - That tabernacle, made by him express - As God Himself had shown him in the mount, - And so inwove with Hebrew history, - God suffered this to pass, and in its place - Preferred the temple built by Solomon. - - "Yet not in houses built with human hands - Dwells the Most High; as, by His prophet, God - Says, 'On the heaven sit I as on a throne, - And the earth make a footstool for My feet.' - 'What house will ye build Me,' the Lord inquires, - 'Or what shall be the place of Mine abode?'" - - So far a loth penurious decent heed - The council had grudged out to Stephen; here - The scowl of curious incredulity, - Wherewith they listened while as yet in doubt - Whither might tend his drift of argument, - Changed to a frown of deadly hate, as they - Conclusion from his use of Scripture drew - That Stephen glanced at overthrow indeed - Meant for the temple. Instantly, alert - To seize occasion, Shimei the sig - Gave to prepared conspirators, who now - Obediently framed a menace grim - Of gesture to denounce the speaker's aim; - And all the council, as one man, astir - With insurrection, frowned a vehement - Refusal to receive the word of God. - - Stephen beheld their aspect, and his soul, - Dilating to a seraph's measure, filled - With sudden prophet's zeal aflame for God. - He forged his indignation into words - Which, like bolts kindling, now he launched at them. - He said: - "Stiff-necked ye, and uncircumcised - In heart and ears! Always do ye resist - The Holy Ghost; as did your fathers, so - Do ye. Which of the prophets did they not, - Your fathers, persecute? Who showed before - The coming of the Just One, those they slew; - And of Him now have ye betrayers been - And murderers. Ye who the law, received - At angels' disposition, have not kept!" - - Cut to the heart at this, those councillors - Gnashed with their teeth on Stephen. - But that sight - Stephen, his eyes rapt elsewhere, did not see. - Full of the Holy Ghost, his face he raised, - Gazing with sense undazzled into heaven, - And saw the glory of God, and Jesus there, - Not sitting, as at ease, but, as in act - To help, standing, on the right hand of God. - He testified that vision thus to men: - "Opened see I the heavens and standing there - The Son of Man on the right hand of God." - - Thereat a loud acclaim of hatred forth - Burst in one voice from all the Sanhedrim. - Full come was Shimei's opportunity. - As started Mattathias to his feet - In honest wrath instinctive, Shimei too - Rose, counterfeiting wrath, sign understood - By his complotters, who now likewise rose - In simultaneous second and support, - Setting the council in a wild turmoil. - They stopped their ears, and all together ran - On Stephen with tumultuary rage - To thrust him forth without the city walls. - - The rush of such commotion through the streets, - A torrent madness raging on its way, - Raging and roaring, every moment more, - Roused a wide wind of rumor and surmise - Troubling the air of all Jerusalem. - Tremor of this reached Rachel's jealous sense, - On edge--she knowing that the Sanhedrim - Would that day summon Stephen to its bar-- - To fear the worst for Stephen and for Saul. - But Ruth, her home more distant, she at home - Urged by importunate cares which for her wrought - Some present respite from the strain and pain - Of that farewell with Stephen--vexing thought! - Too certain to return insistently, - In waking and in sleeping vision, soon, - At night upon her bed, unbidden guest, - And haunt her bosom with sad memories, - And vague, unhappy, beckoning shapes of fears!-- - Ruth, so precluded, nothing knew of all. - - Rachel, with other women of the Way - Like-minded with herself, pathetic group! - Drew timorous nigh the ragged rushing rim - Of that confusion pouring toward the gate - Which northward opened on Damascus road. - - The self-same path it was whereby had walked - A little while before, bearing His cross, - The Saviour of mankind toward Calvary. - Stephen remembered, and, remembering, went - Both meekly more, and more triumphantly, - To suffer like his Lord without the gate. - He said within himself, 'I follow Him; - I feel His footprints underneath my feet.' - Those women watched the martyr every step, - And with hands waved signalled him sympathy. - Such helpless help was help the more to him-- - Who had no need, but gave them back again - Their sympathy in looks of strength and cheer - Which bade them too be faithful unto death, - As they saw him that day. The peace of God, - Lodged in his heart--a trust from Christ, Whose word - Was, "Peace I leave with you, My peace to you - I give; not as the world gives give I you: - Let not your heart be troubled, neither let - It be afraid"--that peace steadfast he bore - Amid the tumult round him, the one thing - Not shaken in a shaken universe, - Like the earth's axle sleeping and the earth - Whirling from centre to circumference! - - Not yet the rout had reached the city gate, - When, lo! a sudden halt, a sudden hush, - Arrested and becalmed the multitude. - A file of Roman soldiers from the fort, - With swift, straight, sure lock-step, steel-clad, that clanged, - Flowed like a rill of flowing mercury, - Heavy yet nimble, through a street that crossed - The course of that mad progress, and, athwart - Its head abutting, stayed; the clang of pause - Rang sharper than the clang of the advance. - The leader, a centurion, sternly spoke: - "What means this uproar? Seek ye to provoke - Your rulers? Love ye, then, your yoke so well - Ye fain would feel it heavier on your necks? - Sedition into insurrection grows - Full easily, and this sedition seems. - Speak, who can tell, and say, What would ye?" - Prompt, - Then, Shimei, of the foremost, stepping forth - Said; - "This is no sedition as might seem; - A crushing of sedition rather. We, - The Sanhedrim"--wherewith a smirk and bow - From Shimei, with wave of hand swept round - Upon his colleagues in their sorry plight - Dishevelled, seemed, in sneering cynic sort, - To introduce them with mock dignity-- - "We Sanhedrim this fellow caught employed - In stirring up sedition, and our zeal - For peace and order under Roman rule - Inflamed us, following our forefathers' way, - To visit death on him without the gate. - We beg you will allow us to proceed - And put to proof of act our loyalty"-- - Hot breath, half hiss, from Mattathias here-- - "This script perhaps will help determine you." - - And Shimei handed up a tablet writ. - The Roman read: - "Let this disorder pass; - It may be useful. Watch it well." - The seal - Once more with care examined, parley had - With Shimei, whose crafty answers meet - Each wary scruple of the officer, - And sign is given to let the rout proceed. - - Meantime a different scene has quietly - Been passing unperceived. That company - Of ministering women Rachel found, - Salomé, and the Marys, blessed name! - With others who had followed and bewailed - When Jesus suffered--these, joined now by those - From Bethany, with Lazarus, prevailed - To edge their way ungrudged through the close ranks - Of idle gazers round not undisposed - Themselves to sympathize, until they stood - Nigh Stephen, and in undertones could speak - With him, and hear his words. - "Weep not for me," - He said, "ye blesséd! I am well content. - I think how short the way is, not how sharp, - To Jesus where just now I saw Him. There - He stood in heaven on the right hand of God. - He seemed to lean toward me with arms outstretched - As if at once to take me to Himself! - I spring toward Him with joy unutterable. - I shall not feel the pain, which will but speed - Me thither. He hath overcome the world. - Be of good cheer, belovéd, ye who wait - A little longer to behold His face. - For you too He hath overcome the world. - Be strong, be faithful, be obedient, - A little while--and we shall meet again - Safe, happy, in the New Jerusalem, - Forever and forever with the Lord. - - "But Ruth, my wife, yet unbelieving--care - For her and for my children! God will give - All to our prayers. And Husband He will be - To her, and Father to the fatherless." - - Rachel to Lazarus whispered: - "Tell him I, - Rachel, Saul's sister, would do something. Ask - What I may do for Ruth, to testify - A sister's sorrow for a brother's fault. - And let him not think hardly, not too hardly, - Of Saul who wrongs him so!" - - And Lazarus - Told Stephen, who, with look benign addressed - To Rachel, said: - "Thou, Rachel, thou thyself, - No other, shalt to Ruth my wife convey - Her husband's very last farewell; good-night - Call it, and bid her meet me there to say - Good-morning. Comfort her with words. To Saul - Say--when the time comes he will hear, not now-- - That all is well, is wholly well. I go-- - And that is well--perhaps in part through him, - Which seems not well, but is, by grace of Christ, - Who thus, in part through me--and surely that - Likewise is well--erelong will make of Saul, - In Stephen's room, a more than Stephen both - To preach and suffer for His name. This hope - Be thine, Rachel, and God be with thee, child!" - - Martha, her hand as ready as her heart, - Had other cheer provided than of words. - 'The willing spirit, if the flesh be weak, - May faint,' she thought, 'and angels strengthening Him - Brought Jesus succor in Gethsemane. - May I not be his angel, Stephen's, now, - And his flesh brace to bear his agony?' - She said to Stephen: - "I have brought thee here - A cake of barley and a honeycomb. - I pray thee eat and cheer therewith thy heart." - "God bless thee, Martha, for thy loving thought!" - Said Stephen; and he took the food from her - And ate it, giving thanks before them all. - And all with him gave thanks, for nothing else - Could so have cheered them in their sad estate - As thus to see their friend at such an hour - Cheering himself with food, his appetite - Not troubled by least trouble of the mind, - And he approved superior to his lot, - Not by a strain of high heroic pride, - Not by access of transient ecstasy, - But simply by the sober confidence, - Well-grounded, of the soul enduring all - As seeing Him Who is invisible. - Besides, had any deemed that Martha erred, - Inopportunely ministering to the flesh, - When spirit unsupported by the flesh - As well had conquered, and more gloriously, - Haply, too, letting this their thought escape, - Unmeant, in look or gesture, to her pain-- - Such might, in Stephen's gracious act, have heard - As if a silent echo of those words-- - Ineffably persuasive sweet reproof - At once and soft assuagement of unease-- - "Why trouble ye the woman? She hath wrought - A good work for Me." - But the Sanhedrim, - Permitted by the Roman to resume - Their way with Stephen, now to him once more - Their notice turned. Within their heart enraged, - First, to have met with such a check, and then, - Scarce less, _so_ to have had the check removed-- - Both this and that their sense of bondage chafed-- - Ill brooked it they to see what now they saw, - Their prisoner in calm converse with his friends. - - "Begone!" to these they cried. "For shame to show - Untimely softness thus to whom ye see - Your rulers judge worthy of death. Begone!" - - One churl among those councillors was found, - When Stephen gently bade his friends give way, - Even for his own sake, who could least endure - To see them suffer roughness, most unmeet - For such as they--one graceless churl was found - To raise his hand at Stephen speaking so - And smite him on the mouth. A wail at this - Broke from those women, and their hair they tore - In passion of compassion and of wrath - Holy as love. But Stephen was most meek, - And only in a shadowed look expressed - Pain at such painful sympathy with pain. - This seen by those, they soon responsively - Resumed composure like his own, and walked, - Following, molested not, at small remove - From the belovéd martyr, cheering him, - And cheered, with sense of some society. - - So, on, with going less precipitate, - And less vociferous rage, but not less fell, - Moved the infatuate multitude, repressed - And maddened, both at once, to feel themselves - Only by sufferance masters of the fate - Of Stephen, and their very footsteps timed - To regular and slow behind those few - Austere, impassive, automatic men - Armed, who, though few they might be, yet meant Rome. - - Arrived at length at the accurséd spot, - They stay. The ground about was strewn with stones, - Rejected fragments from the quarry cleft, - Flakes from the mason's chisel, interspersed - Dilapidations from the city walls - Twice overthrown and razed, or missiles thence - Once by defenders on assailants hurled. - They stay, and, Stephen stationed in the midst - Where, first, a circle of spectators round - Was ordered in disorderly array, - Prepare to act their dreadful blasphemy. - - Within, opposed to Stephen, Saul stood, pale, - Blanched with resolve, anguished, and tremulous, - But in nerve shaken, not in will, to take - His part. Saul's part was only to consent. - Perhaps the eyes, the beautiful sad eyes, - Of Rachel, dark and liquid ever, now - Unfathomably deep with unshed tears-- - Perhaps such eyes, his sister's, fixed on him, - He seeing not because he would not see, - Wrought yet some holy spell that charmed him back - Insensibly from part more active there. - But his consent Saul testified with sign - Open to all to see, and understood. - He held the outer robes thrown off of those - Who, disencumbered so, might, with main strength, - And aim made sure, the better speed to fling - At that meek heavenly man the murderous stone. - - Those witnesses malign who had forsworn - Stephen to this, were first to cast at him - The stone to slay. There Stephen stood, his face, - His glory-smitten face, upturned to heaven, - And his arms thither raised as if to meet - The down-stretched arms of Jesus from on high. - It was a sight both beautiful to see - And piteous. The angels might have wept, - Who saw it, but that they more deeply saw, - And saw the pity in the beauty lost, - Like a few drops of water on a fire - That only serve to feed the flames more bright. - - At the first shower of stones at him with cry - Of self-exciting execration flung, - Stephen, with answering cry, as if of one - Running to refuge and to sanctuary, - Betook him to the covert of the Wings - That trembled with desire to be outstretched - Once over doomed Jerusalem unfain, - And, "Jesus, Lord, receive my spirit!" said. - That his friends heard and echoing said "Amen!" - But they the flying stones saw not, nor saw - Alight the flying stones upon their friend; - For they too turned their faces upward all, - And, gazing unimaginable depths - Beyond the seen, beheld the glory there, - Wherein the scandal and the mystery - Of visible things vanished, like shadows plunged - In the exceeding brightness of the sun, - Or were transformed to make the glory more, - Like discords conquered heightening harmony. - - With the next flight of stones, unwatched likewise, - Stephen, raised far above the fierce effect, - Stinging or stunning, of the cruel blows, - Spoke heavenward once again, not for himself - Petitioning now, but pleading for his foes. - His foes already had prevailed to bring - The martyr to his knees, and, on his knees, - With loud last voice from lips inviolate yet-- - As if that angel chant at Bethlehem - Still sounded, "Peace on earth, good will to men," - Or that diviner tone from Calvary, - "Forgive them, for they know not what they do"-- - One ransomed pure and perfect human note - Threading the dissonant noise with melody-- - He prayed, "Lord Jesus, lay not Thou this sin - To their account." Therewith he fell asleep. - That holy prayer exhaled his breath away, - And on his breath exhaled to heaven in prayer - His spirit thither aspired and was with Christ. - - As Stephen fell asleep, the sun went down; - But over Olivet the great full moon - Rose brightening. 'So,' thought Stephen's friends of him, - 'His life has been extinguished to our eyes, - Only elsewhere to shine, but while we wait - For the new day to dawn that lingers, lo, - His memory instead shall give us light, - Not splendid like the sun, yet like the moon - Lovely!' - - Thus comforting themselves, they saw - The murderers of their friend above his corse - Build roughly of the stones that smote him dead - A kind of cairn in mockery of a tomb. - Melted away meanwhile the multitude - In silence, and, soon after, all were gone - Save the true lovers of the man. Then these - Gathered together round the accurséd spot, - Now hallowed, where he stood to suffer, where - He prayed, and where he fell, and whence he rose - Deathless, leaving the sacred body there, - Dead, desolate of the spirit, but still dear, - Most dear to them. And so, with many tears - Fast falling that nigh blinded them, they took - From off the body, one by one, the stones-- - Almost as if they loved them, with such care!-- - Until his face, his fair disfeatured face, - And his form marred and broken, open lay - To the mild moon that seemed to sympathize, - And touched and softened all with healing beams. - - "Let us bear hence the sacred clay," they said, - "And wash it from the pool of Siloam." - Then Lazarus, with three fellow-helpers more-- - Nathanael, Israelite indeed, was there, - Joseph of Arimathæa too had come, - Later, and Nicodemus, by nightfall, - These were the chosen four, with Lazarus-- - Making a litter of their robes, took up - The noble form that lately Stephen wore, - And gently carried it to Siloam. - With soft lustration there at loving hands, - The dust and blood were wholly washed away; - The hair and beard then decently arranged, - With skill that hid the wounds on cheek or brow, - The eyelids closed on eyes that saw no more, - The scarce cold palms folded upon the breast, - Stephen it seemed indeed just fallen asleep. - Then they were glad that Ruth would see him so, - So peaceful and so beautiful asleep, - Expecting soon to waken satisfied! - "To-morrow will be time enough," they said, - "To tell Ruth--let her sleep to-night." But Ruth - Slept not, or if she slept, slept but to dream - Of Stephen and his last hands on her head. - - Under the balmy moon, up Olivet - To Bethany they bore the holy dust, - And there, beneath the roof that sheltered oft - The Man who had not where to rest His head, - They laid the body down to dreamless sleep; - And slept themselves until the morrow morn. - - - - -BOOK IX. - -RUTH AND RACHEL. - - -Very early in the morning, Rachel, charged with this office by -Stephen, breaks to Ruth the news of her husband's death. The two then -go together to the place where the body of Stephen is laid. There, -Ruth, kneeling in prayer beside her martyred husband, repentantly -accepts his Lord for hers, becoming a Christian. Rachel, having -hastily visited her home, to find Saul gone thence with purpose not -to return, leaves the house in her maid's care and goes back to Ruth, -to whom, being requested to do so, she tells the story of Stephen's -stoning. Then the funeral of Stephen takes place, with a memorial -discourse pronounced, and an elegy recited, at the tomb. - -RUTH AND RACHEL. - - The morrow morn broke fair in Bethany, - And Ruth rose early from unquiet sleep; - Rachel likewise, who slept in Mary's house. - The sun had not yet risen, but in the west - The moon hung whitening opposite the dawn, - When Ruth, her children left asleep, went forth - To feel the freshness of the morning air - Without, and water from the village well - To draw, both for the slaking of her thirst - And for the cooling of her brow that burned - And of her throbbing temples. At the well - Rachel she met who earlier still was forth - On the like errand. The two women hailed - And kissed each other. Ruth to Rachel then - Said: "Thou art not, I trow, this morning come - Hither the long way from Jerusalem?" - - "Nay, Ruth," said Rachel, "here the yesternight - With Mary and Martha I abode a guest." - - "How fresh the wind is," Ruth said, "hither blown - From off the western sea! Us, underneath - The crest of Olivet, it lights upon - Descending, broken, like a breath from heaven. - What a delicious balm!" - "About my brow," - Said Rachel, "gratefully I feel the air, - Attempered so, soft flowing, as if one - That loved me like a mother gently stroked - My temples to undo a band of pain - Bound round them." - "And, in sooth," the other said, - Now looking narrowly at Rachel's face, - "Thou seemest sad of favor, Rachel. Thou, - Thou too, so young, hast then thy cause to grieve! - It is a sad world and a weary. But-- - Forgive me if such quick instinctive fears - Be selfish, I am wife and mother--aught - Of evil tidings bringest thou me? Spare not - To speak. Thou wilt but answer to the dreams - I had this night, portending nameless ill. - Stephen--I fear for him. He yesterday - Left me beyond his wont oppressed in spirit, - And has not since returned. Strange--yet not strange; - Sometimes the livelong night he spends in prayer - Alone upon the top of Olivet - Or in the shadows of Gethsemane." - - "Ruth," Rachel said, "the Angel of the Lord - Round His belovéd, like the mountains round - Jerusalem, encampeth ever; he - Of God's belovéd is, and guarded well!" - - But Ruth scarce listened; she insisting said: - "Perhaps of Stephen some report thou bringest, - Hint doubtless of new danger threatening him!" - - "Nay, Ruth, no longer danger threatens now - Thy husband; that is past, and he is safe." - - "Thank God," said Ruth; "but stay, I dare not yet - Thank God. Tell me, have then our rulers ceased - To frown on Stephen preaching Jesus Christ? - Or Stephen, will he cease and preach no more? - This cannot be, for Stephen is such stuff - As never yet did bend to mortal beck; - And that--our rulers surely have not changed - Thus suddenly their mind. Thou art deceived, - They have deceived thee--Stephen is not safe; - It is their guile to make us think him safe, - He off his guard will fall an easier prey - Into their hands. Rachel, it was not kind, - Not faithful in thee so to be deceived. - More love had made thee more suspicious. I - Suspect forever everybody; thee - Now I suspect. Thou keepest something back, - Or haply palterest with a double sense. - Rachel, I charge thee, I adjure thee, speak - And tell me all. Stephen is dead! Say that-- - Is dead! Thou meantest that by, 'He is safe.' - They have stoned him, stoned my husband, stoned the man - That was the truest Hebrew of them all!" - - Though by her words Ruth challenged frank reply, - Yet by her tones and by her eager looks - She deprecated more what she invoked. - This Rachel saw, and answered not a word. - Then Ruth gainsaid what Rachel would not say: - "They have not done it, could not do it, he-- - Rachel, it is not true, unsay it, quick, - It was a cruel jest to tease me so, - Thou art not a wife, thou art not a mother, else - Thou never hadst conceived so ill a jest!" - - Rachel was tortured, but she could not speak, - And Ruth, secure in sense of respite yet, - Went on invoking what she would not hear: - "Why art thou silent? Speak, and keep not back - The truth, whatever it may be; there's naught - So soothing and so healing as the truth. - But I will not believe that he is dead. - Thou didst not know my husband. Dead! dead! dead! - I tell thee, Rachel, _that_ is something past - Imagining dreadful, hopeless. To be dead - Is--not to love, and not to speak to those - Who loved and love thee, not to hear them speak, - Saying they loved and love thee and lament - They ever gave thee cause of grief and now - Are different and would die a thousand deaths - To have been different then when thou couldst know-- - Death, Rachel,--but of death what canst thou learn, - For thou art but a child and never wast, - Never, to such a husband such a wife-- - To vex the noblest heart that ever broke!" - - Rachel at first had listened with dismay, - And nothing found to answer to Ruth's words, - Whose words indeed flowed on and made no pause - For answer, as if she in truest truth - Sought not the answer that she seemed to seek, - Would fain postpone it rather, or avert. - But when at length the utterance of Ruth's thought - From converse passed into soliloquy - And the deep secret of her soul revealed, - Then Rachel caught a welcome gleam of hope. - A sign of grace she saw or seemed to see - At work for Ruth within her heart of grief, - Transmuting human sorrow to divine - Repentance, and for pain preparing peace. - - "Let us go in together," Rachel said, - For they by this were nigh to Ruth's abode, - "Let us go in where we may be withdrawn - From note of such as here might mark our speech - Or action; I have word from him to thee." - Then they went in, and Ruth bestirred herself - To make a cheer of welcome for her guest. - That momentary truce to troubled thought - For Ruth, and interspace of quietness - From her own words which could not choose but flow - With helpless importunity till then, - Gave Rachel needed chance to speak. She said: - "O Ruth, thy husband fell asleep last night, - And slept a sweeter sleep than thine or mine, - A deep sweet sleep, a happy sleep, a blest. - Thou wouldst not wake him thence for worlds on worlds. - He felt before he slept that he should sleep, - And me, whom God our Father let be nigh, - Stephen bade bear a last good-night to thee. - He did not think the night was very long - Before him for his sleeping, and his wish - Was thou shouldst meet him presently to say - Good-morning. This was his true message, Ruth." - - The ineffably serene steadfast regard - Of Rachel's eyes, that, out of liquid depths - Unsounded, looked angelic love and truth, - With pity mingled, equal measure--tears - Orbing them large, shot through and through with light - Of heavenly hope for Ruth--but, more than all - A subtly sweet insinuating tone, - Most musical, of softness in the voice, - That gently wound into the listener's heart-- - These, with what else, who knows? of help from Heaven, - Wrought a bright miracle of change in Ruth. - She had been hard and dry, a desert rock; - The rock was smitten now with Moses' rod. - Ruth gushed in gracious tears, she veiled herself - With weeping, as sometimes a precipice - Veils itself dim with mist of cataract. - And Rachel wept with Ruth, until Ruth said: - "But where is Stephen, Rachel? It might be - They, meaning death, yet did not compass death. - Such things have been; haste, let us go and see. - Monstrous it were, if he should need me--I - The while here sitting weeping idle tears!" - - "Come," Rachel said, and took her by the hand. - So hand in hand they went to Mary's house, - The elder guided as the younger led, - And neither speaking, stilled with solemn thought. - Mary and Martha met the twain, with mute, - Subdued, affectionate greeting, at the door, - And, understanding without word their wish, - Straight led them inward, with a quietude - Of gesture that spoke peace and peace infused, - To the place where in quietude reposed - That slumberer late so violently lulled - To this so placid sleep. The room was flushed - With hue of gold in hangings round the walls - And rugs of russet muffling deep the floor, - That made a kind of inner light diffused, - Like sunshine without sun and shadowless. - A golden-curtained window opened east, - And east the upturned face of Stephen looked, - Lying there motionless in that fast sleep-- - So lying that, had he his eyelids raised, - He without moving might have seen the morn. - The rest, with one accord not entering, stood - About the door without, silent, and saw - While the wife sole went to the husband's side. - That instant, lo, from out the breaking dawn - A level sunbeam through the curtain slipped - And touched the fair translucent face with light. - Ruth marked it and she testified and said, - Falling upon her knees beside the couch: - "I take it as a token, Lord, from Thee; - Even so send Thou Thy light into my heart! - Lo, by the side of him made beautiful - In death, of whom I was unworthy, here - I give myself--alas, that it should be - Too late for him to have known it!--to his Lord. - I trust to be forgiven for my sin! - I thank Thee that I was not weight enough - Upon him to prevail against Thy might - Within him and prevent this sacrifice-- - Accomplished all without my help, nay, all - In spite of my resistance! O my God, - How hast Thou humbled me! To have had no part, - Wife with her husband to have borne no part-- - Save hindering what she could!--when such a deed - Of martyrdom for Christ was possible! - Behold, O Lord, thus late I take my part! - This now is also mine, as well as his, - This sacrifice. I have offered him to Thee! - And if my share be heavier even than his-- - To live bereaved more grievous martyrdom - Than to have died--this too is my desert, - Accept the witness of my widowhood!" - - Ruth ceased, but rose not from her knees, still fixed - In posture as if grown a pillar of prayer. - Then those three women came and knelt with her - Beside her dead, a silent fellowship - Of sympathy in sacrifice; but soon - Rachel and Mary, one on either side - Of Ruth, borne by the self-same impulse each, - Each at the self-same instant borne, unto - The self-same beautiful appeal, pure love's - Pure touch, stole softly each a hand in hers. - Each plighting hand so proffered Ruth upraised - Slowly and solemnly as with a kind - Of consecrating gesture to her lips, - And kissing seemed to seal a sacrament. - Then she arose, and all arose with her, - When Martha, not forgotten, likewise shared, - She too, with Ruth the kiss of sisterhood. - So, never a word between them spoken, all - Went backward and withdrew, Ruth last, who saw - That sunshine glorifying Stephen's brow, - And bore it thence, Shekinah in her heart. - Her countenance thus illumined from within, - The mother to her orphan children went, - And moved, a light, about her household ways. - She knew that others would with holy heed - Prepare that holy dust for burial. - - But Rachel was more comfortless than Ruth. - Rest in her spirit found she none--until, - First having broken fast, but sparingly, - She hastened with winged footsteps to her home. - There her maid told her Saul went early forth - Leaving this message for his sister: "Here - Bide, if thou wilt; this house be still thy home. - But I go hence, whither I cannot tell, - Nor yet for how long absence; to what end-- - Thou knowest. Cheer thee well!" The little maid - Looked rueful and perplexed, but nothing asked, - As nothing Rachel told her, save to say: - "Quick, bring thine elder sister, thou and she - Shall keep the house together for a time. - I also go, my little maid"--wherewith - Her little maid, now weeping, Rachel kissed-- - "I also go, but weep not, I shall come - Again, I trust, in happier times. Farewell!" - Then Rachel straight to Ruth's abode returned. - - "Glad am I thou hast come once more," said Ruth, - "For I have wished to ask thee many things. - How came his dreadful chance of martyrdom - On Stephen? I can bear to hear it all, - Since all is done and past and--'He is safe,' - As thou saidst, Rachel!" - Tenderly Ruth smiled, - With tears behind her smiles that did not fall. - Then Rachel said: - "I cannot tell thee all - As having all beheld, but this I heard, - That Stephen gave a noble testimony - Before the council who had cited him; - That there his face shone like an angel's, God - Himself so swearing for His servant, while - Against him swore false witnesses suborned - By Shimei; that his enemies could not bear - The fierceness of the love with which in wrath - He burned for God against their wickedness, - And so they rushed upon him violently - And thrust him forth without the city walls. - But God beheld their threatening, and He sent - His Romans to withstand them for a while. - Then we that loved and honored him drew nigh, - And would have spoken words of cheer to him, - But he--O Ruth, thou shouldst have seen him then! - I never can describe to thee how fair - Thy husband was to look upon, while he, - As steadfast as a star and as serene, - And not less lovely-luminous to our eyes, - Stood there amid the angry Sanhedrim - And to us spake such heavenly words of cheer! - He spake of thee, Ruth, and I think God gave - His spirit comfort in good hope for thee. - For, 'God will give all to our prayers,' said he, - And added, 'Husband He will be to her, - And Father to the fatherless.'" - Thereat - Ruth's tears as from a fresh-oped fountain flowed, - And eased her aching heart, too full before - Of love, remorseful love, for perfect peace. - Rachel with Ruth wept tears of sympathy; - But with the sweet and wholesome in her tears - Mixed salt and bitter, for she thought of Saul. - Ruth at length ceased to weep and yearning said: - "And then those Romans let them work their will!" - - "On Stephen's body, yea, Ruth," Rachel said, - "But on his spirit they could have no power." - - "The stones," said Ruth-- - "The stones, Ruth," Rachel said, - "God gave His angels charge concerning them-- - So verily I believe--and strictly bade, - 'Lo, let these slay, but see ye that they do - No harm unto My prophet.' So the stones, - They slew, but hurt not. God translated him; - He rose triumphant in meek majesty. - I should have told thee, Ruth, that while he stood - Before the council, he looked up and saw - Jesus in heaven on the right hand of God-- - There standing; this he testified to all. - It was as if his faithful Lord had risen - To side with Stephen in his agony. - So, when they stoned him, Stephen upward spoke, - 'Lord Jesus, take my spirit'; then once more, - 'Lord, lay not Thou this sin unto their charge.' - This he said kneeling and so fell asleep." - - The two some space sat musing silently; - Then Ruth: - "I feel that thou hast told me all - Most truly, Rachel, as most tenderly. - Thus, then, God giveth His belovéd sleep, - Thus also! And He doeth all things well! - Amen!" - Silence once more, that seemed surcharged - With deepening inarticulate amen - From both, and Ruth, regarding Rachel, said: - "Even so! But, Rachel, us not yet doth God - Will thus to sleep. Still, otherwise to sleep-- - For His belovéd are not also we?-- - May be God's gift to us. Thou surely needest, - Body and spirit, rest." - And Rachel said: - "The words of Stephen leap unto my lips - For answering thee; and these were Stephen's words: - 'God bless thee, Martha, for thy loving thought!' - And this makes me remember that one thing - Done yesterday I missed to tell thee of. - For Martha, faithful heart, forecasting well, - Brought food for Stephen that might hearten him - To bear whatever he had need to bear, - A cake of barley and a honeycomb. - 'God bless thee, Martha, for thy loving thought!' - Said Stephen, and so took the food from her, - And ate it giving thanks before us all. - He ate it with such look of appetite, - It cheered us with a sense of freedom his - From any discomposure of the mind. - O Ruth, in His pavilion God did hide - Thy husband, and his soul had perfect peace!" - - "Was it not done like Martha?" Ruth replied; - "And done like Stephen too. For courtesy - Bloomed like a flower to grace his daily life. - I used to wonder at it--and I now - Wonder I did not see where such a flower, - Where, and where only, such a flower could find - Rooting to flourish in a world like this! - He always told me that the heart of Christ - Nourished what good in him, or beautiful, - I found--or fancied, as he smiled and said. - But I--Oh, holden heart!--I did not see. - And now it is too late, too late, for him - To have known! It may be that he knows it, yea, - But now to know it is not wholly such - As to have known it then, to have known it then! - Alas, there is not any chance of hope - Behind us, Rachel; hope is all before. - Let us look onward; we in hope were saved, - So Stephen used to say, and, 'I go hence - In comfort of some hope,' were his last words, - Or of his last, to me--concerning me, - Spoken with a sad cheerfulness that now - Breaks me with such a surge of memory! - But this is endless, let it here have end. - Come, Rachel, see, the sun rides high, come thou, - And I will bring thee to a quiet room, - Safe from the sun, where thou shalt rest a while." - - So Rachel followed Ruth, not ill content - To be alone for thought if not for sleep. - Her will was not to sleep; but weariness, - With youth and health, was stronger, and she slept. - - Already, when she woke, the sun halfway - From his high noon had down the western slope - Of sky descended, and she hearkening heard - A rumorous noise without upon the ways, - The stir of movement, steps of many feet, - With sound, muffled, of many voices nigh, - That startled her from sweet forgetfulness - To sudden sad remembrance of the things - That had been, and that were, and were to be. - Instinctive up she sprang, for, "Lo," she said, - "They gather unto Stephen's funeral; - Behooves that I be ready with all speed." - Therewith upon her knees she sank and prayed - A prayer for Ruth and for Ruth's little ones, - Widowed and orphaned by so dear a death, - And for herself--and for her brother Saul! - Then her heart swelled to a capacious wish, - And, anguished in one swift vicarious throe - Of great desire for help and grace divine, - She embraced the total church of Jesus Christ-- - Of such a guide, of such a stay, bereaved! - Then Rachel, with the Everlasting Arms - Invisibly, nigh visibly, around - Her to sustain her steps, came forth, as one - That meekly walks leaning on her beloved, - And begged of Ruth that she might sister be - To her, that day, and thenceforth ever, mourn - As sister with her in the eyes of all. - "For I am lonely," Rachel said, "O Ruth, - As thou art; lonely let us be, we twain, - Together, widows both, and mix our tears. - For also I am widow, as thou art, - Yet not as thou--since me a heavier stroke - Makes widow, who have never been a wife!" - - Ruth answered, though she did not understand, - And kissed her friend in plight of sisterhood. - - So they two, clad alike from out Ruth's store - Of raiment, clad in sad attire alike, - As sisters walked together side by side-- - Ruth's children with them, grieved, not knowing why-- - To where, from Mary's house and Martha's borne, - With grievous lamentation, by good men - Devout, the flower and choice of Israel, - Was laid the sacred dust of Stephen down - And sealed within a rock-hewn sepulchre. - - Joseph of Arimathæa, he who sought - And gained from Pilate leave to take away - The body of Jesus crucified, had sent - To Bethany, betimes, before the hour - Of burial, rich spices, a great weight, - Aloes and myrrh, with linen pure and fine, - To wrap the body of Stephen for his tomb. - Mary, the mother of the Lord, with John - Beloved of Jesus, loving her as son, - Came to that feast of sorrow bringing tears, - To Ruth medicinal more than any, wept - By one who had so learned to weep. So there - With sackcloth worn and ashes on the head, - They wailed aloud, that Hebrew company, - Women and men, they beat the breast, they rent - Their raiment, until one stood forth who said: - "Enough already has to grief been given. - Us it befits not here, for Stephen dead, - To mourn as mourn others who have no hope. - He was a burning and a shining light, - And we a season in his beams were glad. - Glory to God who kindled him for us! - Glory to God who hath from us withdrawn - His shining, and now hides him in Himself! - We thought we could not spare him, but God knew. - Let all be as God wills Who knows. Amen!" - - "Amen!" they solemnly responded all, - And he who spake these things went on and said: - "The Lord anointed Stephen with the oil - Of gladness in the gift of speech above - His fellows. How he flamed insufferably, - In words that leapt out of his mouth, like swords - Out of their sheaths, enkindled to devour - The wicked! When he spoke, flew seraphim - And bore from off the altar living coals - Of God which, laid upon his lips, purged them - To utter those pure words that purified. - What zeal, what wisdom, what fixed faith, what power! - He stood our bulwark, he advanced our sword, - And single seemed an insupportable host. - Yet this puissant soldier of the truth, - To disobedience so implacable, - How gentle and how placable he was - To all obedience! He was like his Lord, - That Lion of the tribe of Judah, named - Also the Lamb of God. No words had he - Save words of vivid flame, sudden and swift - And deadly like the lightning, for God's foes; - But for the little flock of Jesus, balm - His speech--into those lips such grace was poured! - - "Nor less in him for mighty work than word - The Holy Ghost a fountain was of power. - From him or through him what a plenteous stream - Flowed like the river of God in miracle! - Signs, wonders, gifts of healing, heavenly powers, - Innumerable flocked about his hand, - Like doves unto their windows flying home, - Waiting there eager to perform his will. - - "A prophet of the elder time, reborn - Into the spirit of this latter age, - Was Stephen. Thanking God for him, let us - Together and steadfastly pray that He - Who made the great Elijah live again - In John the Baptist, give us Stephen back - In resurrection from his tomb with power. - Thus shall we pray as himself prophesied-- - For Stephen, you remember, glanced at this - In prophecy; unless not prophecy - It were, but only generous hope, with wish - To comfort Rachel, when he spake to her - Of grace to come upon her brother yet-- - We shall so seek what seems it he foresaw, - If we ask Jesus to make captive Saul!" - - That speaker ceased, and then a prophetess - Among the women there took up a wail, - Which triumphed into gladness as it grew: - - "Is fallen, is fallen, a prince in Israel! - Woe, while it yet was day, his sun went down! - Daughters of Judah, mourn for Stephen slain! - - "Mourn for a candle of the Lord put out, - A torch of noble witness quenched in blood; - Wear sackcloth of thick darkness and bewail! - - "Repent, O daughters of Jerusalem, - Repent, forsake your wickedness of woe; - Look up, look up, the quenched torch burns a star! - - "Is risen, is risen; behold, at the right hand - On high sits he of his ascended Lord; - Rejoice, rejoice, for Stephen could not die! - - "Comfort ye Ruth; thrice among women she - Lives blesséd, who, from wife to him, became, - Widowed, partaker of his martyrdom! - - "Hosanna to the Son of David, Who, - Beheld of Stephen standing in the heavens, - Received His servant's spirit to Himself! - - "The Resurrection and the Life is He; - He will not leave this body in its tomb; - Stephen and we shall meet Him in the air. - - "Descending with the sound that wakes the dead, - Ten thousand of His saints attending Him, - He comes! He comes! Even so, Lord Jesus, come! - - "Salvation, worship, blessing, glory, power, - Forever and forever unto God, - Our God; He never will forsake His own." - - Uplifted high in heart, they went away. - - - - -BOOK X. - -SAUL AT BETHANY. - - -At the funeral service for Stephen, Shimei was a skulking attendant. -He catches at a mention there overheard by him of the name of Saul in -connection with that of Stephen, to plot an instigated persecuting -visit on Saul's part to Bethany; Shimei hoping that Saul will thus -encounter his own sister identified as a Christian. Saul takes a -band of men and makes the visit. He finds his intended victims all -together at the house of Ruth condoling with her--Rachel indeed -among them. After sharp inward conflict, and much effort put forth -without success to make his victims abjure their faith, Saul finally -takes them to prison. But Rachel, she vainly entreating to share her -companions' fate, he leaves behind. She takes upon herself the charge -of Ruth's children in their own home, where Saul, month after month, -secretly sends to her supply of every need. - -SAUL AT BETHANY. - - Among the sons of God, when these one day - Came to present themselves before the Lord, - Satan came also; and so Shimei, - Amid the throng that mourned at Stephen's death, - Intruded. With smooth face of sanctimony, - Skulking to be unseen or heeded not, - He hovered furtive on the outer edge - Of audience, when those words of praise were said - To hearten--eye and ear alert to mark - All that befell. His thought was, 'Here perhaps - I shall learn something to the true behoof - And profit of our cause--right aim secure - For the next blow of vengeance to be struck.' - The name of Saul mysteriously conjoined - With Rachel's, in abhorrent prophecy - As seemed--this, Shimei caught at eagerly - And said, 'Aha!' - Then, as the throng dispersed - All to their several homes, straight Shimei - Went to seek Saul. Him found that spy malign - With the chief priests in council, plotting deep - To hunt the sect of Jesus to the death. - These had armed Saul with writ and warrant sealed - Empowering him to enter where he would, - House after house, and whomsoever found, - Man be it or woman, guilty of belief - In Jesus as Messiah, such to seize - And drag to prison. - Instantly conceived - Shimei a subtle snare to enmesh the feet - Of Saul. The proud young zealot Pharisee - Should be set on to visit first in search - Those homes of Bethany; where, unadvised - Perhaps, so Shimei guessed, the brother might, - To his dismay, find his own sister one - With the disciples of the Nazarene. - Then to make prisoner his own flesh and blood, - Or openly spare Rachel for kin's sake-- - This, scandal against scandal doubtful weighed, - Would be the hard alternative to Saul. - - "Belovéd brother Saul," so Shimei spoke, - "_I_ mourned at Stephen's funeral to-day. - Not loud, you know, but deep, my mourning was; - Not loud, for I am modest, and my wish - Was less to be seen than to see; but deep, - For there was cause, to one that loved you, Saul, - To be sincerely sad on your behalf. - Incredible it seems, they spoke your name, - Not, as might honor it, with hate and dread, - But very ambiguously, to say the least. - In fact, I fear you may be compromised, - Unless you take prompt measures in the matter. - Hark you, a certain orator stood up - Who, after praising Stephen to his worth, - Distinctly hinted Saul was looked upon - As hopeful future pervert to their cause - Predestined to fill Stephen's vacant room. - The fellow founded on some prophecy - Which, as I gathered, Stephen had put forth. - Now this preposterous notion, with such folk, - Is far more like to prosper, and thus be - Noised undesirably, than you might guess, - As a report injurious to your name. - You will be tainted with disloyalty, - In general esteem--to our great loss. - - "What I propose is that you strike a stroke - So sudden and so ringing and so aimed - As shall decisively and neatly nip - This precious piece of prophecy in the bud, - And put you out of reach of calumny. - You have your warrant and commission; good, - Use them at once, sleep not upon them; now, - This very night--for domiciliary work - Like what you purpose, night is the best time, - Birds to their nests, you know, at night come home-- - This very night, take you a trusty band - And make a bold foray at Bethany. - There Stephen lived, and there a hotbed yet - Thrives of this pestilent heresy. No place - Fitter than the abode and vicinage - Of your late overmatch in controversy - To make first theatre of the exploits - You aim at in this different field--field where, - With odds so in your favor, you should win. - Easier far, given the right support, to drag - To dungeon and to death a hundred men - Or praying women, all as tame as sheep, - Than one impracticable fellow like - That Stephen manage in fair controversy! - - "You have my best kind hopes and all good men's. - Ask for the house that harbored Stephen's corpse - And whence the funeral issued--quarry there - You cannot fail to find. The widow too - Of Stephen, I watched her, and what I saw - Makes me misdoubt her Hebrew orthodoxy. - Sound her--an ounce of thorough work done now, - Unquestionably thorough, will be worth - A hundred weight of paltering by and by. - Despise the fear that now and then a man - May call you cruel; the worst cruelty, - As you and I well know, is ill-timed softness. - This thing must be stamped out; it is a plague, - It creeps from house to house, no house is safe. - Your house, Saul, mine--that sister fair of yours, - Yes, treat the thought with scorn, but some fine day, - Why not? Saul wakes to find his sister lost." - - How far unconsciously, Saul could not guess, - But Shimei, in that last home thrust of his, - Either by pure fortuity, or else - With malice the most exquisitely wise, - Had hit the quivering quick of Saul's sore pride. - Saul winced visibly, and Shimei, satisfied, - Left him alone the prey of his own thoughts. - - Saul's thoughts were visions rather; first, he saw - His sister as in that farewell with her - Bowed beautiful beneath a brother's scorn, - Like a meek flower broken with tempest; then, - Stephen he saw, his face with God in him - Afire, before the council; next, that face - Toward heaven upturned, he, far within the veil - Agaze, beholding there the glory of God; - Once more, the martyr lifting holy hands - On high, with his last breath praying for those - That slew him, praying also then for Saul! - Rachel the while--she rather felt than seen-- - With tears that did not gather, but that made - Her deep eyes deeper than the soundless sea, - Looking at him. Swift then the vision changed, - And he saw Stephen in the temple court - Turn suddenly round on Saul his blinding face - To threaten him with promise that, one day, - He, Saul himself, should grovel in the dust - Before the feet of Jesus crucified! - Those visions were as when the lightning-flash, - By night, fast following lightning-flash, reveals, - One instant and no more, the world, but prints - Its image on the eye intensely bright. - - The final vision wrought a fierce revolt - In Saul from that relenting which, before, - The earlier visions almost made him feel. - As with a mortal gripe, his vise-like will - Clutched at his heart and held it fast and hard. - Scorning to be diverted from his path - Because, forsooth, the meddling Shimei - Pointed it out to him offensively, - Saul moved at once to go to Bethany. - Seven servitors he chose, strong men whom use - Had, hand and heart, seasoned to such employ-- - With these a guide--and started on his way. - Again the moon shone, as the yesternight, - And flooded heaven and earth with glory mild. - But her mild glory now was a rebuke - To human passion, not a balm to pain. - With swords and staves armed, as that night came they - Who looked for Jesus in Gethsemane-- - The needless lamps and torches in their hands - With flare and smoke affronting the moonlight-- - They marched, those seven, following the guide with Saul. - At first these chattered lightly as they walked, - But soon the stern, stark, wordless mood of Saul, - And his grim purpose in his pace expressed, - Urgent and swift, taxing their utmost strength - To follow and not fall behind, quite quelled - The social spirit in all, and on all went - In sullen silence like their chief. Like him, - Insensibly each moment more and more, - While thought and feeling they shut strictly up - Within them from all vent in speech, they these - Changed to brute instinct of vindictiveness; - Insensibly, like him, with every step - Of vehement ongoing, vehement - Propulsion gathered they in mind and will - To reach and grapple with their task. So on - And up with speed they pressed toward Bethany. - - At Bethany, meanwhile, the flock in fold - Abode the coming of those prowler wolves-- - Unweeting, in sad sense of safety lulled. - The sisters, with the brother Lazarus, - Had to Ruth's house at eve repaired; they there - With Rachel sat together, in the court - Under the open sky, and spake with Ruth, - Or spake for Ruth to hear, comforting her. - - "'I am the Resurrection and the Life'"-- - Thus Martha--"how the very words to me - Were spirit of life, were resurrection power, - So spoken, from such lips, at such a time, - When Lazarus lay sleeping in that swoon - Which we call death! I did not need to wait - Until my brother should indeed again - Arise, obedient, at His word, to feel - The utterer of that saying was the Christ." - "But when He wept, when Jesus with us wept," - Said Mary, "I felt solace in His tears - Such that almost I would have always grieved, - To be always so comforted." A pause, - Then eyes on Lazarus turned, and he: "From where - I was--but where I was, although I seem - Well to remember, yet could not I tell - In any words, or show by any signs, - However I might try--I heard His voice - Say, 'Lazarus, come forth.' Those round me heard, - I thought they heard, with me, that potent voice, - And they were not surprised, as was not I, - Seeming to know it and to understand. - That voice goes everywhere and is obeyed, - To all the perfect law of liberty, - And I obeyed as naturally as I breathe; - And I am here, in witness of His power, - Whose power is universal through all worlds." - "His power is great," said Ruth, "and wide His sway, - Yet seems His grace the sovereign of His power." - "Yea," Rachel said, "for doth not power in Him - Bend to the yoke and service of His grace?" - "We easily err," said Lazarus, "seeking here - To comprehend the incomprehensible. - All difference is in us, for all in Him - One and the same is; power is grace and grace - Is power, in Him, nay, power and grace is He. - And He is ours and we are His, and one - Are we with Him and in Him one likewise - Each with the other, all." "How blest!" they said, - "And the whole family in heaven and earth - Are one, and Stephen is with us or we - With him, and heaven is here or here is heaven!" - - A little while in silence and deep muse, - And, by the Holy Spirit, fellowship - With the Almighty Father and His Son. - Then, "Lo, let us join hands," they said, "and sing - That psalm which breathes of unity like this." - With braided tones, in unison they sang: - 'Behold, how good it is for brethren here, - 'How pleasant, thus in unity to dwell - 'Together! It is like that costly chrism - 'Upon the head which overflowing ran - 'Down Aaron's beard and down his garment's folds, - 'Abundant as the dew of Hermon drops, - 'Distilled, upon the heights of Sion where - 'Jehovah fixed the blessing, life, even life - 'Forevermore.' - "A sweet strain and a rich," - Said Lazarus; "David touched it to his harp, - Taught by the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, - Something it lacks to fill the measure up - To that deep sense of oneness which we feel - In Jesus, since He came, since Jesus came - And spake, then went, but came again, in us - Forever to abide. Cannot we sing - Some words of His, as tunable, more deep? - Such words He spake in a celestial rhythm - That night before He sought Gethsemane. - They sat as in the Holy of holies with Him, - And John leaned on His bosom where He sat. - I have heard John rehearse the heavenly words - Until at length I too have them by heart." - Then Lazarus gave them sentences, which all - Chanted in simple measure low and sweet: - 'Let not your heart be troubled, ye believe - 'In God, also in Me believe. Within - 'My Father's house there many mansions are. - 'I should have told you, had it not been so, - 'Because I go to fit a place for you. - 'And if I go and fit for you a place, - 'I shall return and take you to Myself, - 'That where I am there ye may also be.' - - Was it a premonition, or did grief - Surge up through peace and joy to claim its own? - Said Lazarus: "Yet He told us, 'In the world - Ye will have tribulation, though in Me - Ye shall have peace.' With tribulation, peace!" - - His closing words they took from Lazarus' lips, - "With tribulation, peace!" and of them made - A musical refrain half sad, half glad, - Or wholly glad in sadness, which they sang. - When ever were there cadences more sweet, - More sweet or more pathetic? Thrice sang they - Those words together; but, at the fourth time, - Just in that breath between the rise and fall, - Before from 'tribulation' they touched 'peace'-- - A shock as of a mace struck on the door, - Which yielded, and abrupt there strode in--Saul! - - Saul was alone; his men he left without. - The band had first the sisters' dwelling sought, - To find the inmates gone--fled, as Saul guessed. - Without delay, they came to Ruth's abode, - Fiercer from disappointment Saul. But though - Ruthless he came, he now, arrested there, - Ruthful a moment stood at gaze. He saw - Four women and one man in simple sort - Sitting together in communion still. - They did not look like culprits, nay, a light - Purer than purest moonlight seemed to shine - From out their faces underneath the moon. - It was a feast of comfort that they kept, - Those four, with Ruth the widowed--this Saul saw, - And his heart thawed to pity and sheer shame. - He would have turned and left them, but--his men - Without! The chief priests and the Sanhedrim! - And Shimei! And Saul, with all Saul owed - To Saul's fair fame, his conscience, and his God! - - This all was in an instant, while he yet - Only the group and not the persons saw - Who made the group, and so before he knew - His sister in her sombre different garb - Disguised and in the half light of the moon. - As Rachel now he fully recognized, - Dismay almost unmanned him once again. - Then anger to dismay succeeding made - His brother's heart in him against her burn - The hotter that it was a brother's heart. - Speechless he hung, because he could not speak - For anger; but when she, adventuring, drew - Near him and said, "Brother, I pray thee let - Me speak with thee apart a moment," then - The vials of his speech he broke on her: - - "'Brother'! Thou shalt not 'brother' me. Thou hast - No brother more, no sister I. Once, yea-- - But that is long ago, and she is dead, - My sister, and in _her_ name will I hear - No woman speak henceforth. Thou hast missed thy mark - In that appeal. Better hadst thou bode dumb. - Go, woman! Thither! Sit thee with thine own!" - - Saul, with his finger pointing to her seat, - Just left, in added scorn, spurned her from him. - Then Lazarus spoke: "With me do what thou wilt; - But these are women, let me stand for them." - "Stand for thyself," said Saul, "and answer me. - Thou art called Lazarus, I trow?" "Thou hast said," - Lazarus replied. "Well, friend, with thee," said Saul, - "I have to speak. Disciple art thou, then, - Of Jesus Nazarene, late crucified?" - "Of Jesus," full confessing, Lazarus said, - "Of Jesus, whom, not knowing what they did, - Men crucified, but whom God glorified, - Raising Him from the dead and seating Him - At the right hand of glory in the heavens-- - Of Him I am disciple. Bless His name!" - - "Thou art young to utter blasphemy," said Saul; - "Sure unadvisedly thou hast spoken this. - Unsay it instantly, and swear it false, - Or, by the warrant of the Sanhedrim, - Thou goest with me to prison, perhaps to death, - The way of Stephen and all heretics!" - - "Thou speakest idly," Lazarus said to Saul; - "Prison and death no terrors have for me. - The Lord I serve is Lord of life and death." - - "Yea, I have heard," said Saul to Lazarus, - "Thou boastest to have been from death itself - Called back to life by whom thou namest Christ. - Let him, once more, call thee from out the tomb - To which I shall consign thee--if he can. - Saul then perhaps will his disciple be! - Poor fool, fanatic, what shall I call thee? - Persist not in this folly. Be a Jew, - A Jew indeed, nor fling thy life away. - Anathema be Jesus!' say but that, - Thou, Lazarus, and all the rest, with thee, - And I go hence taking the sword away, - The sword of just authority, undrawn, - Asleep within its scabbard, ye all safe, - All Jews indeed, and I given back again - A sister, Rachel mine, won from the dead! - 'Anathema be Jesus!' say those words." - - Saul ceased, awaiting what those five would do. - They did not look at one another; all, - As with one will to all--their eyes upraised, - And their hands clasped in ecstasy of awe-- - Together "Alleluia Jesus!" said. - On Saul a power like lightning fallen from heaven - Fell, at that adoration from their lips. - A moment he stood stupefied, and then, - With a great wrench of scornful will, he freed - Himself and summoned his retainers in. - - These entered rudely, but abashed they hung, - And wondering saw their master half abashed, - Before that little company clothed on - With virtue like a dreadful panoply. - Half with the air of one subdued, or one - Feeling he acts by sufferance not by power, - Saul bids bind all--save Rachel--and forthwith - Lead them to prison. - "Also me, bind me," - So Rachel to the men said eagerly, - And offered her fair wrists. They looked at Saul, - But Saul vouchsafed to them nor word nor sign. - Still, 'No,' they gathered from that cold aspect - In him which seemed to say, 'That which I bid, - Do, further, naught.' Rachel to Saul himself - Beseechingly then turned and said: "O Saul, - Full well I know thou doest this, constrained - By conscience. Then by conscience be constrained - To let thy men bind also me, who am - As guilty as these are and with them should share - One lot." - "I did not come here to be taught - My duty," Saul said, "least of all by thee. - And least of all from thee will I abide - To be adjured as by my conscience. Once - I had a sister, she was conscience to me, - But, as I told thee, that was long ago, - And she is dead, my sister!" - Sadness mixed, - Unmeant, resisted, irresistible, - With Saul's enforced hardheartedness, which broke - His tone to pathos, and, despite himself - With those last words he burst in tears. He shook - In shudders of strong agony, while all - Wondered, but Rachel did not wonder, she - Knew far too well her brother, far too well - Knew their joint past, the two pasts they had had - Together, long and happy one, and one - So brief, so bitter,--and she pitied Saul. - She pitied him, but strongly did not weep-- - Though afterward, alone, remembering, - She wept as if her eyes were fountains of tears-- - With him now Rachel would not weep, for she - Knew far too well her brother, that he scorned - Himself for weeping those hot tears, and would - Be vexed to see tears wept in sympathy - As if with will he let his mood relent. - So Rachel held her pity hard shut up - Within her heart, which ached the more denied - Its wished-for vent in tears, and Saul soon curbed - His passion and in other passion veiled. - "Haste, there!" he said, sharp turning on his men, - "The night flies, while ye loiter." - Now the men - Already had bound Lazarus. He, ere yet - The shameful needless bonds upon the wrists - Of those four gentle women were made fast, - Said: "Saul, what evil have these women done - That they deserve roughness like this? I go - Willingly with thee, albeit innocent, - For I a man am and can well endure - Bonds, stripes, dungeon, or death, having such hope - Within me as makes all afflictions light, - Whatever they may be, compared with that - Eternal weight of glory nigh at hand. - Like hope have also these, and they will bear, - Doubtless, supported, whatsoever ill - Unmerited thou choosest to inflict. - But wilt thou choose to inflict indignity - And pain on such as these?" - "I do not choose," - Said Saul; "I without choosing do, not what - I would, but what I must. I too wear chains, - Am bond of conscience, heavier chains wear I - Than these light manacles that bind the hands - But leave the heart free and one's will one's own. - Chained am I and driven. Conscience drives me on, - Both will and heart in me under the lash - Cower, and I here as but a galley-slave - Do what my conscience bids, joyless, and fierce - From lack of joy, more miserable far, - Binding, than ye are bound, with your fool's joy - Of windy hope! For me, I only know - That, in whatever way, this thing accursed, - This craze to think _that_ man the Christ, must be - Curbed, checked, stopped, crushed, brought to an utter end, - Forever. All the future of our race - Hangs on it. Woman, tempted, fell, she first, - In Eden, whence is all our woe, and now - Women it seems are the peculiar prey - Of this new trick of devilish subtlety; - And, as of old, woman deceived becomes - Deceiver, and through her the mischief spreads - Ungovernably. So women, too--the cause - In part of the disease--must in part pay - The price of cure. For remedy this is, - Not punishment. Ye for the general health - Suffer--for your own health not less, if ye - Yield wisely, and not foolishly resist. - Yield wisely now, and let me hence depart - Cheered to have healed a little here the hurt - With which the daughter of God's people bleeds!" - - How little prospered this his new appeal, - Saul learned, when Ruth, as not having heard even, said: - "At least let me, if I indeed must leave - My children double orphans so, let me - Now go and see them in their helpless sleep, - And take a farewell of them with my eyes. - But who will care for them when I am gone? - I cannot, will not, go away from them. - Nay, ye may bind me, ye may slay me, drag - Me hence may ye, alive or dead, but make - Me go with my own feet away from them, - My children, in their innocent infancy, - And leave them to pine motherless, forlorn, - And perish in their innocent infancy-- - That is beyond your strength--I will not go-- - A mother may defy the Sanhedrim!" - - Ruth spoke dry-eyed, with holy mother's wrath, - Sublime in her indignant eloquence. - Saul, not unmoved, although inexorable, - Said: "Woman, as thy wish is, thou shalt go - Freely to see thy children. May the sight - Dispose thee to a better mind! Come back - Ready to say, 'For their sake, I renounce - My folly, I will be true Jewish mother - To them, so let me stay,'--and thou shalt stay. - - Ruth going, Rachel thought, 'Shall I too go - With her, that I may help her bear to part - From her dear babes?' Quickly resolved behind - To tarry, she, Ruth gone, went up to Saul, - And said: "I pray thee, Saul, let Rachel go - Instead of Ruth to prison. Let Ruth bide - To nurse her children. I will take her place - Gladly in her captivity, and be - A surety for her. Young and strong am I, - And I will be a firm good surety, Saul, - Not fleeing and not complaining, always there,-- - And if, hereafter ever, it should seem - Needful to have Ruth come herself to prison, - Why, she will still be here, under thy hand, - As now, so then, to be hence thither led. - Be kind, and have me bound straightway, before - Ruth comes again, that she be left no choice - But to let Rachel have her wilful way, - Perceiving that I have my bonds on me - To go to prison with her, if not without, - While much I wish to go without her--wish, - And, by thy kind permission, have the power. - Dost thou not think, Saul"--wherewith Rachel smiled - On Saul a starlight smile, which made him feel - How high she was above him in her sphere - Unconsciously--"Dost thou not think that I - Will make as good a prisoner as Ruth?" - - Had she not smiled that smile, Saul might have thought, - 'Infatuated child!' and thought aloud. - But that bright smile of almost humor sad - Showed him how sanely her true self she was, - And he was baffled, sudden-smitten dumb. - He could not answer her; much less could he - Bid bind those slender wrists with manacles - And send his sister to imprisonment! - So there Saul stood before her, marble-mute. - Not long--for Ruth soon now came back, more calm, - She having prayed beside her sleeping babes, - And trusted them again to the Most High - As Father, and from the Most High received - Grace to bear graciously her testimony, - Even by imprisonment, and children reft, - For Stephen's Lord and hers. The others marked - Ruth's placid changed demeanor, and gave thanks - Silent to God who thus their prayer had heard. - "I go," she said to Saul, "for Jesus' sake - Wherever thou mayst lead. My babes I trust, - As Stephen trusted them before he suffered, - Unto the Father of the fatherless. - Lo, I am ready--bind me--for His sake!" - - Never so ruefully had those hard men - Bound any hands for prison as they bound hers; - And scarcely Saul found steady voice to say: - "Thy children shall be cared for tenderly, - Till thou return to them in sounder mind; - The fathers of our tribes will see to this." - - Then Rachel said, and saying it wept at last: - "They would not bind me, Ruth, to take thy place, - Though I entreated them while thou wert gone. - I shall be left, unworthy to be left, - If ye, beloved, are worthy to be taken! - But, Ruth, if thou wilt let me, I shall stay - And myself be a mother to thy babes, - Nurturing them most lovingly, alike - For thine, their father's, and their own sweet sakes. - And I will daily bring thee word of them, - Treasuring for thee each little syllable - They lisp from day to day of loving speech - Concerning father or mother gone away. - They shall not lack whatever I can give - Of mother's tendance, so as yet to feel - That I am not their mother, only one - Less wise, less good, less loving, and less fair - Than she, who for their mother's sake loves them! - All this, I trust, will not last very long, - This motherlessness for them, this childlessness - For thee--thou wilt come back--but, O Ruth, pray"-- - Thus Rachel softly for Ruth sole to hear-- - "For surely now thou understandest well, - Too well! what then I meant when once I told thee, - 'I too am widow as thou art, yet not - As thou, since me stroke heavier has bereaved!'-- - O Ruth, pray thou and never cease to pray - For Saul, my brother!" - - So they went away, - And, lodged in prison, those four captives sang, - A silent melody making in their hearts, - "With tribulation, peace!" until they slept. - But Rachel having followed at remove - Behind them, saw where they were put in hold, - Then, hedged about meanwhile with purity, - With convoy doubtless too of angels hedged, - Gladly on such an errand earthward come, - Invisible bright legion hovering round!-- - Safely returned to sleep in Stephen's house. - - There she abode, and thence, an angel she! - Went daily to and fro between Ruth's house - And Ruth in prison, bearing messages, - Refections often bearing, food or drink, - Her own housewifely skill and instinct nice, - With other comforts portable, sometimes, - Pillow or cushion, rug or robe or shawl, - Such as might serve to cheer the homesick heart - In any there imprisoned, with sweet sense - At least of loving thought from one for those - In bonds, as herself with them bound; the while - That for the orphaned children she made home. - Nor ever failed to Rachel full supply - Of all whatever need there was to her. - Month after month, her cruse was brim with oil, - With meal her measure, large replenishment. - God put it in the heart of Saul to send, - Diverted like an irrigating rill - Full all its season from the affluent Nile, - A secret stream of various providence - For Rachel and for Rachel's fosterlings - Fed from the fountain of his patrimony. - - - - -BOOK XI. - -SAUL AND HIRANI. - - -Saul, ill-content with his own prosperity in persecution, retires -gloomily, late at night, to his desolated home. He vainly tries to -sleep, and, rising very early, goes to consult Gamaliel. Returning, -he encounters Shimei, who, with gibes, instigates a further act of -persecution on Saul's part, cunningly contriving it to make refusal -impossible. Saul attempting the arrest proposed by Shimei meets with -opposition, which the latter has secretly inspired. The persecutor -in consequence narrowly escapes violent death, being rescued at the -critical moment by Shimei; who himself, with a band of servitors, -makes the arrest unsuccessfully attempted by Saul alone. The man -arrested confesses Jesus before the Sanhedrim, constant against every -inducement to deny his Lord. He is scourged, at the instance of -Shimei, and finally, at the instance of Mattathias, stoned; Saul in -both cases giving his vote against the man. - -SAUL AND HIRANI. - - With large prosperity and little joy, - Thus the first stage of that 'straight path' foreseen - By him to Rachel, 'traced in blood and tears,' - Saul had accomplished, and the night was late; - He parted from his men and was alone. - Alone and moody, by the westering moon, - His face downcast turned absently toward what - Late was his home, home longer not to him, - With footstep slow suspended by sad thought-- - Which had no goal, but ever round and round - On one fixed centre hopelessly revolved-- - Saul paced the still streets of Jerusalem, - Like a soul seeking rest and finding none. - Before the door at length he finds himself - Of his own house forsaken yesterday. - - For an uncertain absence, but for long - As he supposed, Saul thence that morn had fled - In haste and bitterness. He could not bear - To think of meeting Rachel day by day, - And that great gulf impassable between - Her and himself yawning! he hands imbrued - Perhaps in blood of those she counted dear - But he most hateful counted bringing home, - Her innocent white hands to touch, and feel - The difference! Therefore he fled because - 'Rachel,' thought he, 'must bide, and bide we twain - Cannot.' But now Rachel was gone, and Saul, - Alone and lonely, sojourner might be - Where brother and sister late had shared a home. - He enters noiselessly, and unperceived - Steals to his chamber; there upon his couch - To restless thought, he, not to rest, lies down. - Restless and fruitless, save that, morning yet - Pearl-white, untinted with that ruddy flush - Of color in the east before the sun, - Saul rose, and, after joyless orisons, - Went to Gamaliel's house, sure him to find - Already on his roof to greet the dawn. - - "In anguish sore and sore perplexity - Of spirit, master," Saul said, "lo, I come - To thee, not knowing whither else to go, - For solace, and the solving of my doubt." - - "Welcome thou comest ever, even or morn," - Gamaliel said; "but what disquiets thee? - When in the council last I heard thee speak, - Thou wert all firmness, as one wholly clear - In purpose, and thou hadst that glad aspect, - Though serious, which befits the mind resolved. - Whence, Saul, the change in thee?" - - "Thou knowest," said Saul - "How prospered my attempt, ventured upon - Without thy counsel, in that issue joined - With Stephen." - - "Yea, my son," Gamaliel said; - "But I, meantime, after my counsel given - Dissuading thee, had learned myself to feel - How failed the hand of brute authority - Against this strange faith of the Nazarene. - Thine undertaking I less disapproved - After our hearing of the Galilæans. - Something perceived in them, or through them felt, - Disturbed me with a strange solicitude, - Which the ill fortune of thine own assay - Did not relieve. But thou, thou still wert clear, - Wert thou not, Saul? Thine action did not halt; - Promptly in Stephen's stoning thou took'st part." - - "I acted promptly, that I might be clear - In thought," said Saul; "this, rather than because - I was so clear. My halting urged me on. - Yet now, O master mine, I might perhaps - Be clear, but that my coadjutorship - Offends me so, torments me with such doubt. - In the right way how can I be, and be - In the same way with Shimei? My soul - Sickens at him, at all his words and ways - Sickens, and still he dogs me every step, - Clings to me like my shadow, whispers me - Over my shoulder, pointing me out my way, - Until I hardly can do that which else - Freely I should, because he bids me do it!" - - "Yea, Saul, my son, trust thou thine instinct there," - Gravely Gamaliel said, with slow reserve - That warned how more than he would say was meant; - "Our brother Shimei is a dark man, - Whose public zeal is edged with private spite; - Him well, son Saul, it thee behooves beware. - Since when thou scornedst him in those high words - Before the council, Shimei hates thee, Saul, - And hate like his is sleepless till revenge. - Ill for a cause that must be served by him! - But some are tools, and others ministers, - Of God, Who works His holy will with all!" - - Unwarned by warning, but in conscience pricked, - And following his own tyrannous thought, Saul spoke: - "Those infamous false witnesses of his-- - Say, master, did I on my conscience take - The guilt of their suborning, when consent - I gave to Stephen's death thereby procured? - My conscience like a scorpion stings me on, - But whether a good conscience before God - It be, or rather a conscience violated, - Which I must quiet by not heeding it, - And by confusing it with din of deeds - Forever doing--this I cannot well - Resolve me, and--but, nay, for that were false, - I do not wish thou shouldst resolve me it. - Forgive me, and farewell! But pray for Saul!" - - Therewith, and pausing not, like one distraught, - Or one goaded, and wildly seeking fast - Enough before the goad to fly, which flies - Only the faster, following, for his speed, - And pricks the harder--so Saul broke away - And left Gamaliel on his roof alone - Astonished. - Swiftly now, yet with a haste - As of one wishing to leave far behind - Some spot abhorred, much more than as of one - Eager a goal before him to attain, - Say rather as of one insanely fierce - Somewhither, anywhither, from himself - Pursuing hard himself, to fly, Saul flew - Back toward his dwelling. At the door arrived, - He well-nigh stumbled--for his hasting feet - Against some shapeless heap struck that alive - Seemed, for it moved, and from the threshold, where - He in a kind of ambush crouching lay, - Slowly into the semblance of a man, - Under Saul's eyes down bent, upgrew--Shimei! - - 'Sin coucheth at the door!' thought Saul; he thought - Half of himself, as half of Shimei, - For, 'If thou doest not well, thou Saul!' thought he, - Then, "Reptile! How beneath my heel should I - His serpent head have bruised!" hissed hotly out - Between his set teeth, and perused the man. - Half under breath this, then to him aloud: - "What art thou? Imp of hell spawned hither new - Up from the pit? Avaunt! I loathe thee hence!" - - "Nay, brother Saul," grinned Shimei, therefore pleased - Thus spurned to be, because the spurning was - With anguish of disgust to him who spurned, - Malevolently yet storing reserve - Of hatred and revenge therefor, to be - Afterward feasted when the time should come, - "Nay, brother Saul, you look with eyesight dazed - From undersleeping, and from rash surprise - At this encounter. I am Shimei, - Your special coadjutor tried and true. - I am a little early, I confess-- - Or late, which shall I call it? early and late-- - Like moral good and evil, Saul--ofttimes - Change places with your point of view--become - The one the other, as you look at them. - - "You see I hardly slept myself this night, - Thinking of you, and pleasuring my mind - With fancies of the odd coincidences - That might be happening you at Bethany. - I got prompt information how it all - Fell out, and hastened hither to advise - With you. Upon your sleep, already much - Cut short, I would not thoughtlessly break in, - And so I dropped me at your threshold here, - To wait a proper hour for seeing you, - And yet not let you pass out hence unseen. - I must have fallen asleep, and, brother Saul - Be sure I was no less surprised than you, - When you just now came on me unaware. - Ha! ha! How naturally you mistook your friend - For something not so pleasant from the pit - Vomited suddenly up under your feet! - Another might have taken it amiss - To be so little courteously greeted, - But I--why, give and take, say I, in joke, - You have bravely evened up the score between us!" - - "I do not bandy jokes with such as you, - Suborner of false witnesses!" gnashed Saul. - Saul's look, his tone, had withered any man - Save Shimei, who grew blithe in sultry heats - Of human scorn as in his element. - So Shimei flourished lustier hearing Saul - Despise him with the question further asked: - "What is there common between you and me?" - - "Oh! Ah!" sneered Shimei; "I had thought you dazed - In eyesight only, but distempered mind - You show now, taking this high strain with me. - 'What common 'twixt us?' Yea, yea, very good! - 'Suborner of false witnesses'--hence base, - Shimei, but very, very virtuous, Saul, - Who, with much flourish of disdain, his hands, - His lily hands, washes, for all to see, - Quite white and fair of all complicity - With 'lies,' 'devilish lies,' 'lies damnable,' - You know, and so forth, and in due course then, - His moral indignation unabated, - Takes profit of said lies to make away - With Stephen, through more weighty argument - In stones found than conveniently to hand - Came when he crossed words with that heretic!" - - The mordant sneer corrosive of such speech - Ate through the thin mail of Saul's scornful pride, - And bit him in his wincing sense of truth. - Against these thrusts in no wise could he fence, - Having the foothold lost whereon he stood - Firm in the conscience of integrity. - Unbidden would those words of Stephen, "Pricks - To kick against!" returning come to him - In memory, while ever, with each return, - Fiercer waxed Saul's resistance, fiercer wound - Infixing in his secret-suffering mind-- - As should the bullock battle with the goads - Behind him, shrinking flesh on sharpened steel. - So now his wild heart Saul pressed sternly up - Against the cruel points of Shimei's jeer, - And suffered them in silence. - Shimei - Felt his own triumph, and at feline ease - Leisurely played with his proud captive. "Saul," - He added, "you and I are men too wise - To waste strength here in mutual blame. Forgive - Me that I was so far led on to speak - As if retorting word for word unkind. - I should have made allowance for your state, - Devoid of that just self-complacency - So needful to a happy health of mind. - Now you and I at bottom are such twins, - We ought to understand each other well; - It is a shame that this has not been so. - Here we are one in aim, and unity - In aim--what deeper unity than that - Joins ever man and man? Let us strike hands - Together, since our hearts beat unison." - - Not less revolted at these words was Saul, - More, rather, that he knew how insincere - They were, how hollow, as how void of truth, - Spoken in pure malicious irony. - The sense of difference his from Shimei, - Browbeaten in him, badgered, stunned, ashamed, - Could not rejoice in thought, in speech far less, - Against that flourished claim of unity. - He stood silent, ignobly helpless, while - Maliciously his pastime further took - With him his captor, who then, sated, said: - "Well, Saul, I shall excuse it to a mind - In you disordered through late loss of sleep, - That you do not invite me in to sit - A little at my ease while I disclose - The thought I had in coming to you now. - Nay, nay"--for Saul, broken in self-command - False shame to feel, and false self-blame, as found - Defaulting dues of hospitality, - Instinctive moved toward making Shimei guest-- - "Permit me to decline the courtesy. - You are tired, you are very tired, and you should rest. - Once within, seated, I might stay too long, - Bound by the charms of your society. - - "I pray you be not overmuch disturbed, - But really you should know it, Saul, the chance - You fell in with this night at Bethany-- - I mean your meeting of your sister there - Confessed a bold disciple of the Way-- - Is likely to engender consequence. - It was a noble chance, Saul, from the Lord, - Pushed to your hand--would you had used it nobly! - Alas, at the extreme pinch, your virtue failed! - I can excuse it, while regretting it, - I myself, Saul. Not every one, I fear, - Is naturally so lenient as I am. - My sympathy is facile, but the most - Will say, 'Why did not Saul send _her_ to prison?' - Now what you need is, to forestall such talk - By giving people something else to say. - Fill their mouth full with daily fresh report - Of other, and still other, great exploits - Achieved by you in the same line, and then - They either will forget that one lapse yours, - Or cease, from the perversion of a sister, - Connived at or colluded with by you, - To accuse a taint and pravity of blood - Inclining you yourself to heresy. - - "I give myself no end of trouble for you, - And I have made discovery of the man - You must not fail to move for as next prize. - He is a notable fellow, full of quip, - Quaint turn of phrase, and ready repartee, - Each trick of tongue to catch the common ear, - And mischievous accordingly; for he - Boasts everywhere how, having been born blind - And grown to forty years of age in blindness, - He one day met Jesus of Nazareth, - When that deceiver spat upon the ground - And mixed an unguent of the clay, therewith - Smearing his sightless balls, and bidding him - Go wash them in the pool of Siloam; - He went and washed, and came a seeing man. - - "Such is his story, and so plausibly - He tells it that a wide belief he wins. - 'Hirani' is the name by which he goes; - Name self-assumed since his pretended cure, - A kind of label that he boldly thrusts - In people's faces to placard his lie. - 'He made me see'--he, to wit, Jesus, mind-- - As were no other 'he' in all the world! - Well, this Hirani to be weaver feigns, - Mere cover to that other trade he drives-- - A famous flourishing one with him, they say-- - Proselyte-making for the Nazarene. - Clap him in prison, Saul, let him repeat - His marvel to the unbelieving walls. - At present, many of the Way are fled - Hither and thither through the countryside, - But this man tarries to rehearse his tale. - So there your plan is, ready-wrought for you; - Now, Saul, go sleep upon it, and farewell." - - Man through malicious mind more miserable, - More miserable man from every cause - Of inward sorrow save malicious mind, - Never were met and parted than when there - Shimei found Saul and left him thus that morn. - Once more Saul visited his couch in vain; - Sleep could he not, could not but round and round - Tread the treadmill of painful barren thought, - On this fixed only, with resentful will, - _Not_ to do that which Shimei pressed him to. - So, having eaten, without appetite, - He flung forth in the street dispirited-- - Aimless, nor on the way through hope to aim, - Hopeless, nor on the way through aim to hope-- - Irresolute, deject, energiless, - Therefore the destined prey of whatso snare - Should sudden first waylay his nerveless foot-- - Forth in the street flung, at his door to meet - An ambushed messenger of Shimei's, - Who from his master gave him written word: - "The Sanhedrim to sit this afternoon - In council on the case you will present. - All feel the utmost flattering confidence - That Saul will promptly bring his prisoner in. - The bearer of this can guide you to your man." - - 'Himself false witness now become, the wretch!' - Thought Saul. 'This buyer of false witnesses - Has falsely told my brethren that I put - Myself in pledge to do a special task, - His bidding, and has got the council called - In expectation on their part from me - That I will bring them in this man to judge-- - Death doubtless meant, instead of prison, for _him_! - The wretch, the perjured wretch, and damnable! - Yet for me what escape? Alternative - None offers. Yea, denounce might I the man - Even to his teeth before them all a liar-- - But to what profit? He could truly say - I listened, not demurring, when he broached - This his new plan, as I had done before - Concerning the arrests at Bethany - By him projected, meekly made by me! - I should seem caviller, than he more false, - And trifler with the ancient majesty - Prescriptive of the Sanhedrim.' - Saul writhed - With all the frail remainder of his force, - Writhed--and submitted. With the guide he went, - And the man found whom he, under duress - Resented, sought. The invisible chains which then - That captive captor wore, far worse galled him - Than those whereof he plained at Bethany. - Master more cruel yet the devil can be - Than vehement conscience blinded by self-will. - Pride driving makes an intimate misery, - But a more intimate misery pride driven! - - At his loom seated--there his handicraft, - Late learned by him after sight given him late, - Busily plying--Saul's intended prey, - With his hands weaving, as the shuttle flew, - A fabric of coarse cloth, wove with his tongue, - That subtler shuttle in the loom of thought, - Discourse simple yet sage, for those to hear, - A goodly audience, who had gathered round - Him in his place of labor out-of-doors - Under an awning stretched that fenced the sun-- - Drawn thither by the fame of what he told, - A strange experience never man's before. - - "Thou art disciple of the Nazarene?" - Abruptly so, intruding, Saul inquired. - The accent of authority that spoke - In him, the masterful demeanor his, - All felt, and of the listeners some, afraid, - Withdrew in silence; but the sifted more - Who stayed clouded their aspect, and, with grim - Mutter in undertone exchanged between - Them, each with other, asked or answered who - This was that rudely thus and threateningly - Broke in upon them. Saul! the Sanhedrim! - Were dreaded names, but red runs Jewish blood, - And hot, and quick, and those affronted men - Scarce waited for their neighbor seen thus scorned - To answer yea to his stern challenger, - Ere they together moved in mass about - Saul unattended, naked of all arms - Save his authority, and, hustling him, - Seemed on the verge of using violent hands - To thrust him forth--nay, to Saul's ears there came - That pregnant word, ready on Jewish tongues, - Yet readier hardly than to Jewish hands - The deed, word full of instant menace, "Stones!" - - Saul knew his danger and his helplessness; - But, far from terror, though not void of fear, - Blanching not blenching, he a tonic breath - Drew, in an air that to another man - Had softened all his fibre or dissolved. - Vanished that mood of feebleness he brought, - And in its place a resolute, alert, - Defiant sense of self-sufficing strength - Supported him, nay, buoyed him almost gay, - As thus, with bitter words, he taunted them: - "Yea, now ye show what lessons ye have learned - Of unresisting meekness at the feet - Of this your teacher--_then_ not to resist - When ye are certain to be overpowered! - But twenty of you to one man are brave! - Nay, but one man may twenty of you scorn. - Back, there! Stand back! This man my prisoner is. - I, Saul, commissioned by the Sanhedrim, - Summon and seize him to appear this day - Before their just tribunal to be judged - As self-confessed disciple of the Way. - Follow me thou! Make way before me there!" - - The peremptory tone, the audacity, - The prompt aggressive movement, with the proud, - High, lordly speech disdainful, the assured - Serene assumption of authority - Enforced by personal will as strong as power-- - These for a moment's space surrounded Saul - With that inviolable immunity, - The nameless spell which perfect courage casts; - Nay, so far gave him full ascendant there - That he quite to his man his way had made - And on a shoulder laid the arresting hand. - But stay! not quelled, suspended only, seems - The indignant angry humor of the crowd. - Scarce has Saul uttered his last scornful words - And turned to front the men about him massed-- - Not doubting but, with only the drawn sword - Of his fixed forward countenance, he shall - This side and that before him cleave a way - Wide from amid them forth to pass--upon - Such hinging-point scarce poises Saul, when they, - With many-handed violence, seize him - And, irresistibly uplifting, bear - Helpless, headforemost, ignominiously, - Whither they will. - - In vain Hirani cries, - By turns rebuking and beseeching them; - In vain he follows, warning them beware - To involve themselves in risk fruitless for him; - In vain implores them even for Jesus' sake, - Whose name will be dishonored by their deed; - Presents himself in vain a prisoner - Willing to go with Saul unmanacled; - In vain avouches he, in any case, - Shall yield his person to the Sanhedrim, - Doubtless to suffer but the heavier doom - For what is doing, unless they refrain. - Hirani had adjured them by the name - Of Jesus, but those heady men, that name, - That mastership, owned not, Jews only still, - Still in the changed new spirit all unschooled. - So by their own mad motion ever mad - Growing, they hurtle Saul along the way-- - He the while musing, with mind strangely clear, - How like to Stephen's lot his own is now!-- - Till chance unlooked-for their wild turbulence stays. - - All had been teemed from Shimei's fruitful brain. - First, he had mixed the listening crowd around - The weaver at that moment with base men, - His creatures, who, for hirelings' pay, should stir - Their neighbors up to wreak indignity - Upon Saul's person, wounding to his pride, - And in the public view disparaging. - Then, at the point of need, to succor Saul, - Bringing his haughty colleague under debt - To himself, Shimei, for his very life-- - This was that crafty plotter's next concern. - A band accordingly of men-at-arms, - Sworn in the service of the Sanhedrim, - He had made ready; and these now appeared - Confronting that tumultuary crowd. - Saul rescued--not without some disarray - And soil of rent apparel, hair and beard - Dishevelled, and disfigured countenance, - His person thus disparaged to the eye, - Hirani, as ringleader of the rout, - Chained and brought forward, while go free, but blamed - For being misled, the others--Shimei then - To view emerges. He addresses Saul: - "Well met! That fellow, with his crew of like, - Treated you badly, Saul. You might have prayed - To be delivered into Stephen's hands - From tender mercies such as theirs! I trust - You have not suffered worse than what I see, - Some slight derangement of apparel shown, - Your hair and beard less sleek than might beseem, - With here and there a scratch scored on your face-- - Nothing more serious, let me trust? Our men - Were at the nick of time in coming up. - It was not pure coincidence. You see, - Both knowing your mettle and the vicious ways - These sanctimonious ruffians have at times, - I had misgivings that you might be rash, - And suffer disadvantage at their hands. - So, as in like case you would do by me, - I, with these faithful servitors of ours, - Run to your rescue here, and not too soon! - A little later would have been too late. - You were well started down the steep incline, - Which, very happily, as I learn, you styled - 'The way of Stephen and all heretics.' - Droll, very, with of course its serious side, - Queer irony, you know, of will Divine, - Supposing they had really stoned you, Saul! - Well, well, it turns out better than your fears. - You will not, true, and I lament it, make - Quite a triumphal entry with your man - Before the Sanhedrim, leading him in, - With air of captain fresh from glorious war, - Who brings proud trophy of his single spear - Redoubtable; but the main point is ours, - The man we want is safe in custody." - - Thus Shimei with his devilish sneering glee - Nettled the heart of Saul and cheered his own. - - Before the council Shimei stood forth, - Instead of Saul, to accuse the prisoner. - With plausible glib mendacity, he said: - "Not only is this fellow heretic - After the manner of those Galilæans, - But myself saw with mine own eyes just now - How he the idlers in the street stirred up - To most unseemly act of violence - Against our brother Saul, worthy of death, - As being aimed at death, unless that I - Had ready been at hand with force enough - To rescue one of our own number thus - To the most imminent brink of stoning brought. - Saul, if he would, might show himself to you - In lively witness of the things I say." - - Hereon to Saul he signed with hand and eye; - But Saul arose and calmly, with disdain, - Thus spoke: "The man here present prisoner - Is, out of his own mouth, disciple proved - Of Jesus Nazarene. As such I sought - To bring him hither before you to be judged. - This my attempt, most unexpectedly, - A crowd of idlers round about him drawn - Vacantly listening to discourse from him, - Resented; they, resisting, thrust me back-- - I had ventured single-handed and alone-- - And, borne to madness, might perhaps have wrought - Some harm to me--I know not; but one thing - I know, and that I freely testify, - This man, our prisoner, did nought of all, - Contrariwise, with all his eloquence - Endeavored to dissuade those violent, - Constantly saying and averring he, - In any case, should, of his own free will, - Give himself up to you--thereby to clear - The Name he sought to honor of reproach - For wild deeds done as in defence of him." - - A moment, having heard Saul testify, - The Sanhedrim sat silent in fixed thought. - Then Shimei, ever easily equal found - To his occasion, when need seemed to him - Of whatsoever fraud in word or act, - Said that of course from brother Saul was heard - Never aught other than he deemed was true; - But the fact was, as would by witnesses - Be amply proved, that all this culprit's show - Of zeal to stay those rioters back was show - Merely, dust in the eyes of Saul to cast, - Or rather sport to make of him, the prey - Secure supposed of his, the prisoner's, - Malicious machination through the hands - Of his confederates, or tools, who knew - Better their master's purposes, his real - Purposes, than his feigned dissuasive words - To heed, and let his victim go. Saul's state - Was at the moment such, so ill at ease - His mind--why, even his body in that vile - Duress was hardly to be called his own-- - Saul--and without offence would Shimei say it-- - Might be regarded as not competent - On this particular point to testify. - At all events, here were good witnesses - Who, from a safer, steadier point of view - Than Saul's, and longer occupied, could tell - Both what the prisoner's wont had been to teach, - And what he instigated in this case. - - With such preamble to prepare their minds, - Minds used to guess the drift of Shimei's wish, - This arch-artificer of fraud produced - As witnesses the men whom he had late - Mixed with Hirani's audience to foment - That lawlessness. Such serviceable tongues - Failed not to swear, in all, as Shimei wished. - - Saul, in his secret mind with anguish torn, - Gazed at the man forsworn against, maligned, - And almost envied him. A look of peace - Was on him like a light of fixéd stars, - So constant, and so inaccessible - Of change through jar, through stain, so clear, so fair! - He listened to the voices round him loud, - As if some softer voice from farther sent - Made ever an inner music to his mind - Charming him with a melody unheard. - He saw the things, the faces, and the forms, - About him nigh, as if he looked beyond - Or through them, and beheld far, far away - Or whom or what to others was unseen. - - So when the high-priest, from his middle seat - Among the councillors, accosted him, - Asking, "To all these things what sayest thou?" - The prisoner, like one absent-minded brought - To sudden sense of present things, replied: - "I hardly understand what 'these things' are, - For otherwhither I was drawn in thought. - But if it be inquired concerning Him - Whom lately they not knowing crucified, - Why, this I answer for my testimony: - 'Let there be light,' said God, and light there was. - Almost thus did that Man of Nazareth, - Creative, speak for me, and changed my world - Of native darkness to this cheerful scene - Above, beneath, about me, sudden spread, - And sun and moon and stars for me ordained. - I praise Him as the Lord of life and light, - And Giver of light and life to dead and blind. - All glory to His ever-blesséd Name!" - - The simple ecstasy from which he spoke, - Illuminated, and the holy power - Of truth, in witness such, meekly so borne, - Wrought even upon the jealous Sanhedrim - An influence which they could not resist, - And a pang shot to the inmost heart of Saul. - A faltering of compunction close on shame - Made the high-priest half-tenderly, with tone - As of a father toward a child in fault, - Say: "Nay, my son, deceived art thou; of will - Surely thou dost not utter blasphemy. - If so be demon power had leave from God - To give thee back one day what demon power - Had erst one day from God had leave to take - Away, thy sight--be glad indeed, but fear - To yield wrongly thy praise to demon power - Permitted; all to God permissive yield. - Glory belongs to God alone. My son, - Bethink thee now betimes and save thy soul. - 'Jesus of Nazareth anathema!' - Those words repeat for all to hear, and go - Acquitted hence of that thy blasphemy." - - So the high-priest to him, but he replied: - "Blinded again I should expect to be, - My eyeballs blasted to the roots of sight, - Nay, worse, my inner seeing quenched in dark, - Forever and forevermore past cure, - Were I to speak that Name except to praise. - Glory to God and glory to His Son, - Forever and forever in the heavens, - The heaven of heavens, seated at His right hand!" - - "A bold blasphemer!" so, discordant, shrieked - Suddenly Shimei, the spell to break - He feared those simple, solemn, holy words - Again might cast upon the Sanhedrim. - - The chance for heaven precarious is on earth - Ever, and now the heavenly chance was lost, - Such counter breath unable to withstand. - Those half-rapt souls reverted to themselves, - And brooked to listen--nay, assent gave they, - Even Saul too gave assent wrung out!--when, next, - "Stripes for his back!" sharply shrilled Shimei; - "Good forty stripes less one may save his soul! - He loves his blasphemy, give him his fill, - Whet him his appetite, make him blaspheme - His own Lord God, the man of Nazareth. - For that thrice damnéd name require from him, - At every lash, an imprecation loud, - On pain of instant death should one curse fail!" - - So there with cruel blows was scourged the man, - At every blow he crying out aloud - Joy that he might thus suffer for that Name, - And, baffled, they gnashing their teeth on him. - "His madness has infected all his flesh," - Screamed Mattathias; "cure there is but one. - Destroy his flesh with stones, let his flesh rot!" - - This also they, beside themselves with rage, - Rage rabid from the sight of bloodshed vain, - Resolved--resolving with them likewise Saul! - Without the gate they thrust their victim forth, - And there stoned him calling upon the name - Of Jesus to his last expiring breath. - - That night, the violated body, left - There where it fell by those his murderers - To be of ravening beast or bird the prey, - Was thence, with reverent rite, by unseen hands - Borne to a sepulchre, with spices wrapt - In linen pure and fine, and laid away - In secret, not unwept or unbewailed - Of such as loved him for the love he bore, - Quenchless by death, to the Belovéd Name. - - - - -BOOK XII. - -SAUL AND THE APOSTLES. - - -Again deeply distressed in heart, Saul at set of sun withdraws -to the top of Olivet for solitary thought. There falling asleep, -after pensive soliloquy, he dreams that Shimei has followed him -thither, and that he now pours a characteristic strain of sneer and -instigation into his ear. This rouses him, and he goes moodily home. -After a long, deep slumber there, he resolves on undertaking what he -dreamed that Shimei proposed, namely, the arrest of the apostles. -His men fail him at the pinch, and Saul bitterly upbraids them, -declaring strongly that their renegade behavior only determines him -the more sternly to root utterly out the pestilent Galilæan heresy, -at whatever cost of exertion and blood and tears. - -SAUL AND THE APOSTLES. - - So one day more of bitterness had spent - Saul, and the night, the solemn night, came on, - Grateful to him, for he would be alone. - Whether the thought of home, no home, repelled, - Or longing toward his sister unconfessed - There in that banishment at Bethany - Bright with her presence in it--whether this - Drew him, or wish of lonely room and height - Where more he might from human kind be far-- - However listing, Saul to Olivet - Turned him, and slowly to the summit climbed. - - The moon not risen yet, the hemisphere - Of heaven above him was with clustered stars - Glittering, and awful with the glory of God. - Upward into those lucid azure deeps, - Withdrawn, deep beyond deep, immeasurably, - Gazing, Saul said: "Deep calleth unto deep! - Those deeps above me unto deeps within - Me cry, as infinite to infinite. - The spaces of my spirit answer back; - I feel them, empty but capacious, vast - And void abysses of unfed desire, - Hunger eternal and eternal thirst! - Upward I gaze, and see the steadfast stars - Unshaken in their station calmly shine, - I listen to the silence of the skies - And yearn, with what desire! for peace like that, - Vainly, with what desire! for peace like that! - Beneath the pure calm of the holy heaven, - So nigh! here am I seething like the sea, - That cannot rest, casting up mire and dirt - Continually! O state forlorn! Where, where, - My God, for me is rest? For me, for me! - 'Great peace have they,' so sang that psalmist taught - By Thee, 'Great peace have they that love Thy law - And nothing shall offend them.' Answer me, - Lord God, do _I_ not love Thy law? Then why - This opposite of peace within my breast? - Am I deceived? Do _not_ I love Thy law? - Answer me Thou!" - But answer came there none, - Or Saul was deaf, and the great sky looked down, - With all its multitude of starry eyes, - Impassible, upon a human soul - Wretched, unrespited from long unrest. - - The weary man upon a spot of ground - Bare to the heaven had thrown himself supine; - Lying diffuse, his wistful face upturned, - And poring on the starry-scriptured scroll - Above him, he such thoughts breathed out in words. - He had deemed himself alone, aloof from men; - But seemed had scarce his murmurous monotone - Died on his lips, he skyward gazing still, - When he was conscious of approaching feet, - Feet all at once so nigh, they in the dark - Touched him ere he could rouse himself to stand. - - 'Why, brother Saul! I stumble on you here, - Much as this morn you stumbled over me!' - Such, to the sleeping man, a voice seemed borne. - - 'Those odious false-cheery tones once more! - Shimei has watched, and, hither following me, - Lurked overhearing my soliloquy; - Then, stealthily retiring a few steps, - Comes back, as with the brisk and frank advance - Of one somewhither walking at full speed, - And stumbles against me of purpose rude!' - - So Saul divined dissembling Shimei, - Who said, or to Saul, dreaming, seemed to say-- - Vision as life-like as reality: - "How naturally appear our paths to cross! - I thought that I would take a casual stroll - Alone, and you the same thought had, it seems, - At the same time, directed both, odd too, - The self-same way--another proof, you see, - What kindred spirits we are! - "You must have marked - How fine the night is! What a wealth of stars! - Do you not sometimes wish, Saul, you could be - As comfortably calm at heart as stars? - How wonderfully quiet all is there, - Up in the region of the firmament! - Probably stars have nothing else to do - Than to be calm like that, and smile at us - Fretting ourselves down here with worry and work. - Worry is worse than work to wear us out. - But worst of all is having huge desires - That nothing in the world can satisfy. - Some men moon sighing for they know not what, - Mainly great hollow hungry mouths and maws, - Like void sea-beds; abysses of desire, - You know, that not the world itself could fill. - Better close up your heart than stretch it wide - And never get enough to make it full. - Adjust yourself, say I, to circumstance, - Hard work adjusting circumstance to you! - There's nothing better than to go right on - Doing the obvious duty next to hand, - And let the stars pursue their peaceful way, - As hindered not, so envied not, by you. - The sky is calm, no doubt--the upper sky-- - But happens we do not live in the sky, - But on the earth, a very different place, - And man's work we, not star's work, have to do; - So let us be about it while we may. - - "For instance now, to bring the matter home - (I trust I shall not seem officious, Saul, - I really must make one suggestion more), - Your pristine prestige has been much impaired - Through slips and ill-successes on your part. - No mean advantage to a man, repute - For what the godless Romans call 'good luck,' - Piously we, 'the favor of the Lord'; - This is forsaking you, I grieve to find, - On all sides round, wherever I inquire. - Up, and recover it with one bold push, - Push that dares hazard all upon a cast. - You know twelve men there are in special sort - Dubbed the 'apostles' of the Nazarene, - Who play a part assigned as witnesses - To testify that Jesus rose again, - After his crucifixion, from the dead. - These fellows boldly in Jerusalem - Stay, while the rest run scattering far and wide. - Some kind of superstitious charm or awe - Surrounds them--that is, in their own conceit - And fond illusion of impunity. - Boldly arrest them, Saul, and spoil the spell." - - Thus far, as oft in dreams will chance, Saul lay - And helpless heard what irked him sore to hear; - But now, the loathing irrepressible - Excited by such hateful speech, roused him - To spurning that asunder broke the bonds, - The nightmare bonds, of sleep. He, full awake, - Groped with his hands about, dreading to feel - Shimei indeed couched nigh, as he had dreamed, - Breathing into his ear. No Shimei there! - He sprang upon his feet, and in the light - Of the waned moon, now risen, still large and fair, - Looked round and round--to find himself alone. - - "A dream, then," Saul said, "only a hideous dream! - Thank God! How horribly real it seemed! How like - Must I have grown to _him_, to have had his thoughts! - What demon's doom only to have such thoughts! - Perhaps a demon whispered these now to me! - I could even pity Shimei, to be haunt - And harbor of his ceaseless evil thoughts-- - Could pity, save that I detest too much. - I cannot be like him and loathe him so; - Or does he haply also loathe himself? - Then were I like, for sure I loathe myself! - What travesty it was of those my thoughts! - And not ignoble thoughts, though vain, they were. - The mad pranks that our dreaming brains will play!" - - So musing, there Saul, on the mountain's brow, - Statue-like stood some moments in suspense; - Then slow descending to his house repaired. - A deep, deep draught of pure oblivion - In sleep drowned him until the morrow noon. - - Prayer then, and then fast broken, and calmly Saul - The ill dream of his yesternight revolved. - What better project for fresh act than that - Which, gladly now he pondered, Shimei - Did not propose, but only Shimei's - False lively mimic counterfeit in sleep? - Yea, he would next, with prompt but circumspect - Audacity, the audacious head and front - Smite of this growing mischief, in those men - Styled the apostles of the Nazarene. - - Saul knew within his heart that secretly - He dreaded this adventure; therefore he, - With will sardonically set, moved on - To undertake it. Twenty men of tried - True mettle, men with muscle iron-firm, - And mind seasoned, through many hazards run, - And long wont of impunity, to scorn - All danger--such a score of men chose Saul, - And, from them veiling yet his purpose, took, - With indirection intricate, his way - Toward where, as he, by diligent quest, had learned, - The twelve apostles used each day to meet - In secret from their prowling enemies; - But to the common people, loving them - For manifold miracles of beneficence, - Their secret meeting-place was not unknown. - - As, gradually, Saul with his retinue - Drew near the spot, so large a following - Of arméd men, led by a chief whose fame - Was rife now through Jerusalem for deeds - And purposes of uttermost revenge - Against the Galilæan heresy, - Gathered about their course a growing crowd, - Who, urged by various thought and feeling, watched - What might that minatory march intend. - Reached thus at length the place, Saul stays his steps, - And, turning to his men in halt to hear, - Speaks, with that dense clear voice which tense will breeds: - "Here hide the twelve arch-heretics of all. - Ye come to take them hence bond prisoners, - For lodgment in a hold whence no escape, - That they may cease sedition to foment. - Duly the fathers of the Sanhedrim, - Wise warders of our Hebrew commonwealth, - Will thence adjudge them to their doom of death. - No waste of words in parley now, leave asked, - Terms offered, naught of that, no paltering pause, - Instantly, stroke on stroke, down with the door!" - - But pause they did, those picked, use-hardened men; - They stood as struck with palsy or with fear. - "Traitors be ye, or cravens, which?" cried Saul-- - Amazement, indignation, ire, disdain, - Effacing exhortation in his tone. - Then, mastering himself, less fiercely he - Chode them: "Whence and whereto is this? Mean ye, - Ye surely mean not, mutiny? Rouse, then, - With will; obey, your loyalty retrieve!" - - But still they hung there moveless, until one, - Seeming the spokesman of his fellows, said: - "No mutineers, no traitors, cravens none, - Are we. But look around, and judge what means - This concourse of beholders"--"'Look around'? - _Around_ look?" thundered Saul. "Nay, straight-on looks, - These sole, become stout hearts, staunch wills. 'Around' - Cease looking ye, and all right forward stare - To where yon door fronts you and you affronts. - Batter it down, and, staring forward, on!" - - The vehement, vindictive, dense onslaught - Of that impatient, proud, imperious will - Smote like the missile of a catapult - Against the clamped immovable dead wall - Of fixed inert resistance to Saul's wish, - Which strangely, as one man, those men opposed. - That impact did not shake that stubborn strength, - Nor shiver back in staggering recoil-- - Absorbed, annulled, annihilated, waste! - - One infinitesimal instant, Saul a blind - Mad impulse felt--which, that same instant, he - Quenched in a simultaneous saner thought-- - To rush single upon the door, with blank - Ridiculous demonstration of balked will - Indignant. "Me, then, seize, your chief contemned," - Said Saul, "contemned, since not obeyed, and me - Deliver captive to the Sanhedrim, - Denounced unworthy of your trust, and theirs!" - - As, saying this, around he glanced, he saw, - With unintending eyes, a spectacle - Which well had awed him, but that he was Saul. - The frequence of spectators serried nigh - Had armed themselves with stones, and imminent stood, - A thunder-cloud of menace on each brow, - Ready those bolts of vengeance to let fly, - In hail-storm that no mortal might withstand, - At whoso dared defy their angry mood; - Portent so dire Saul could not but peruse. - - "It was but question which should overawe, - Ye, or this rabble of sedition here, - And ye have solved it like the cowards ye are!" - So, with his passion humored to its height, - And javelin looks shot at his men in shower, - Cried Saul; "I had deemed otherwise of you. - And yet, even yet, once wake the dormant man - Within you, and, from hands through fear relaxed, - Harmless will drop those miscreant stones which now, - With your poltroonery, ye invoke to fall - In well-deservéd doom upon your heads!" - - Upbraided thus, they, by that spokesman, said: - "Stoning may lightly be despised by men - Like us, whose trade it is at need to die; - And bloody death were meet for men of blood. - But we are of the people, as are these - Whom here thou seest around us, stone in hand; - And we, the people, love for cause those men, - Our benefactors, whom thou seekest to slay-- - Wherefore, we know not, save perhaps it be - Some ill persuasion thine that slanders them - As enemies of our race, seditious men, - Conspiring to do evil and not good. - But, if we should as lief, as we should loth, - Offer them violence, and if we could, - As we could not, hope then to escape the stones - Here seen uneasy in so many hands - At only brandished threat of harm to them, - Know, there is more than mail enduing these - Inviolate against what human touch - Might mean them wrong. Something intangible, - Invisible, inaudible, unknown, - A might as irresistible as strange, - Not only arms them proof against assault, - But issues from them in dread strokes of doom, - Silent like lightning, and like lightning swift, - And instantaneous deadly more than that. - What prison-walls can prisoners hold these men? - Hast thou not heard how Ananias fell, - Sapphira too, his wife, dead at their feet, - Fell at their feet stone-dead, when they but charged - A lie unto the Spirit of the Lord - On those twain twinned in judgment as in crime? - A dreadful visitation, as from God; - But, whencesoever issuing, dreadful yet! - No panoply have we against such stroke, - Against the authors of such stroke, no power. - Slay us, or get us slain, we can but die; - But die like Ananias will we not!" - - Saul listened with illimitable scorn; - And scorn incensed his rage thus crossed to be, - Hopelessly crossed, by crass perversity. - In rage and scorn, he scourged those men with words: - "There is no reasoning with minds like you!-- - Too ignorant to guess how ignorant - Ye are, and self-conceited in degree - To match. Such ignorance, with self-conceit - Such, renders blind indeed. What boots it I - Should tell you superstition clouds your brain? - Your superstition would not let you hear. - Your very senses, given by God to be - The avenues of knowledge to your mind, - Satan has clogged to truth, and made of them - But open thoroughfares for lies from him - To enter by and capture you his own. - Mere Satan's lies those tales are that ye tell, - Of prison-doors thrown wide mysteriously - To let these men go free, and of deaths dealt - By magic sentence weaponless from them-- - Mere Satan's lies those tales, or, were they true, - Yet tokens only of Satanic power - And craft permitted to disport them here - For their destruction who to be destroyed - Prove themselves greedy by such act as yours. - Dupes of the devil, go, I pity you! - This is your weakness, not your villainy. - I thought to make you helpers in my strife - To save the souls of others, but your souls - Themselves need saving first and most of all-- - If souls like yours of saving worthy be, - Or capable! Some different make of men - From you, seems I must seek, to serve my need. - Yet you I thank at least for this, that ye - By your behavior show me what a sore, - How seated, and how wide, into the heart - Eats of my nation! Lo, I take the cup, - The full, the overflowing cup of shame - Which ye this day wring out for me, that cup - Take I with thanks from you, and to the dregs - Drain it, in pledge, in pledge and sacrament, - That I hereafter give myself more whole, - More absolute, more consecrate, to one, - One only, pure endeavor and desire, - The utter rooting out--at cost how dear, - No reckoning, mine or other's, toil, and tears, - And blood--wherever Jewish name be found, - Of this foul creeping rot and leprosy, - This blight, this blast, this mildew, on our fame!" - - Saul, in the light of luminous wrath, foresaw - Nigh, and saluted, that career, which thence, - After Judæan cities overrun - With havoc at his hand to Jesus' name, - Will bear him ravening on Damascus road! - - - - -BOOK XIII. - -SAUL AND SERGIUS. - - -After further persecution accomplished by him in Judæa, Saul, with -spirits recovered, sets out for Damascus to carry thither the -persecuting sword. Pausing on the brow of hill Scopus to survey -Jerusalem just left, he soliloquizes. At the same moment, there rides -up a troop of Roman horse escorting a man who turns out to be Sergius -Paulus, an old-time acquaintance of Saul's, also bound to Damascus. -The two pursue their journey together, highly enjoying their ride in -that charming season of spring weather, and delightedly conversing -on the way. They talk over Greek literature, and in particular by -starlight at the close of the first day's journey, Sergius Paulus -having by occasion recited an apposite passage of Homer, Saul -matches and contrasts this first with a psalm of David, and then -additionally with a strain from the prophet Isaiah. This gives rise -to conversation on ensuing days, in which religious questions are -discussed. Sergius declares himself an atheist of the Epicurean sort, -and he plies Saul with incredulous inquiries about the religion of -the Jews--Saul answering with Hebrew conviction and earnestness. The -two part company at Neapolis (Shechem) because Sergius Paulus halts -there, and Saul, in the spirit of true Jewish strictness, will for -his part not rest till he has quite passed the bounds of Samaria. - -SAUL AND SERGIUS. - - Not yet his fill of slaughter supped, though forth - Afar the timorous flock of Jesus now - Were from before his restless, ravening, fierce, - Rapacious sword out of Judæa fled - To alien lands remote, beyond the heights - Of Hermon with their everlasting snows, - And farther to the islands of the sea-- - Not yet, even so, his fill of slaughter supped, - Saul had from the high-priest commission sought - To search among the Hebrew synagogues - Of Syrian Damascus, and thence bring - Bound to Jerusalem whomever found, - Woman or man, confessing Jesus Christ. - - The season was fresh flowering spring; the earth - Was glad with universal green to greet - The sun once more, returned in his blue heaven - After his winter's sojourn in the south. - How blithe the welcome of the morning was, - Forth looking from his east across the Hills - Of Moab on the just awakening world! - Saul met it with a sense as if of spring - And morning linking hand in hand for dance - Together in the courses of his blood, - As, mounted on a palfrey fresh and fleet, - With servitors attendant following him, - He issued jocund from Damascus gate. - The animal spirits of youth and health in him, - The joy of new adventure, the fine pulse - Of life felt in the buoyant, bounding step - With which his steed advanced him on the road, - The secret pleasure of release at last, - Release and long secure removal, won, - Through growing leagues of distance interposed, - From the abhorred access of Shimei-- - These, with the season and the hour so bright, - Brightened the darkling heart of Saul to cheer. - He was a radiant aspect, fair to see, - Fronting his future with that sanguine smile! - - The acclivity surmounted of a hill, - Whence downward dipped his road, declining north, - And farewell glimpse gave of Jerusalem, - Saul rein drew on his foamy-flankéd steed, - And, about winding him, paused, looking back. - His retinue, far otherwise than he - Mounted, part even on foot, with sumpter beasts - Bearing camp equipage, behind were fallen. - These, presently come up, he lets pass on - Before him in the way, while still at gaze, - There on the back of his indignant steed - Resentful to be curbed in mid-career-- - Companion hoofs heard leaving him behind-- - Saul sits, perusing, with an inner eye, - Yet more than with his outer, what he sees. - Half-shadow and half-light, Jerusalem - He sees, smitten athwart her level roofs - With sunshine from the horizontal sun, - The temple of Jehovah in the midst, - As if itself a sun, so dazzling bright - With its refulgence of reflected beams; - While, round about, the warder mountains stand, - Bathing their sacred brows in sacred light. - Saul's heart distends immense with patriot's joy, - Yet joy pierced through and through with patriot's pain. - - "O beautiful for situation, thou, - Jerusalem!" he fervently bursts forth. - "Peace be within thy walls, prosperity - Within thy palaces! Yea, yet again, - Now for my brethren and companions' sakes, - Say I, 'Within thee, peace!' Lo, my vow hear: - For that the temple of the Lord my God - Is in thee, I henceforth thy good will seek. - And Thou, Jehovah in the heavens! behold, - Saul for himself that ancient promise claims: - 'Prosper shall he Jerusalem who loves.' - For love not I Jerusalem, with love - To anguish, for her anguish and her tears? - Take pleasure in her stones, favor her dust, - O God, my God! Is not the set time come? - Do I not hear Thee say: 'Awake, awake, - Put on thy strength, O Zion, long forlorn, - And beautiful thy garments put thou on, - Jerusalem! Henceforth no more shall come - The uncircumcised into thee, nor the unclean!'" - - "Amen!" Saul added, with a gush of tears, - The light mercurial feeling in his heart - Less to sad sinking, weighted down, than all, - With fluent lapse, to pleasing pathos changed. - Into that strain, so ardent and so true, - Of patriot prayer, deeply had braided been, - Half to himself unknown, a silent strand - Of subtle self-regard, vague personal hope - That would have spurned to be imprisoned in words: - 'The new Jerusalem that was to be, - Should she not Saul her chief deliverer hail!' - - Musing, and praying, and beholding, so, - Saul suddenly a sound of clanging hoofs - Heard, and, his eyes quick thither turning, saw, - Between hill Scopus, on whose top he stood, - And the Damascus gate through which he came, - Advancing toward him on the Roman road-- - Cemented solid with its rutted stones, - Like an original stratum of the sphere-- - A turm of horse, large not, but formidable, - Caparison and armor gleaming bright, - And with a nameless air forerunning them - Of wide-renownéd might invincible - Expressed in that momentous rhythmic tread - Four-footed, underneath which from afar - With pulse on pulse now rock to iron rang. - The cavalcade, by slow degrees more slow, - Moved up the acclivity till, reached the brow, - Sank to a walk their pace, when Saul perceived - An arméd escort was convoying one - Thereby betokened an ambassador, - Somewhither posting on affair of state, - Or haply citizen of high degree - Honored with ceremonious retinue. - - This man regarded Saul with curious look - Respectful, which almost admiring grew; - And gravely, as their mutual glances met, - The youthful Roman to the youthful Jew - Inclined in distant salutation meant - For natural courtesy due from peer to peer. - Saul, in like wise, his greeting gave him back; - Whereon the Roman, reining to one side - His horse, and halting, said: "Peace, but methinks - I saw thee late, months since it may have been, - Where that fanatic Stephen suffered death - With stoning at your angry elders' hands." - "I, in that act of punishment," said Saul, - "As loyal Jew befitted, took my part." - "Nay, but as now I read thy features nigh," - Sudden more earnest grown, the Roman said, - "Labors my brain with yet a different thought. - Somewhere we twain must earlier still have met. - In Tarsus I some boyish seasons spent; - I there, by chance full well-remembered, knew - A Hebrew-Roman boy whose name was Saul." - "Then Sergius Paulus is thy name," said Saul, - "And Saul am I--and Saul to Sergius, peace!" - Who but as man and man just now had met - Greeted again in sense of comradeship. - - "Thy face is toward Jerusalem," to Saul - Said Sergius; "but thy look is less of one - Arriving, journey finished, than of one - Forth setting on adventure planned abroad." - "I journey to Damascus," Saul replied: - "And thither also I," said Sergius. - Damascus-ward turned Saul his horse's head, - And slowly, with the Roman, now resumed - His onward way, while further Sergius said: - "Having a brief apprenticeship at arms - Accomplished, to Jerusalem I came, - Centurion still, urged by desire to see - Thy capital city, famed throughout the world. - Since witnessing--by lucky hap it fell - My military duty to be there-- - Since witnessing that spectacle so strange - Of Stephen's stoning--strange to Roman eyes, - Yet to eyes Jewish doubtless quite as strange - Our Roman fashion, hanging on the cross-- - All various ways of various tribes of men - From clime to clime, delights me to observe-- - What comedy to the gods must we present!-- - Since I saw Stephen slain with stones, I say, - Good fortune, and some interest made for me - At Rome, have given me this my welcome chance - To travel and more widely see the world. - Now to Damascus I as legate go." - "And of our Sanhedrim as legate, I," - Said Saul, "if so without offence I may - From Jewish mode to Gentile dare my speech - Conform--legate, or hand executive, - Say rather, in some certain offices - Deemed needful, to consult my nation's weal." - - With mutual question asked and answered, vein - Of old-time boyish reminiscence shared - Between them as together on they rode-- - Their horses pricking each the other's speed-- - The two soon overtook their retinues, - Who, seeing their chiefs adjoined in comradeship, - Themselves in comradeship dissolved their sense - Of race and race to mix as men and men. - - So all day long together, side by side, - Riding, or resting in the noontide shade, - Sergius and Saul, a frank companionship, - Immixed their minds in speech of many things. - Young life, young health, glad sense of fair emprise, - High-hearted hope of boundless futures theirs, - Delicious weather and blithe season bland, - Blue cloudless heaven forever overhead-- - By the sole sun usurped his tabernacle - Whence sovran virtue beaming into all-- - Sweet voice of singing-bird, sweet smile of flower, - Sweet breath exhaled from tender-fruited vine, - Joy, a full feast, through every flooded sense-- - And, heightening all, that billowy onward sway - Of motion without effort on their steeds, - Made, to those lord possessors of the world, - Their talking like the coursing of their blood, - Self-moved, or like the running of a brook - That laughs and sparkles on its downward way, - As ceasing never from its hope to drain - The fountain, brimming ever, whence it flows. - - Of arms, of art, and of philosophy, - They spoke, and letters; spoke, too, of the fame - Of ancient Grecian masters of the mind, - Who ruled, and rule, by charm of prose or verse. - First, Homer, hoar with immemorial eld, - Pouring his epics in that profluent stream - Which, like his ocean, wandered round the world; - Bold Pindar, with his lyric ecstasies, - On throbbing wings of exultation borne - Into the empyrean, whence his song - Broken descends in showers of melody; - Father of history, Herodotus, - "Half poet, epic, or idyllic, he"-- - So, Saul thereto assenting, Sergius said-- - "With his Ionic strain mellifluous - Of wonder-loving artless narrative"; - Thucydides, the soul of energy; - Æschylus, Titan; happy Sophocles; - With soft Euripides unfortunate; - Then Socrates, "Who wrote no books," said Saul, - "Or wrote most living books in living men; - Plato, the chiefest book of Socrates, - Yet mind so large and so original - That, in him reading what his teacher taught, - One knows not whether Socrates it be, - Or Socrates's pupil, that one reads"-- - "Knows not, and, for delight, cares not to know, - Full-sated with the feast of such discourse, - So wealthy, wise, urbane, harmonious!"-- - Stung to enthusiasm, thus Sergius, - Continuing what from Saul ceased incomplete. - "Our Tully," added he, "from Plato's well - Deepest his draughts drank of philosophy, - And, thence inspired, wrote such sweet dialogue, - Latin half seemed delectable as Greek." - "Yea, and a man of fine civility - In manners as in mind, your Tully was," - Said Saul; "Cilicia keeps his memory green - For virtues long in Roman rulers rare. - His too a sounding, stately eloquence, - And copious; but Greek Demosthenes - Pleases me better, with that stormy stress - Of passion in him, reason on fire with love - Or hatred, that indignant vehemence - Which overwhelms us like a torrent flood, - Or, like a torrent flood, upon its breast - Lifts us, and tosses us, and bears us on! - He is more like our Hebrew prophets rapt - Above themselves in sympathy with God." - - In talk like this the livelong day was spent; - Hardly the talkers heeding when they passed - Meadows of flowers pied rich in colors gay, - Poppy, anemone, convolvulus, - Bright marigold wide yellowing belts of green - Into a vivid gold that dazed the eye; - And heeding hardly if upsprang the lark - From almost underneath their horses' hoofs, - Startled to leave her humble hiding nest, - And, soaring, better hide her otherwise - Amid the blinding lightnings of the sun; - Such sights and sounds and glancing motions swift - Scarce heeded--yet, as subtle influence, - Admitted, each, to infuse insensibly - Into their mood an added joyousness-- - The afternoon declined into the eve. - Passed now a fountain on the wayside cliff, - Coyly, through ferny leafage, shedding down - Its weeping waters shown in fresher green, - Up a long glen they mounted to a crest - Of hill where opened a soft grassy plain-- - Inviting, should one wish his tent to spread-- - And here they twain their double camp bid pitch. - - Supper soon ended, Saul and Sergius, - Ere sleep they seek, a hill, not far, ascend, - The highest neighboring seen, less thence to view - The landscape round them in the deepening dark - Glooming, or even the heavens above their heads - Brightening each moment in the deepening dark, - Than youth's unused excess of strength to ease - With exercise, and to achieve the highest. - But there the splendors of the firmament, - Enlarged so lustrous through that Syrian sky, - Hailed such a storm of vertical starlight - Downward upon their sense as through their sense - Inward into their soul beat, and a while - Mute held them, hushed with wonder and with awe, - Awe to the Hebrew, to the Roman, joy. - Then said the Roman: - "This is like that place - Of glorious Homer where he hangs the sky - Innumerably bright with moon and stars - Over the Trojan host and their camp-fires: - - 'Holding high thoughts, they on the bridge of war - 'Sat all night long, and many blazed their fires. - 'As when in heaven stars round the glittering moon - 'Shine forth exceeding beautiful, and when - 'Breathlessly tranquil is the upper air, - 'And in their places all the stars are seen, - 'And glad at heart the watching shepherd is; - 'So many, 'twixt the ships and Xanthus' streams, - 'Shone fires by Trojans kindled fronting Troy.'" - - "The spirit of Greece, with Greek simplicity, - A nobleness all of Homer, there I feel," - Concession checking with reserve, said Saul; - "Our Hebrew, to us Hebrews, rises higher. - Homer, unconscious of sublimity, - Down all its dreadful height above our sphere - Brings the august encampment of the skies-- - To count the number of the Trojan fires! - Our poet David otherwise beholds - The brilliance of the nightly firmament, - Seeing it mirror of the majesty - Of Him who spread it arching over earth, - And who yet stoops His awful thought to think - Kindly of us as Father to our race, - Nay, kingdom gives us, glory, honor, power, - And all things subjugates beneath our feet. - Let me some echoes from that harp awake - To which, with solemn touches, this his theme - Our psalmist David chanted long ago: - 'Jehovah, our dread Sovereign, how Thy Name - 'Is excellent in glory through the earth! - 'Upon the heavens Thy glory hast Thou set; - 'The heart of babe and suckling reads it there, - 'And, raised to rapture, utters forth Thy praise, - 'That mute may be the adversary mouth - 'Which would the ever-living God gainsay. - 'When I survey Thy heavens, Thy handiwork, - 'The moon, the stars, Thou didst of old ordain, - 'Man, what is he? that Thou for him shouldst care, - 'The son of man, that Thou shouldst visit him. - 'For Thou hast made him hardly lower than God, - 'And dost with glory him and honor crown. - 'Dominion over all Thy works to wield - 'Thou madest him, and underneath his feet - 'Put'st all things, sheep and oxen, roaming beast, - 'And winging fowl, and swimming fish, and all - 'That passes through the pathways of the seas. - 'Jehovah, our dread Sovereign, how Thy Name - 'Is excellent in glory through the earth!'" - - Recited in slow solemn monotone, - As with an inward voice muffled by awe, - Those new and strange barbaric-sounding notes - Of Hebrew music shut in measured words - Smote on some deeper chord in Sergius' ear - That, trembling, tranced him silent for a while. - Then he said, rousing: "What a sombre strain! - From the light-hearted Greek how different!" - - "Sombre thou callest it, and solemn I, - Who find in such solemnity a joy; - But different, yea, from the light-thoughted Greek." - Less as in converse than soliloquy - Deep-musing so to Sergius Saul replied. - "Our bard Isaiah modulates the strain - Into another mood less pastoral. - He pours divine contempt on idol gods, - On idol gods and on their worshippers; - And then majestically hymns His praise - Who made yon host of heaven and leads them out. - 'To whom then will ye liken God?' he cries, - 'Or what similitude to Him compare? - 'The skilled artificer an image forms, - 'And this the goldsmith overlays with gold, - 'And tricks it smartly out with silver chains: - 'Or haply one too poor for cost like this - 'Chooseth him out a tree judged sound and good, - 'And seeks a cunning workman who shall thence - 'Grave him an image that may shift to stand! - 'But nay, ye foolish, have ye then not known? - 'Not heard have ye? You hath it not been told - 'From the remote beginning of the world? - 'From the foundations of the ancient earth - 'Have ye indeed so missed to understand? - 'He sits upon the circle of the earth - 'And they that dwell therein are grasshoppers; - 'He as a curtain doth the heavens outspread, - 'And makes a blue pavilion of the sky. - 'To whom then will ye liken Me? saith God; - 'Whom shall I equal? saith the Holy One. - 'Lift up your eyes on high, the heavens behold-- - 'Who hath these things created? who their host - 'By number bringeth out, and all by names - 'Calls? By the greatness of His might, for that - 'So strong in power is He, not one star fails.'" - - The deep tones ceased, and once more silence fell - Between those two amid the silent night. - But Sergius, lightly rallying soon to speech, - Said, with a ready, easy sympathy: - "There seems indeed to breathe in such a strain - Some solemn joy, but the solemnity - Is greater, and my spirit is oppressed. - Not less your poets differ from the Greek - In matter than in manner, when they sing. - How high you make your deity to be, - Beyond the stature of the gods of Greece! - Homer has Zeus compel the clouds, forth flash - The lightnings, and the thunderbolts down hurl; - The mightiest meddler with the world, his Zeus, - Yet of the world the mighty maker not. - But your Jehovah reaches even to that, - As with his fingers fashioning yonder heaven, - And fixing in their station moon and stars. - And he in human things concerns himself! - The Epicurean gods are cold and calm; - On high Olympus far withdrawn they sit, - And smile, and either not at all regard - Our case, or, if so be regarding, smile - Still, unconcerned, our case however hard. - Your Hebrew God is much more amiable, - But much more probable that Olympian crew; - Nay, probable not at all is either; dream, - Fond dream, the fable of divinities - Who either care, or care not, for our case. - We are the creatures and the sport of chance, - Puppets tossed hither and thither in idle play, - A while, a little while, fooled to suppose - We do the dancing we are jerked to do-- - And then, resolved from our compacture brief - Into the atoms which once on a time - Together chanced and so were we, we drop - Plumb down again into the great inane - Abyss, and recommence the eternal whirl! - There is that Epicurean cosmogony, - An endless cycle of evolution turned - Upon itself, in worlds forevermore - Becoming, out of worlds forevermore - Merging in their original elements: - No god, or gods, to tangle worse the skein - Inextricably tangled by blind chance!" - - Saul was affronted, but he held his peace, - Brooding the while his jealousy for God. - At length, with intense calm, he spoke and said: - "The Hebrew spirit is severe and says, - 'The fool it is who in his secret heart, - Rebelling, wills no God.' 'The Hebrew spirit,' - Said I? Forget those unadviséd words; - For to speak so is not the Hebrew spirit. - God is a jealous God; His glory He - Will to another not divide; and God - Himself it is, the Living God, and not - What, Gentile fashion, my rash lips miscalled - 'The Hebrew spirit,' that charges atheism - With folly. God His prophet psalmist bade - Write with a diamond pen on adamant - That stern damnation of the atheous soul: - 'The fool hath in his heart said, God is not.' - This tell I thee my conscience so to cleanse - Of sin in saying 'The Hebrew spirit' for God." - - With tolerant wonder, Sergius heard and said: - "A strangely serious race you Hebrews are; - I do not think I understand you yet. - I shall be glad to-morrow, if so please - Thee likewise, to renew this night's discourse." - So they descended from the hill and slept. - - The herald Dawn, white-fingered, from the east - Had signalled to the stars, 'He comes! He comes!' - And these, veiling themselves from view with light, - Had all into the unapparent deep - Retired, and left the hemisphere of heaven, - Late glowing with their fixed or wandering fires, - One crystal hollow of pure space made void - To be a fit pavilion for the sun, - When forth from their encampment rode the twain, - Fresh as the morning from the baths of sleep, - And keen with hunger for the forward road. - "The allotment of my tribe," said Saul--"my tribe - Is Benjamin--in measure such, bare rock - And rugged hill, hardly through age-long toil - Of tilth so clothed as we have seen them clothed, - In terrace above terrace of won soil, - With verdure--that, we leave behind, to cross - This day the fatter fields of Ephraim." - Then Saul to Sergius rehearsed in short - The tale of Hebrew history, how God, - Having his fathers out of Egypt brought, - With sign and wonder thence delivering them - And hither led them through the parted sea, - And past the smoking top of Sinai-- - Touched by the finger of God to burn with fire - And thunder and lighten more than man could bear - To see or hear, in sanction of His law-- - Had lastly parcelled out this land to them - In portions by their tribes to be their rest. - - While Saul to Sergius so discoursing spoke, - Over their right the sun, long since uprisen, - Climbed the steep slope of morning in the sky. - And now the summit of a ridge those twain - Reach, whence, straightforward looking, they behold, - In light so bright, through air so fair, a scene - Of the most choice the eye can rest upon. - A wide and long champaign of fruitful green, - On either side hemmed in with skirting hill, - Stretches before them to the bounding sky, - Where Hermon, scarce descried through distance dim, - Silvers with frost each morn his crown of snows. - Descended, they therein, through billowing wheat - Wind-swayed, might, to a watcher from the hill, - Seem laboring like two swimmers in the surf, - And hardly, in the fluctuation, way - Making whither they went; yet swiftly borne - Were they, and easily, onward. Soon Saul said-- - And therewith pointed to two mountain peaks, - Seen towering on the left to lordly height, - Twin warders of a lesser vale between, - In stature twin and twin in symmetry-- - "Ebal and Gerizim yon mountains are, - And these between the vale of Shechem lies, - Theatre once of oath and sacrament - Enacted by my nation with dread rite. - 'A strangely serious race', thou yesterday - Calledst us Hebrews, strangely frivolous race - Surely were we, if somewhat serious not, - For we are heirs of serious history. - Yon natural amphitheatre thou seest, - Circled and sloped against those mountain sides - With spacious interval of plain enclosed; - There was the oath of our obedience sworn. - On Ebal half our tribes, and half our tribes - On Gerizim, stood opposite, and midst, - The tribe of Levi, God's peculiar tribe, - Stood in the vale about the ark of God, - Whence Joshua, our great captain, read the law-- - He and the Levites, ocean-like the sound-- - With blessing or with curse by God adjoined - As disobedient or obedient we. - This was when scarce our fathers had set foot - Hitherside Jordan in the promised land; - They from their stronghold camp came here express - To swear such solemn covenant with God. - Six hundred thousand souls of fighting-men, - With women and with children fourfold more, - Ranged on the one side or the other, joined - To them that mustered in the middle vale, - All heard the threatening or the gracious words, - And all, in multitudinous answer, said - 'Amen!'--the tribes on Ebal to the curse, - And to the blessing, those on Gerizim, - Replying--choral imprecation dire - Upon themselves of every human ill, - If disobedient found, of promised good - Acceptance at the price, acknowledged just, - Of whole obedience to God's holy law. - It was as if Jehovah had adjured - All things, above, below, His witnesses, - 'Hear, O ye heavens, and thou, O earth, give ear, - While thus My people covenant swear with Me.' - The host of Israel, though such numbers, heard-- - These mountain-sides redouble so the voice." - - "Theatric sacramental rite most weird," - Said Sergius, "thou hast described to me. - Sure never elsewhere did lawgiver yet, - With ceremony such, a people swear - To obedience of his laws. The laws, I trow, - Subscribed and sealed with signature so strange, - Strange must have been. Example couldst thou give?" - - "Of all those laws," said Saul, "doubtless the law - To Gentile ears the strangest, is the first; - That law it is which makes the Jew a Jew: - 'Other than Me no god shalt thou confess; - 'Image, resemblance, none, molten or carved, - 'Of whatsoever thing in heaven, or earth, - 'Or hidden region underneath the earth, - 'Fashion to thee shalt thou, or bow thee down - 'In service or in worship unto them; - 'For I the Lord thy God a jealous God - 'Am, and I visit the iniquity - 'Of fathers upon children, chastisement, - 'In long entail, on generation linked - 'To generation, following hard the line - 'Of such as hate Me, endless mercy shown - 'To such as love Me and observe My law. - 'Curséd be he who dares to disobey'; - And Ebal, with its countless multitude, - Thundered to Gerizim a loud 'Amen!' - While heaven above and the wide world around - Hearkened in witness of the dreadful oath." - - Saul ceased as mute with awe of memory; - And something of a sympathetic sense, - Communicated, also Sergius made - Silent in presence of such history. - Not long, for, rousing from his reverie, - And looking up before him nigh, he sees - A city with its walls and roofs and towers. - "Neapolis!" exclaims the Roman voice, - The Jewish, in tone different, "Sychar!" said. - "Neapolis! And here I halt," said Sergius; - "Sychar! And forward through Samaria, I, - Not pausing till this hateful soil be passed," - Said Saul; "perchance to-morrow met again, - Beyond, we may together forward fare." - - So there they parted with such slight farewell; - Nor after met, until, two morrows more - Now spent in separate travel, they had reached - The bursting fountain of the Jordan, where, - Forth from between the feet of Hermon born - Forever--in the joy and anguish born, - The certain anguish and the doubtful joy - Tumultuous of an everlasting birth-- - Leaps to the light of life that famous stream, - Like many another child--from Adam sprung-- - To run his heedless, headlong, downward course - And lose himself at last in the Dead Sea! - Here was what life, all-welcoming, lusty life, - Doom of what deadly worse than death was there! - - A city here the tetrarch Philip built, - Or raised to more magnificent, which then, - In honor of dishonorable name - Imperial, Tiberius Cæsar, he - Called Cæsarea, and Philippi too - Eponymous therewith for surname joined; - But Paneas, earlier name, clung to the place, - As to this day it clings in Banias. - - - - -BOOK XIV. - -FOR DAMASCUS. - - -Coming together again at Cæsarea Philippi (Paneas, Banias) after an -interval of days, Saul and Sergius cross the southern spur of Hermon. -A violent thunderstorm comes slowly up during the afternoon, which -gives Sergius occasion, by way of mask to his own secret disquietude, -to quote his Epicurean poet Lucretius on the subject of Jupiter's -control of thunderbolts. As the storm increases in violence, the -fears of Sergius overpower him, and he breaks down at last into a -deprecatory prayer and vow to Jupiter. Saul then, the storm still -raging, rehearses from Scripture appropriate fragments of psalm, -timing them to the various successive bursts of tempest. The sound of -a tranquil human voice has a quieting effect on Sergius, and even on -the frightened steeds of the two travellers. The storm ceases, and -they pass the night under a serene sky, ready to set out the next -morning for the last stage of their journey to Damascus. - -FOR DAMASCUS. - - The splendor of the morning yet once more - Was a theophany in Syria, - When Saul and Sergius, met, from Paneas - Started, with mind to overpass that day - The spur of Hermon interposed between - Them and Damascus. - "Strange the human bent," - Said Saul, "the universal human bent, - Toward worship of unreal divinities! - 'Paneas!' The very sound insults the name - And solitary majesty of God, - Jehovah, Ever-living, Only True. - Think of it! 'Pan', forsooth! And God, who made - These things which we behold, these waters, woods, - And mountains, glens, and rocky cliffs, and caves, - Who these things made, and made the mind of man - Capacious of Himself, or capable - At least of knowing Him Creator, such - A God thrust from His own creation forth, - By His own noblest creature thus thrust forth, - That a rough, rustic, gross, grotesque, burlesque, - Goat-footed, and goat-bearded, horned and tailed - Divinity like Pan, foul caricature - At best of man himself who fashions him, - And out of wanton fancy furnishes him - His meet appendages of brute wild beast-- - That this deform abortion of the brain - Might take the room, made void, of God outcast, - And, with his ramping, reeling, riotous rout - Of fauns and satyrs, claim to be adored! - I feel the Hebrew blood within me boil - At outrage such from man on God and man! - Phoebus Apollo seems an upward reach - Of human fancy in theogony; - Some height, some aspiration, there at least, - Toward what in man, if not the noblest, yet - Is nobler than the beasts that browse, or graze. - Apollo, too, I hate, but I loathe Pan!" - - "We Romans are more catholic than you - Hebrews," said Sergius, "more hospitable - To different peoples' different gods. Our own - Synod of native deities we have, - But we make room for others than our own. - From Greece we have adopted all her gods, - And all the gods of Egypt and the East - Are domiciled at Rome--all save your god, - Jehovah, his pretensions overleap - The bounds of even our hospitality, - Who not on any terms of fellowship - Will sit a fellow with his fellow-gods. - Him sole except, it is our policy - To entertain with wise indifference - In brotherly equality all gods - Of whatsoever nations of the earth. - A temple at Rome have we, Pantheon called, - So called as to this end expressly built - That there no human god might lack a home. - Such is our Roman way; your Hebrew way - Is different; different races, different ways." - Sergius so spoke as if concluding all - With the last word of wisdom to be said; - He paused, and Saul mused whether wise it were - To answer, when thus Sergius further spoke: - "I marked late, when 'Neapolis!' I said, - 'Sychar!' saidst thou, in tone as if of scorn; - 'Hateful,' thou also calledst Samarian soil-- - Wherefore? if I may know." "'Sychar,'" said Saul, - "Imports deceit, and there deceit abounds. - From the Samaritans we Jews refrain; - Corrupters they of the right ways of God. - Across their soil we either shun to go, - Or, going, hasten with unpausing feet." - - "Those also have their ways!" said Sergius; - "Such humors of the blood thou wilt not cure. - Worship Jehovah ye, it is your way, - And let us Gentiles serve our several gods, - Or serve them not, be atheists if we choose-- - I, as thou knowest, an atheist choose to be-- - Of comity and peace the sole safe rule. - This therefore is the sum--I say it again-- - Ways diverse worship men, or worship not, - All as our natural bents may us incline. - Keep your Jehovah, you, He is your God, - Chosen, or feigned and fashioned to your mind-- - Keep Him, but not impose your ethnic dream, - Or guess, of deity on all mankind." - - "No dream of ours," said Saul, "Jehovah is. - Nay, nay, alas, far otherwise than so, - Our Hebrew dreams of God have, like the dreams - Dreamed by all races of mankind besides, - Grovelled to low and lower, have bestial been, - Or reptile, nay, to insensate wood and stone - Descended; we have loved idolatry, - We, with the rest, and hardly healed have been, - Though purged with hyssop of dire history, - Constrained--against the subtly treacherous soft - Relentings of our heart, oft yielded to, - Then punished oft full sore, which bade us spare - Whom God to spare forbade--constrained to slay - With our own swords, abolish utterly, - The idolatrous possessors of this land, - In judgment just on their idolatry, - And lest we too be tainted with their sin; - Yet foul relapse despite, and after, stripes, - Stripes upon stripes again and yet again, - Suffered from the right hand of God incensed, - Defeat, captivity, long servitude, - With the probe searched, with the knife carved until - Scarce left was life to bear the cautery - Wherewith a holy and a jealous God - Out of our quivering soul throughly would burn - That clinging, deep, inveterate human plague - Inherited from Adam in his fall, - That devil-taught depravity which prompts - Apostasy to other gods no gods-- - Hardly so healed, with dreadful chastisement, - Has been my nation of her dreadful crime. - Loth, slow, ingrate, rebellious pupils, we - Taught have been thus to worship only God-- - Jehovah, only God of the whole earth!" - - Those last words as he spoke, Saul his right hand - Swept round in waving gesture--for they now - A height of goodly prospect had attained, - Wherefrom, pausing to breathe their laboring steeds, - They backward looked beneath them far abroad-- - Swept round his hand, as if the circuit wide - Of the whole earth might there his words attest; - Their fill they gazed, then upward strained once more. - At length a stage of smoother going reached, - Sergius, abreast of Saul, took up the word: - "Yea, might one deem thy Hebrew race indeed - Had been the subjects of such history, - So purposed, then sound were thine argument - And thy Jehovah would be very God, - And God alone, and God of the whole earth. - But other races too besides thine own - Have had their chances, their vicissitudes; - Fortune to all has served her whirling wheel, - And every several race has had its turn - Of rising now, now sinking in the dust. - Wherefore should we you Hebrews sole of all - Reckon divinely taught by history, - Taught to be theists in an atheist world, - Or in a world idolatrous, of God - The True, the Only, only worshippers?" - - "The other nations all," so Saul rejoined, - "Followed the bent of nature, had their will, - What they chose did, and were idolatrous, - God gave them up to their apostasy; - Us God withstood, His Hebrews He forbade; - With the same bent as others, as headstrong, - We Hebrews strangely went a different way, - And upward moved against a downward bent. - A fiery flaming sword turned every way - Forever met us on the errant track, - And forced us right though still found facing wrong. - God's prophets did not fail, age after age-- - Until for that we needed them no more-- - To warn us, chide us, threaten, plead, conjure, - Against our passion for idolatry. - Yet, as defying all that God could do, - Such was the force of that infatuate love - Fast-rooted in the sottish Hebrew heart - For idol-worship, that King Solomon, - The greatest, wisest, wealthiest of our kings, - Mightiest, most famous, most magnificent, - The glory and the crown of Israel, - The wonder and the proverb of the East-- - This king, at point of culmination highest - To the far-shining splendor of our race, - The son of David, Solomon, turned back - From God who gave him his pre-eminence, - From God, the Living God, turned back, and sold - His heart, his spacious, all-experienced heart, - To gods that were no gods. - "Against a will, - A set of nature, a prime pravity - Stubborn like this, and tenfold impulse given - Through such example in our first of kings, - That, conflagration of infection round, - _We_ should escape and not idolatrous be, - We only of all nations on the earth, - This, without miracle, were miracle, - A miracle of chance, confounding chance, - Monstrous, incredible, impossible! - Nay, miracles on miracles were for us wrought, - The manifest finger of God unquestionable, - Yet to ourselves ourselves, to all men we, - Wisely looked on, are chiefest miracle, - Witness from age to age that God is God." - - With Hebrew heat, thus Saul to Sergius; - The frequent steep ascents meanwhile, the halts - For rest, for prospect, or for dalliance - Under some cooling shade of rock or tree-- - Shield from the waxing fervors of the sun-- - Slack pace, due to the humors of their steeds - Unchidden while their masters held discourse, - Left the twain still below the topmost crest - Of Hermon when the noontide hour was on. - Large leisure to refection and repose - Allowed, with converse, and mid-afternoon - It was, before to horse again were got - The horsemen, and their forward way resumed. - As, lightly, they into the saddle sprang, - Out of a purple-dark dense cloud that slept - Wakefully now along the horizon's rim - Under the flaming sun in the deep west, - There came a roll of thunder to their ears, - Remote, and mellow with remoteness, rich - Bass music in long rumbling monotone; - They listened with delight to hear the sound. - - Then Sergius, as the vibration died - In low delicious tremble from their sense, - Said, coupling this with that in Saul's discourse, - Fresh, or remembered from the days before: - "That thunder and this mountain bring to me, - Imagined, the wild scene on Sinai - When your lawgiver gave his laws to you. - He schemed it well to have a thunder-storm - Chime in and be a brave accompaniment - To enforce his ordinances upon the awe - Of the unthinking timorous multitude. - Popular leaders and lawgivers have - Always and everywhere their tricks of trade, - To impress, hoodwink, and wheedle vulgar minds. - Our Sabine Numa, he Pompilius named, - Had his mysterious nymph Egeria - To bring him statutes for all men to heed; - And that Lycurgus got an oracle - From famous Delphi to approve his laws, - Which having sworn his Spartans to observe - At least till he returned from whither he went - Abroad, he, after, masked in such disguise - That never thence to have returned he seemed. - The herd of men still love to be cajoled, - Trolled hither and thither about with baited lies; - Frighten them now with brandished empty threat, - And now with laud as empty tickle them. - Augustus taught the art to tyrannize - Through forms of ancient freedom false and vain, - The stale trick since of all our emperors. - Your Hebrew Moses in his rude grand way - Well plied his shifts of lead and government." - - Thunder, a rising mutter, broke again, - And Sergius in his saddle turned to look; - But Saul, with forward face intent, replied: - "Nay, but our Moses thou dost misconceive. - All was to lose and naught to gain for him - Then when he left the ease, the pomp, the power, - Of Pharaoh's court--of Pharaoh's daughter son - Esteemed, and to imperial futures heir-- - This left, and loth his brethren led, slaves they, - Out of the realm of Egypt to the sea-- - For such a multitude impassable, - Yet passed, through mighty miracle, by all-- - Beyond the sea, into that wilderness - Led them, where neither food nor water was, - Yet food found they, and water, in the waste, - Full forty years of error till they came - Next to a land set thick with bristling spears - Against them--though land promised them for theirs-- - And land that Moses never was to see, - Save as afar in prospect from the mount, - Because unworthy judged to enter there, - Who unadviséd words in haste let slip, - Unworthy judged, and meekly by himself - Recorded judged unworthy--such a man, - To such a people, so long led by him, - Through such straits of extremity, not once - Spake words to humor or to flatter them; - Thwarted them rather, balked them of their wish, - Upbraided, blamed, rebuked, and punished them, - Each art of selfish demagogue eschewed. - To rule and leadership like his, nowhere - Wilt thou find precedent or parallel; - One key alone unlocks the mystery--God!" - - At that last word from Saul, like answer, came - A deep-mouthed boom of thunder from the west, - After a sword of lightning sudden drawn - Then sheathed within the scabbard of the cloud, - Which now, spread wide, had blotted out the sun. - A vagrant breath of tempest shook the trees, - And the scared birds flew homeward to their nests. - Sergius remarked the stir of elements - Uneasily the more that he alone - Remarked it, Saul, involved in his own thought, - Seeming unconscious of the outward world. - The Roman, groping in his secret mind - Vainly to find support of sympathy, - Faltered to feel himself thus fronted sole - With danger he could neither ward nor shun, - In presence yet forbidding sign of fear. - - In this distress he buoyed himself with words, - Cheer seeking in the sound of his own voice: - "A merry place that in Lucretius - Where this bold poet rallies Jupiter-- - The whole Olympian crew, Jupiter most-- - In such a rattling vein of pleasantry, - On his plenipotence with thunderbolts! - Lucretius, thou shouldst know, interpreter - Of Epicurus is to Roman minds; - From whom we moderns learn the truth of things - And generation of the universe. - 'If Jupiter,' Lucretius sings and says, - 'If Jupiter it be, and other gods, - 'That with terrific sound the temple shake, - 'Shake the resplendent temple of the skies, - 'And launch the lightning whither each one wills, - 'Why is it that the strokes transfix not those - 'Guilty of some abominable crime, - 'As these within their breast the flames inhale, - 'Instruction sharp to mortals--why not this, - 'Rather than that the man of no base thing - 'To himself conscious should be wrapt about - 'Innocent in the flames, and suddenly - 'With whirlwind and with fire from heaven consumed? - 'Also, why seek they out, the gods, for work - 'Like this, deserted spots, and waste their pains? - 'Or haply do they then just exercise - 'Their muscles, that thereby their arms be strong?'" - - Sergius so far, from his Lucretius, - When the cloud, cloven, let out an arrowy flash, - And, following soon, a muffled muttering threat - Prolonged, that ended in a ragged roar-- - As if, with angry rupture, violent hands - Atwain had torn the fabric of the sky. - A shuddering pause, but again Sergius, - Flying his poet's gibes at Jupiter: - "'Why never from a sky clear everywhere - 'Does Jupiter upon the lands hurl down - 'His thunderbolts, and thunder-booms outpour? - 'Or, when the clouds have come, does he descend - 'Then into them that nigh at hand he thence - 'The striking of his weapon may direct?'" - - One sheet of flame the bending welkin wrapt, - And a broadside of thunder roared amain. - With mortal strife against a mortal fear, - Hidden, the Roman struggled, not in vain-- - As, faltering yet from his feigned gayety, - He, in a forced voice almost grim, went on - With that Lucretian blasphemy of Jove: - "'Why lofty places seeks out Jupiter, - 'And why most numerous vestiges find we - 'Traced of his fires on lonely mountain-tops?'" - - No farther--flash on flash and crash on crash, - Chaos of light and universe of sound!-- - For the wind roared a tumult like the sea - Which the gulfs filled between the thunder-peals. - - One mighty blast, frantic as battle-charge - When, mad with last despair, ten thousand horse - Headlong into the hell at cannon-mouth - Plunge--such a blast rushed down the rent ravine - Whereby, along a shaggy side, the twain, - Now nigh the utmost mountain summit, climbed. - The glacial air, as in a torrent rolled - Precipitous or vertical sheer down - Some dizzy height in cataract, so swift! - Unhorsed them both; but, crouching, man and steed, - With one wise instinct instantly to all, - Which equalled all--supreme desire of life-- - They huddling crept transverse to where a rock - On their right hand lifted its moveless brow - And, safely founded in the mountain's base, - Made, leaning, an impendent roof which now - Proffered a dreadful shelter from the storm. - - Hardly this refuge gained, the tempest, loosed, - Hailstones and coals of fire commingled, fell. - The wind, with such a weight oppressed, went down, - And, with the sinking wind, a water-spout, - Whirled roaring in its spiral from on high, - Those watchers saw peel off, with one steep swoop - Descending, a whole mountain-top and roll - Its shattered forest into the ravine - Suddenly thus with foaming torrent filled. - Therewith, as weary were the storm, a lull; - Lull only, for the welkin seemed to sink - Collapsed about them, and what was the sky - Became the nether atmosphere on fire, - Enrobing them with lightning fold on fold - And thunder detonating at their ears. - - Sergius, ere shut had seared his eyes the glare, - Saw a gigantic cedar nigh at hand, - Under a flaming wedge of thunderbolt, - Riven in parted halves from head to foot, - Fall burning down the frightful precipice. - Spite of himself, his terror turned to prayer: - "O Jupiter," he said, "it was not meant, - What I spoke late against thy majesty! - Spare me yet this once more, and I a vow, - A pledged rich vow, will in thy temple hang, - Then when I first shall safe reach Rome, inscribed - 'From Sergius Paulus to King Jupiter, - Lord of the lightning and the thunderbolt.'" - - "'Give ye unto Jehovah,'" so at last, - Fragments of psalm responsive to the storm-- - As in antiphony of worship joined, - He and the elements!--chanting, Saul burst forth, - At intervals, between the swells of sound, - And varying to the tempest's varying phase, - "'Give ye unto Jehovah, lo, all ye - 'Sons of the mighty, to Jehovah give - 'Glory and strength; unto Jehovah give - 'The equal glory due unto His name; - 'Worship Jehovah in fair robes of praise!'" - - "'Deep calleth unto deep at the dread noise - 'Made by Thy waterspouts. The earth, it shook - 'And trembled; the foundations of the hills - 'Moved and were shaken for that He was wroth. - 'The heavens moreover bowed He, and came down, - 'He His pavilion round about Him made - 'Dark waters and the thick clouds of the skies. - "'Jehovah also thundered in the heavens, - 'And therein the Most High gave forth His voice, - 'Hailstones and coals of fire! - - "'Jehovah's voice - 'In power! - "'Jehovah's voice in majesty! - - "'Jehovah's voice is on the waters! God, - 'The God of glory thunders! - "'Lo, His voice, - 'Jehovah's voice, the mighty cedar breaks, - 'Jehovah's voice divides the flames of fire! - - "'Praise ye Jehovah, heavens of heavens, and ye - 'Waters that be above the heavens, Him praise! - 'Praise ye Jehovah, from the earth beneath, - 'Thou fire, thou hail, thou snow, and vapors ye, - 'Thou, stormy wind that dost fulfil His word!'" - - So Saul, in dialogue with the elements, - That heard him, and responded voice for voice. - Sublimity into sublimity - Other, immeasurable heights more high, - Was lifted and transformed, the terror gone, - Gone or exalted to ennobling awe-- - In converse such, God, with His image man! - The thunder, and the lightning, and the hail - Falling in power, the pomp of moving clouds, - The sound of torrent and of cataract, - The multitudinous orchestra of winds-- - Trumpet and pipe, resounding cymbal loud, - Timbrel and harp, sackbut and psaltery-- - The majesty of cedars prostrate strewn - In utmost adoration, the veiled sun, - The kneeling heavens, face downward on the earth, - In act of penitence as found unclean - By the white-burning holiness of God-- - All this wild gesture of the elements - And deep convulsion of the frame of things, - Appalling only erst, interpreted - By interjections such from Saul of phrase - Inspired, seemed from confusion and turmoil - Transposed and harmonized to an august - Service and symphony of prayer and praise - And solemn liturgy of the universe. - - Sergius was charmed insensibly to peace, - And a calm human voice had subtle power - To soothe to breathing rest the trembling steeds. - And now began the cadence of the storm; - Lifted the sky was from the burdened earth, - The lightnings flashed less imminent, less thick. - The thunder dulled his stroke, retired to far - And farther in the muffling firmament, - The hail ceased falling in a fall of rain, - Through which at last the low descending sun - Smiled in a rainbow on the opposite cloud. - "God's sign," said Saul, "His seal of promise set - Oft on the clouds of heaven when storm is past, - In radiant curve of blended colors fair, - That He with flood no more will drown the world." - - Therewith they got them to their path again, - And, forward hastening, on the farther slope - Of Hermon overpassed, were met by some - Returning of their escort companies - Who sought their laggard masters left behind. - These had crossed earlier, and, before the storm, - Housed them in covert, where all now with joy - Welcomed their chiefs from threatened scath escaped. - They slept that night beneath a starry sky - Fair as if wrinkled never by a frown; - To-morrow they would see that paradise, - Renowned Damascus, pearl of all the East. - This their sleep filled with dream of things to be, - Until the morning breaking radiant made - The desert seem to blossom as the rose - Wherein Damascus sat an oasis. - - - - -BOOK XV. - -SAUL AND JESUS. - - -The scene of the poem changes, being transferred to Paradise. Here -a group composed of those who had come to their death by the hands -of Saul assemble, privileged by special grace to witness from their -celestial station the happy overthrow and conversion of their late -persecutor. Sergius applies his interpretation of the occurrence, -and Saul finishes his journey on foot, blind, led by the hand into -Damascus. - -SAUL AND JESUS. - - Without the limits of this earthly sphere, - Immeasurable distances beyond - The region of the utmost fixéd stars, - Nay, high above all height, transcending space, - Transcending time, subsists a different world, - Invisible, inapprehensible - To whatsoever power of human sense, - All unimaginable even--so far - Removed from aught that ever we on earth - Have seen, or heard, or felt, or known, or guessed. - Believed in only, and not otherwise - Than to the vision of meek Faith revealed - (Though indefeasible inheritance - Reserved for her fruition after death), - Yet is that world unknown substantial more - Than all this solid-seeming universe - Of matter round about us that assaults - Our senses daily with its imminence, - Its impact, as if nothing else were real! - But till the destined moment, we must deem, - Much more, must speak, of that transcendent world, - And of our human brethren there insphered, - In figure borrowed of our mortal state. - - While those things nigh Damascus so befell, - And now the night was almost waned to morn, - Its different morning in that different world - Dawned to the saints forever summering there - In bliss and glory with their glorious Lord. - Morning in the celestial Paradise - Is not as morning here, new-springing day - Crescent the same out of eclipsing night: - No night is there, and therefore no vicissitude - Of dark and bright to separate the days. - Yet condescends our Father to their frame, - Still finite though immortal, still in need - Of changes to diversify their state, - And punctuate into periods the smooth lapse, - Else cloying with prolonged beatitude, - Of that eternal dateless life serene - Lived by the happy souls in Paradise; - Our Father condescends and gives them days - And days, with difference of each from each, - That they may reckon up and date their bliss; - No night is there, but without night a morn. - Morning in Paradise is perfect light - Ineffably more fair become to-day - Than yesterday, forever, through more fair - Disclosure, dawn on dawn, eternally - Made of the glory of the face of Him - In whom to His belovéd God still shines. - - Morn such had risen once more in Paradise, - When there a group elect together drawn, - Wearing a brow of expectation each, - Stood on a flowery hill enringed around - To be almost an island with a loop - Of river, the river of life, that lucent flowed - Mirroring ranks of trees along its banks - Ruddy or gold in gleams of fruitage seen - Glimpsing against the rich green of their leaves-- - Here stood a chosen group who waited now - Tidings a messenger to come should bring. - These were those all who lately on the earth - Had suffered death for Jesus' sake through Saul-- - All saving Stephen; he, at point of dawn - That morning, had been summoned by his Lord - To bear from Him some embassy of grace. - The man born blind was there whom Jesus healed - To double seeing, seeing of the soul, - As of the body, and whom not the threat - Of stripes, of stones, and not the blandishment - Of gentle words from lips with power of death - Could bribe to live at cost of least unfaith - Toward his Light-giver and Redeemer Lord-- - He, and a little company besides, - Women with men, who like him lightly recked - Of loss but for a moment then and there - Compared with that far more exceeding weight - Of glory now, in over-recompense, - Forever and forever sealed their own. - - This little group, beyond their happy wont - Beatified with hope that heavenly morn, - Soon greet one coming whose irradiate brow - Bespeaks him fresh from audience with the King; - Stephen it was, whose earthly-shining face - Was shadow to the brightness now it wore. - The martyr to his fellow-martyrs brought - Glad tidings; they were all that day to see - Break forth in power the glory of the Lord. - "Saul," Stephen said, "still breathes his threatening out - And slaughter aimed against the church of Christ; - He journeys to Damascus in this mind. - But the Lord Christ will meet him in the way - And overthrow him with resistless light. - Ours is to tarry on this pleasant hill - Of prospect, and, hence gazing, all behold, - Tasting a sweet revenge of Paradise, - To see our prayers fulfilled, in Saul become - From persecutor brother well-beloved, - And builder from destroyer of the church." - - So these there sat them down upon the mount. - Here, gaze turned ever earthward, they in talk - Of earthly things that still were dear to them - Consumed the happy heavenly hours, until, - To those their native Syrian climes, drew nigh - Noontide; then, in a new theophany, - The transit of a shadow!--seldom seen - There where was neither sun, nor moon, nor star, - But all was equal universal light-- - Came sudden notice to their eyes to watch - The Messianic dread procession forth, - Christ in the majesty of solitude, - Swifter than meteor's fall, from Paradise. - - HE, purposed not to slay, only cast down - Saul from the top of his presumptuous pride, - And break him from his disobedient will, - Would not in His essential glory meet - His creature, lest he be abolished quite, - But dimmed Himself with splendor which, more bright - Than the supreme effulgence of the sun - At mid-day in a crystal firmament, - Fixed, but more vivid than the fleeting flash - Of lightning when its beam burns most intense, - Was splendor yet of ray less luminous - Than the accustomed radiance of His face, - And showed as cloud against that shining sky. - - For, in that unimaginable world - Of perfect, purged from sin and sin's defect, - The senses of the blest inhabitants, - Their organs and their faculties, are all - Inured to bear with ease, with pleasure bear, - Continuance and intensity of light - That mortal frames like ours would quite consume. - Those there from light need neither change nor rest, - Their proper substance is illuminate, - And their bliss is to bathe themselves in light, - And light, more light, drunk in at every pore - From the bright omnipresence of the Lord, - Revealed each day brighter forevermore, - Makes their eternal life eternal joy. - - But on this day select of many days, - The happy people all of Paradise - Saw Jesus as a darkness of less light, - A glancing shadow, pass from out their sphere-- - The most unweeting whither or why He went; - But those knew who kept vigil on the mount. - These had their sense for sight and sound that day - Exalted to seraphic keen and clear - Beyond the glorious wont of Paradise; - While a circumfluous ether interfused - For their behoof between where thus they stood - And where they earthward looked, a subtile air, - A discontinuous element rare like space, - Was now such vehicle, so voluble, - For lightest appulse to both eye and ear - Supernal, thrice sevenfold refined, as made - Seem nigh things seen or heard, however far. - - Fixed to behold and hearken thus at ease, - They saw afar two pilgrim companies, - Where, near Damascus, these a shady tuft - Of grove or thicket, in the arid waste - Of burning sand, at noontide hour had found, - For rest and coolness ere their goal they gained. - Those pilgrims just in act, as seemed, to start - Anew upon the way for their last stage - Of going, one, well recognized for Saul-- - Remounted not from halt, but some few steps - Leading his horse with bridle-rein remiss - Along his destined path--comrade beside, - Was by this comrade asked, as in discourse - After suspense renewed: "How was it, then, - Through what offence, that he deserved his death? - Since atheist not, and not idolater, - Nor yet of those Samaritan heretics, - Wherein did Stephen fail of loyalty?" - "Traitor was he," said Saul, "to our chief hope, - He taught that Jesus Nazarene was Christ; - Nay, that impostor, he, blaspheming, made - Coequal partner of the eternal throne - And solitary majesty of God; - Worst of idolatry such blasphemy! - Jesus of Nazareth anathema!" - - Almost, at this, a shudder of horror ran - Chill through the spiritual pure corporeal frames - Wherein were housed those blessed essences, - Hearing from earth such words in Paradise! - They then considered at what cost were bought - Perpetual consciousness of things terrene! - - Watched they meanwhile that cloud of glory go - Darkened wherein the Lord of light was hid. - Incredibly though swift its far descent, - Yet answerably swift their vision was, - As swift likewise the motion of their mind; - And so they plainly saw how, by degrees, - What shadow was, in the celestial sphere, - Became a growing brightness as it went, - Until, within the bounds of sunshine come, - That mild beclouded glory, still unchanged, - Paled with its bright the brilliance of the sun. - Hardly those watchers dare keep looking, pierced - With a redeemed fine sympathy for Saul, - And marvelling, "Such light can he bear and live?" - - To Saul himself no interval there seemed; - Instant, with his anathema, down smote - That awful light on him, and straight to earth - Prostrate as dead he fell, yet heard a Voice, - Awful not less, speak twice his name, "Saul, Saul," - And, "Wherefore dost thou persecute Me?" ask. - Then further these deep searching words to him: - "Hard findst it thou to kick against the pricks!" - "Who art Thou, Lord?" came trembling forth from Saul, - Whereby their brother yet alive those knew. - "Jesus I am, Jesus of Nazareth, - The crucified, whom thou dost persecute," - They heard Messiah say, and thrilled with joy - Of gratitude to feel afresh that He - Suffered when any suffered for His sake, - And bled in wounds that made His brethren bleed, - Joining Himself to them, by fellowship - Of passion, they in Him and He in them, - The living members with the living Head - Mysteriously incorporate in one. - Thus a sweet thrill of grateful love to Him, - Their Saviour, trembled in those heavenly breasts, - While in suspense of balanced hope and fear-- - The fear but such as made the hope more bliss-- - They waited what their brother next would say. - - But in the prostrate man, at such reply, - Felt from amidst that imminent light descend, - "I Jesus am whom thou dost persecute," - Thought following thought, a fleet succession, flew - The boundless blank astonishment was brief - Which, as with wing world-wide of hurricane, - Shadowy, his mind bewildering overswept. - 'Such power of splendor his, the Nazarene's! - Jesus had launched that thunderbolt of light! - The Lord of Glory then the crucified!' - The momentary hurricane was past, - But passing it had overturned the world. - - Saul vividly saw Stephen as that day - He shone Shekinah in the temple court - Effulgent with a milder light like this; - 'And this was that which Stephen prophesied! - How madly had he kicked against the pricks!' - Next, Stephen martyr stood before his eyes - Uplifting holy hands to heaven in prayer, - On poise for that translation to his Lord - Wherein his, Saul's, the murderer's part had been! - And Rachel flashed in vision on his mind, - Pathetically beautiful, once more, - As on that moonlit eve at Bethany! - The sisters there, and Lazarus--with Ruth - Exalted in her mother-majesty! - Hirani, then, in his simplicity - Perplexed before the Sanhedrim, but borne - In ecstasy above them far away, - Thence looking down upon them all, a light - Fair on his forehead like the light of stars; - All these things in his past, with many more-- - Instant, at sudden summons of his mind, - To swear against him his own blasphemy-- - Shot through Saul's spirit, as the lightning leaps, - Rapid, one leap, from end to end of heaven. - 'This dreadful splendor was not vengeance all, - It had not slain him, he was thinking still! - A grace was in the glory, oh, how fair!' - The features of a Face began to dawn - Upon him in the darkness of that light; - As the sun shineth in his strength, it shone, - An awful Meekness mild with Majesty! - - The outward light light to his soul became-- - A light of knowledge of the glory of God - To Saul, seen in the face of Jesus Christ! - 'It would be freedom to serve such a Lord!' - The passion of rebellion all was gone, - A passion of obedience in its place; - The will that hated had dissolved away, - And will no more was left, but only love. - This love which was obedience spoke and asked, - "Lord Jesus, what wilt thou have me to do?" - - The Brightness of the Father's Glory said: - "Rise thou, and stand upon thy feet, for I - Have to this end appeared to thee, to make - Thee minister and witness both of what - This day thou hast beheld and of those things - Wherein I after will appear to thee, - Delivering thee from Jewish enemies - And from the Gentiles unto whom I now - Send thee, their eyes to unseal and them to turn - From darkness unto light, and from the power - Of Satan unto God, that they of sins - Forgiveness may receive, and heirs become - Among those sanctified through faith in Me." - - Saul heard, and in his heart of hearts obeyed; - And his whole life thenceforth obedience was-- - Whereof the greater song remains to sing, - If so be God vouchsafe such grace to me. - - But Jesus to His servant further said, - "Hence now into Damascus city go; - There fully shall be shown thee all thy way." - - A way indeed stain-traced in blood and tears, - As Saul foresaw to Rachel; but in tears - And blood his own thereafter to the end, - Even to the end of that apostleship. - - Yet glorious end! Already then afar - Will kindle the dark earth with many a ray, - Never to be extinguished, of heaven's light - Caught from the torch that this world-wandering man, - This flying angel fledged with wingéd feet - Tireless, this heart of love unquenchable, - Has borne abroad, when, now the good fight fought, - Finished his course, the faith full kept, he, last, - With aged eagle eyes strained forward, sees - The crown of righteousness laid up for him - Which Christ, the Righteous Judge, will give him then, - Give him in that forever-imminent Day-- - Nor him alone, as his vicarious soul - Swells to remember, but all them likewise - Who shall have loved the appearing of the Lord. - - The transit of a thought athwart the brain-- - What computation for such speed in flight! - What reckoning of the number of the thoughts - That in an individual instant will - Chase one another through a human mind - In never-sundered continuity - Of change! The measureless diameters - Of being that a mortal man may cross - From one pulse to another of the blood! - How, in the twinkling of an eye, become - The spirit its own polar opposite! - Between his Lord's reply, "I Jesus am," - And his own further question instant asked, - "Lord Jesus, what wilt Thou have me to do?" - That prostrate proud young Hebrew penitent - The utmost stretch of longitude traversed - That can divide two different selves in man-- - He from rebellious to obedient passed, - Blasphemer was adoring worshipper, - The Pharisee was Christian, Saul was Paul. - - At witness of the wondrous change, the joy, - The grateful joy, within those friendly minds - Above who saw it, borne to ecstasy - Of gladness, was triumphal, and broke forth - In singing such as heard in Paradise: - "Glory to God, and to our Saviour Lord, - For one more captive to the heavenly thrall; - For one more human soul to heaven reclaimed - From hell, and star set in Christ's diadem! - For one more witness, an apostle new, - Like angel flying through mid-heaven, to fly - And wing the Gospel wide throughout the world! - Thanks to thee, Christ, for that his name is SAUL!" - - Heard was this quiring song afar, and heaven - Her other joy suspended at the sound: - And every echoing hill of Paradise, - Each grove, each grotto, every fountain-side, - With every bank of river, every glen, - And every bowery, flowery wide champaign - Where angels bask in bliss, took up the strain - And rang it swelling to the highest heaven; - While harpers harped it to their harps, and palms - Were rhythmic waved in music to the eye, - And the trees clapped their hands, and God was pleased. - - So they in Paradise, who saw and heard - Truly; Saul's fellow-pilgrims nigh at hand - Vacantly wondered, who, though they the light - Beheld, and heard the voice speak, missed the sense. - Sergius, recovered from his first surprise - And terror, mused within himself, and found, - Remembering words from Saul against the gods, - Easy solution of the mystery; - 'Pan roared at him from out the copse-wood nigh, - With wholesome punishment of fear infused - Avenging his despised divinity; - While lord Apollo twanged his silver bow - And shot at him a shaft of blinding light; - The gods of right are wroth to be reviled!' - - Saul from the ground arose a sightless man; - The glory that not slew had blinded him. - His steed he would not mount again to ride, - But chose, humbly, and guided by the hand, - Footing to go among his followers. - Who, that blithe morning, as the morning blithe, - Forth for Damascus from Jerusalem - Rode breathing threat and slaughter quenchless sworn - Against the church of Jesus Nazarene, - Entered the city walking, led and blind, - Bondslave thenceforth to the One Worthy Name. - -THE END. - - -Transcriber's note: - -Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). - -Small capital text has been replaced with all capitals. - -Variations in spelling, punctuation and hyphenation have been -retained except in obvious cases of typographical error. - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Epic of Saul, by William Cleaver Wilkinson - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EPIC OF SAUL *** - -***** This file should be named 43247-8.txt or 43247-8.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/4/3/2/4/43247/ - -Produced by David Edwards and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org - - -Title: The Epic of Saul - -Author: William Cleaver Wilkinson - -Release Date: July 18, 2013 [EBook #43247] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EPIC OF SAUL *** - - - - -Produced by David Edwards and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - -</pre> - - +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 43247 ***</div> <hr class="tb" /> @@ -246,8 +207,8 @@ Internet Archive) formed at Jerusalem against the life of the apostle, which in the sequel led to a prolonged suspension of his free missionary career. It embraces the incidents of his removal -from Jerusalem to Cæsarea, of his imprisonment at the latter -place, of his journey to Rome for trial before Cæsar, and of +from Jerusalem to Cæsarea, of his imprisonment at the latter +place, of his journey to Rome for trial before Cæsar, and of his final martyrdom. The design of the poem as a whole is to present through conduct on Paul's part and through speech from him, a living portrait of the man that he was, together @@ -443,7 +404,7 @@ recommends pursuing against them a policy of guile.</p> <span class="i0">One upright pillar in a fallen state.<br /></span> <span class="i0">Fallen, for Rome had pushed her foaming wave<br /></span> <span class="i0">Of conquest far into the East, and laid<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Judæa under deluge, quiet now,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Judæa under deluge, quiet now,<br /></span> <span class="i0">But deep, of domination absolute—<br /></span> <span class="i0">A weight as of the sea upon her breast.<br /></span> <span class="i0">Jerusalem was glorious to behold,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span> @@ -452,7 +413,7 @@ recommends pursuing against them a policy of guile.</p> <span class="i0">Alas, but more her glory, more her shame!<br /></span> <span class="i0">For all her glory was the Roman's now,<br /></span> <span class="i0">The queen a vassal at a tyrant's feet,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">She Cæsar serving who should serve but God.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She Cæsar serving who should serve but God.<br /></span> <span class="i0">And, worse disgrace than heathen servitude,<br /></span> <span class="i0">There recreant Jews were found, and more and more,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Who their hearts sold to their captivity,<br /></span> @@ -494,7 +455,7 @@ recommends pursuing against them a policy of guile.</p> <span class="i0">False children unto Abraham, to vex<br /></span> <span class="i0">Our nation's peace and shame us to our foes.<br /></span> <span class="i0">The son of Joseph suffered his desert,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span> -<span class="i0">Accurséd, on the tree, pretender vile,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Accurséd, on the tree, pretender vile,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Who out of Nazareth came forth to claim<br /></span> <span class="i0">Messiahship, the gift of David's line,<br /></span> <span class="i0">And trailed a glorious banner in the dust,<br /></span> @@ -549,7 +510,7 @@ recommends pursuing against them a policy of guile.</p> <span class="i0">In words that flamed like lightning and that smote<br /></span> <span class="i0">Like thunder-stones, against those grovelling men<br /></span> <span class="i0">Who Israel taught to grovel at the feet<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of Galilæan Jesus crucified,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Galilæan Jesus crucified,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Accepted for the Christ, forsooth, of God!<br /></span> <span class="i0">Such wish, becoming purpose, Saul has brought<br /></span> <span class="i0">This evening to Gamaliel, with high hope,<br /></span> @@ -793,7 +754,7 @@ recommends pursuing against them a policy of guile.</p> <span class="i0">Forthwith the captain of the temple goes,<br /></span> <span class="i0">His band attending, and, no violence shown—<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span> <span class="i0">For fear was on them of the people, lest<br /></span> -<span class="i0">They stone them—leads the Galilæans in.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They stone them—leads the Galilæans in.<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Robed venerably each in rich array<br /></span> <span class="i0">Of purple, and fine linen, glistering white<br /></span> @@ -809,7 +770,7 @@ recommends pursuing against them a policy of guile.</p> <span class="i0">And, while the high-priest of their nation, throned<br /></span> <span class="i0">Middle and chief among the councillors,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Denouncing asked: "Did we not straitly bid<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Forbear to teach in this accurséd name?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forbear to teach in this accurséd name?<br /></span> <span class="i0">And, lo, ye fill Jerusalem with bruit,<br /></span> <span class="i0">And seek to bring on us this person's blood!"—<br /></span> <span class="i0">While thus, sternly, he spoke, those simple men<br /></span> @@ -842,7 +803,7 @@ recommends pursuing against them a policy of guile.</p> <span class="i0">The steady, prompt obedience, the serene<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span> <span class="i0">Courage that dared, without defying, all<br /></span> <span class="i0">The terrors brandished by the Sanhedrim—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">This spirit, strange in those despiséd men,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This spirit, strange in those despiséd men,<br /></span> <span class="i0">As with a soft and subtle atmosphere<br /></span> <span class="i0">Enfolding and suffusing him, subdued<br /></span> <span class="i0">The solid temper of his mind, the strong<br /></span> @@ -885,7 +846,7 @@ recommends pursuing against them a policy of guile.</p> <span class="i0">A full and fell accord conjoined them there!—<br /></span> <span class="i0">Was doubt or question to the Sanhedrim;<br /></span> <span class="i0">But in what chosen way their chosen goal,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The doom of death for those accurséd men,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The doom of death for those accurséd men,<br /></span> <span class="i0">With safe sure speed, most prudently, to reach—<br /></span> <span class="i0">This doubt embroiled a vehement debate.<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> @@ -972,7 +933,7 @@ recommends pursuing against them a policy of guile.</p> <span class="i0">And were at peace! In that secure retreat<br /></span> <span class="i0">Withdrawn, the secret place of the Most High,<br /></span> <span class="i0">The angel of the Lord encamping round,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Composédly at leisure they looked out<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Composédly at leisure they looked out<br /></span> <span class="i0">And saw the wicked plot against the just,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Vainly, and gnash upon him with his teeth!<br /></span> <span class="i0">Within their hearts they knew his day would come.<br /></span> @@ -1174,7 +1135,7 @@ scourging is finally resolved upon.</p> <span class="i0">Should rise for speech—and that beloved gray head<br /></span> <span class="i0">Before me bowed, unready yet—might seem<br /></span> <span class="i0">Unseemly. But to speak after he speaks,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">My own reveréd guide, the guide of all,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My own reveréd guide, the guide of all,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Would be, should I then speak to differ, more<br /></span> <span class="i0">Unseemly still. And what I have to say,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Being my thought, burns in me to be said,<br /></span> @@ -1330,7 +1291,7 @@ scourging is finally resolved upon.</p> <span class="i0">And reverence his in ample revenue,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Was easy master of the Sanhedrim:<br /></span> <span class="i0">On him the council rested and revolved,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">As on a fixéd centre and support.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As on a fixéd centre and support.<br /></span> <span class="i0">And now 'Gamaliel! let us hear at last<br /></span> <span class="i0">Gamaliel's word' was suddenly the sole,<br /></span> <span class="i0">The simultaneous, silent thought to all.<br /></span> @@ -1410,11 +1371,11 @@ scourging is finally resolved upon.</p> <span class="i0">I dread to trust myself, lest I, myself<br /></span> <span class="i0">Obeying, misdeem myself obeying God.<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">"Hearken, my children. These accuséd men<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Hearken, my children. These accuséd men<br /></span> <span class="i0">Unlikely, most unlikely, choice of Heaven<br /></span> <span class="i0">To be His prophets, seemed, and seem, to me.<br /></span> <span class="i0">I look at them and find no prophet mien;<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span> -<span class="i0">I listen and their Galilæan speech<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I listen and their Galilæan speech<br /></span> <span class="i0">Offends me; and far more the scandal is<br /></span> <span class="i0">To think what message they propound to us.<br /></span> <span class="i0">Their person and their message I reject—<br /></span> @@ -1683,7 +1644,7 @@ knowing it, Saul's own beloved sister Rachel.</p> <span class="i0">That fountain darkling in the depths of self<br /></span> <span class="i0">Whence into light all streams of being flowed.<br /></span> <span class="i0">Saul daily, nightly, waking, sleeping, dreamed<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of a new nation, his belovéd own,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a new nation, his belovéd own,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Resurgent from the dust consummate fair,<br /></span> <span class="i0">And, for chief corner-stone, with shoutings reared<br /></span> <span class="i0">To station in the stately edifice—<br /></span> @@ -2073,7 +2034,7 @@ knowing it, Saul's own beloved sister Rachel.</p> <span class="i0">And ever a blessing true it is to men<br /></span> <span class="i0">To bend the neck beneath an equal yoke<br /></span> <span class="i0">Of ruler strong and wise and just to rule.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Then will at last the Gentiles blesséd be<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then will at last the Gentiles blesséd be<br /></span> <span class="i0">In Abraham, when, from Abraham's loins derived<br /></span> <span class="i0">Through David, God's Anointed shall begin,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span> <span class="i0">In David's city, His long government<br /></span> @@ -2147,10 +2108,10 @@ knowing it, Saul's own beloved sister Rachel.</p> <span class="i0">With their illiterate 'Lo, here!' 'Lo, there!'"<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">At this increasing burst of scorn from Saul,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Exultant like the pæan and the cry<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span> +<span class="i0">Exultant like the pæan and the cry<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span> <span class="i0">That rises through the palpitating air<br /></span> <span class="i0">When storming warriors take the citadel,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Once more from Rachel's fixéd eyes the tears<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Once more from Rachel's fixéd eyes the tears<br /></span> <span class="i0">Of sympathetic exultation flowed—<br /></span> <span class="i0">The sister with the brother, as in strife<br /></span> <span class="i0">Before the battle striving equally,<br /></span> @@ -2439,7 +2400,7 @@ the course of the controversy.</p> <span class="i0">He proudly, confidently deemed, against<br /></span> <span class="i0">Whatever counter force of eloquence—<br /></span> <span class="i0">This tenure his he saw relaxed, dissolved,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Evanishéd, as it had never been.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Evanishéd, as it had never been.<br /></span> <span class="i0">Perplexed, astonished, but impenetrable,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Though dashed and damped in spirit and in hope,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Angry he stood, recoiled upon himself.<br /></span> @@ -2579,7 +2540,7 @@ the course of the controversy.</p> <span class="i0">Resentment fated to bear bitter fruit,<br /></span> <span class="i0">But melt at last in gracious shame and tears.<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">With fixéd look impassible, he gazed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With fixéd look impassible, he gazed<br /></span> <span class="i0">At Stephen, while, in altered phase, that pure<br /></span> <span class="i0">Effulgence of apostleship burned on:<br /></span> <span class="i0">"Nor, brethren, let this word of mine become<br /></span> @@ -3179,14 +3140,14 @@ depths of dejection over the fallen state of his fortunes.</p> <span class="i0">Though not quite on his errand; Rome agrees<br /></span> <span class="i0">To wink, while we indulge ourselves in what<br /></span> <span class="i0">To us will be self-rule resumed, to her,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A spasm of our Judæan savagery.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A spasm of our Judæan savagery.<br /></span> <span class="i0">Thus is the way made eligibly clear<br /></span> <span class="i0">For brother Mattathias with those stones<br /></span> <span class="i0">He raves about on all occasions—rubbed<br /></span> <span class="i0">Smooth, they must be, as David's from the brook,<br /></span> <span class="i0">With constant wear in Mattathias' hands!<br /></span> <span class="i0">Was it not grim to hear him talk that day?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">His dream of Maccabæan blood aboil<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span> +<span class="i0">His dream of Maccabæan blood aboil<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span> <span class="i0">Within his veins has been too much for him,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Made him a monomaniac on this point;<br /></span> <span class="i0">He sees before him visionary stones,<br /></span> @@ -3550,7 +3511,7 @@ out threatening and slaughter against the Christian church.</p> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">"But when," said Saul, forestalling ruefully<br /></span> <span class="i0">The expected and the dreaded change and fall<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From such a chanted pæan to his praise—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From such a chanted pæan to his praise—<br /></span> <span class="i0">"But when"—<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i10">"But when, O Saul," she said, "when he,<br /></span> @@ -4142,7 +4103,7 @@ Mary, with their brother Lazarus, see him going, and follow.</p> <span class="i0">And that far more which never tongue could say,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Surges upon me, surge on surge of thought<br /></span> <span class="i0">And feeling, like an overflowing flood,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Belovéd, then, how weak I am, how frail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Belovéd, then, how weak I am, how frail,<br /></span> <span class="i0">How low and like to die! I lean toward thee,<br /></span> <span class="i0">As if the oak should lean upon his vine."<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> @@ -4460,7 +4421,7 @@ house until morning.</p> <span class="i0">Which late from Saul ye heard concerning wounds<br /></span> <span class="i0">Intended to this Jewish commonwealth,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Ye now have heard forsooth again from these—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">How temple, law, and well-belovéd ways<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span> +<span class="i0">How temple, law, and well-belovéd ways<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span> <span class="i0">Bequeathed us by our fathers from of old<br /></span> <span class="i0">Are threatened in the message that I preach.<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> @@ -4685,7 +4646,7 @@ house until morning.</p> <span class="i0">Meantime a different scene has quietly<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span> <span class="i0">Been passing unperceived. That company<br /></span> <span class="i0">Of ministering women Rachel found,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Salomé, and the Marys, blessed name!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Salomé, and the Marys, blessed name!<br /></span> <span class="i0">With others who had followed and bewailed<br /></span> <span class="i0">When Jesus suffered—these, joined now by those<br /></span> <span class="i0">From Bethany, with Lazarus, prevailed<br /></span> @@ -4695,7 +4656,7 @@ house until morning.</p> <span class="i0">Nigh Stephen, and in undertones could speak<br /></span> <span class="i0">With him, and hear his words.<br /></span> <span class="i30">"Weep not for me,"<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He said, "ye blesséd! I am well content.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He said, "ye blesséd! I am well content.<br /></span> <span class="i0">I think how short the way is, not how sharp,<br /></span> <span class="i0">To Jesus where just now I saw Him. There<br /></span> <span class="i0">He stood in heaven on the right hand of God.<br /></span> @@ -4704,7 +4665,7 @@ house until morning.</p> <span class="i0">I spring toward Him with joy unutterable.<br /></span> <span class="i0">I shall not feel the pain, which will but speed<br /></span> <span class="i0">Me thither. He hath overcome the world.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Be of good cheer, belovéd, ye who wait<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be of good cheer, belovéd, ye who wait<br /></span> <span class="i0">A little longer to behold His face.<br /></span> <span class="i0">For you too He hath overcome the world.<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span> <span class="i0">Be strong, be faithful, be obedient,<br /></span> @@ -4810,7 +4771,7 @@ house until morning.</p> <span class="i0">This seen by those, they soon responsively<br /></span> <span class="i0">Resumed composure like his own, and walked,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Following, molested not, at small remove<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From the belovéd martyr, cheering him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From the belovéd martyr, cheering him,<br /></span> <span class="i0">And cheered, with sense of some society.<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">So, on, with going less precipitate,<br /></span> @@ -4823,7 +4784,7 @@ house until morning.</p> <span class="i0">Austere, impassive, automatic men<br /></span> <span class="i0">Armed, who, though few they might be, yet meant Rome.<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Arrived at length at the accurséd spot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Arrived at length at the accurséd spot,<br /></span> <span class="i0">They stay. The ground about was strewn with stones,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Rejected fragments from the quarry cleft,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Flakes from the mason's chisel, interspersed<br /></span> @@ -4923,7 +4884,7 @@ house until morning.</p> <span class="i0">Melted away meanwhile the multitude<br /></span> <span class="i0">In silence, and, soon after, all were gone<br /></span> <span class="i0">Save the true lovers of the man. Then these<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Gathered together round the accurséd spot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gathered together round the accurséd spot,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Now hallowed, where he stood to suffer, where<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span> <span class="i0">He prayed, and where he fell, and whence he rose<br /></span> <span class="i0">Deathless, leaving the sacred body there,<br /></span> @@ -4941,7 +4902,7 @@ house until morning.</p> <span class="i0">"And wash it from the pool of Siloam."<br /></span> <span class="i0">Then Lazarus, with three fellow-helpers more—<br /></span> <span class="i0">Nathanael, Israelite indeed, was there,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Joseph of Arimathæa too had come,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Joseph of Arimathæa too had come,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Later, and Nicodemus, by nightfall,<br /></span> <span class="i0">These were the chosen four, with Lazarus—<br /></span> <span class="i0">Making a litter of their robes, took up<br /></span> @@ -5051,9 +5012,9 @@ tomb.</p> <span class="i0">Or in the shadows of Gethsemane."<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">"Ruth," Rachel said, "the Angel of the Lord<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Round His belovéd, like the mountains round<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Round His belovéd, like the mountains round<br /></span> <span class="i0">Jerusalem, encampeth ever; he<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of God's belovéd is, and guarded well!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of God's belovéd is, and guarded well!"<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">But Ruth scarce listened; she insisting said:<br /></span> <span class="i0">"Perhaps of Stephen some report thou bringest,<br /></span> @@ -5357,7 +5318,7 @@ tomb.</p> <span class="i14">"I feel that thou hast told me all<br /></span> <span class="i0">Most truly, Rachel, as most tenderly.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Thus, then, God giveth His belovéd sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus, then, God giveth His belovéd sleep,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Thus also! And He doeth all things well!<br /></span> <span class="i0">Amen!"<br /></span> @@ -5366,7 +5327,7 @@ tomb.</p> <span class="i0">From both, and Ruth, regarding Rachel, said:<br /></span> <span class="i0">"Even so! But, Rachel, us not yet doth God<br /></span> <span class="i0">Will thus to sleep. Still, otherwise to sleep—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For His belovéd are not also we?—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For His belovéd are not also we?—<br /></span> <span class="i0">May be God's gift to us. Thou surely needest,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Body and spirit, rest."<br /></span> @@ -5470,7 +5431,7 @@ tomb.</p> <span class="i0">Was laid the sacred dust of Stephen down<br /></span> <span class="i0">And sealed within a rock-hewn sepulchre.<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Joseph of Arimathæa, he who sought<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Joseph of Arimathæa, he who sought<br /></span> <span class="i0">And gained from Pilate leave to take away<br /></span> <span class="i0">The body of Jesus crucified, had sent<br /></span> <span class="i0">To Bethany, betimes, before the hour<br /></span> @@ -5568,7 +5529,7 @@ tomb.</p> <span class="i0">Rejoice, rejoice, for Stephen could not die!<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">"Comfort ye Ruth; thrice among women she<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lives blesséd, who, from wife to him, became,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lives blesséd, who, from wife to him, became,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Widowed, partaker of his martyrdom!<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">"Hosanna to the Son of David, Who,<br /></span> @@ -5666,7 +5627,7 @@ of every need.</p> <span class="i0">This, scandal against scandal doubtful weighed,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Would be the hard alternative to Saul.<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">"Belovéd brother Saul," so Shimei spoke,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span> +<span class="i0">"Belovéd brother Saul," so Shimei spoke,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span> <span class="i0">"<em>I</em> mourned at Stephen's funeral to-day.<br /></span> <span class="i0">Not loud, you know, but deep, my mourning was;<br /></span> <span class="i0">Not loud, for I am modest, and my wish<br /></span> @@ -6374,7 +6335,7 @@ his vote against the man.</p> <span class="i0">How failed the hand of brute authority<br /></span> <span class="i0">Against this strange faith of the Nazarene.<br /></span> <span class="i0">Thine undertaking I less disapproved<br /></span> -<span class="i0">After our hearing of the Galilæans.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">After our hearing of the Galilæans.<br /></span> <span class="i0">Something perceived in them, or through them felt,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Disturbed me with a strange solicitude,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span> <span class="i0">Which the ill fortune of thine own assay<br /></span> @@ -6874,7 +6835,7 @@ his vote against the man.</p> <span class="i0">Instead of Saul, to accuse the prisoner.<br /></span> <span class="i0">With plausible glib mendacity, he said:<br /></span> <span class="i0">"Not only is this fellow heretic<br /></span> -<span class="i0">After the manner of those Galilæans,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">After the manner of those Galilæans,<br /></span> <span class="i0">But myself saw with mine own eyes just now<br /></span> <span class="i0">How he the idlers in the street stirred up<br /></span> <span class="i0">To most unseemly act of violence<br /></span> @@ -6950,7 +6911,7 @@ his vote against the man.</p> <span class="i0">Saul, in his secret mind with anguish torn,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Gazed at the man forsworn against, maligned,<br /></span> <span class="i0">And almost envied him. A look of peace<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Was on him like a light of fixéd stars,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was on him like a light of fixéd stars,<br /></span> <span class="i0">So constant, and so inaccessible<br /></span> <span class="i0">Of change through jar, through stain, so clear, so fair!<br /></span> <span class="i0">He listened to the voices round him loud,<br /></span> @@ -6980,7 +6941,7 @@ his vote against the man.</p> <span class="i0">And sun and moon and stars for me ordained.<br /></span> <span class="i0">I praise Him as the Lord of life and light,<br /></span> <span class="i0">And Giver of light and life to dead and blind.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">All glory to His ever-blesséd Name!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All glory to His ever-blesséd Name!"<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">The simple ecstasy from which he spoke,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Illuminated, and the holy power<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[295]</a></span> @@ -7031,7 +6992,7 @@ his vote against the man.</p> <span class="i0">He loves his blasphemy, give him his fill,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Whet him his appetite, make him blaspheme<br /></span> <span class="i0">His own Lord God, the man of Nazareth.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For that thrice damnéd name require from him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For that thrice damnéd name require from him,<br /></span> <span class="i0">At every lash, an imprecation loud,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[297]</a></span> <span class="i0">On pain of instant death should one curse fail!"<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> @@ -7058,7 +7019,7 @@ his vote against the man.</p> <span class="i0">In linen pure and fine, and laid away<br /></span> <span class="i0">In secret, not unwept or unbewailed<br /></span> <span class="i0">Of such as loved him for the love he bore,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Quenchless by death, to the Belovéd Name.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quenchless by death, to the Belovéd Name.<br /></span> </div></div> <hr class="chap" /> @@ -7084,7 +7045,7 @@ that Shimei proposed, namely, the arrest of the apostles. His men fail him at the pinch, and Saul bitterly upbraids them, declaring strongly that their renegade behavior only determines him the more sternly to root utterly out the -pestilent Galilæan heresy, at whatever cost of exertion and +pestilent Galilæan heresy, at whatever cost of exertion and blood and tears.</p> <p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[301]</a></span></p> @@ -7292,10 +7253,10 @@ blood and tears.</p> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">As, gradually, Saul with his retinue<br /></span> <span class="i0">Drew near the spot, so large a following<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of arméd men, led by a chief whose fame<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of arméd men, led by a chief whose fame<br /></span> <span class="i0">Was rife now through Jerusalem for deeds<br /></span> <span class="i0">And purposes of uttermost revenge<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Against the Galilæan heresy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Against the Galilæan heresy,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Gathered about their course a growing crowd,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Who, urged by various thought and feeling, watched<br /></span> <span class="i0">What might that minatory march intend.<br /></span> @@ -7375,7 +7336,7 @@ blood and tears.</p> <span class="i0">Within you, and, from hands through fear relaxed,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Harmless will drop those miscreant stones which now,<br /></span> <span class="i0">With your poltroonery, ye invoke to fall<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In well-deservéd doom upon your heads!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In well-deservéd doom upon your heads!"<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Upbraided thus, they, by that spokesman, said:<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[313]</a></span> <span class="i0">"Stoning may lightly be despised by men<br /></span> @@ -7468,7 +7429,7 @@ blood and tears.</p> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Saul, in the light of luminous wrath, foresaw<br /></span> <span class="i0">Nigh, and saluted, that career, which thence,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">After Judæan cities overrun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">After Judæan cities overrun<br /></span> <span class="i0">With havoc at his hand to Jesus' name,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Will bear him ravening on Damascus road!<br /></span> </div></div> @@ -7485,7 +7446,7 @@ blood and tears.</p> <p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318"> </a></span></p> -<p>After further persecution accomplished by him in Judæa, +<p>After further persecution accomplished by him in Judæa, Saul, with spirits recovered, sets out for Damascus to carry thither the persecuting sword. Pausing on the brow of hill Scopus to survey Jerusalem just left, he soliloquizes. At the @@ -7517,7 +7478,7 @@ quite passed the bounds of Samaria.</p> <span class="i0">Not yet his fill of slaughter supped, though forth<br /></span> <span class="i0">Afar the timorous flock of Jesus now<br /></span> <span class="i0">Were from before his restless, ravening, fierce,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Rapacious sword out of Judæa fled<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rapacious sword out of Judæa fled<br /></span> <span class="i0">To alien lands remote, beyond the heights<br /></span> <span class="i0">Of Hermon with their everlasting snows,<br /></span> <span class="i0">And farther to the islands of the sea—<br /></span> @@ -7557,7 +7518,7 @@ quite passed the bounds of Samaria.</p> <span class="i0">The acclivity surmounted of a hill,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Whence downward dipped his road, declining north,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[321]</a></span> <span class="i0">And farewell glimpse gave of Jerusalem,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Saul rein drew on his foamy-flankéd steed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Saul rein drew on his foamy-flankéd steed,<br /></span> <span class="i0">And, about winding him, paused, looking back.<br /></span> <span class="i0">His retinue, far otherwise than he<br /></span> <span class="i0">Mounted, part even on foot, with sumpter beasts<br /></span> @@ -7624,14 +7585,14 @@ quite passed the bounds of Samaria.</p> <span class="i0">A turm of horse, large not, but formidable,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Caparison and armor gleaming bright,<br /></span> <span class="i0">And with a nameless air forerunning them<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of wide-renownéd might invincible<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of wide-renownéd might invincible<br /></span> <span class="i0">Expressed in that momentous rhythmic tread<br /></span> <span class="i0">Four-footed, underneath which from afar<br /></span> <span class="i0">With pulse on pulse now rock to iron rang.<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[324]</a></span> <span class="i0">The cavalcade, by slow degrees more slow,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Moved up the acclivity till, reached the brow,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Sank to a walk their pace, when Saul perceived<br /></span> -<span class="i0">An arméd escort was convoying one<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An arméd escort was convoying one<br /></span> <span class="i0">Thereby betokened an ambassador,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Somewhither posting on affair of state,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Or haply citizen of high degree<br /></span> @@ -7745,7 +7706,7 @@ quite passed the bounds of Samaria.</p> <span class="i0">"With his Ionic strain mellifluous<br /></span> <span class="i0">Of wonder-loving artless narrative";<br /></span> <span class="i0">Thucydides, the soul of energy;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Æschylus, Titan; happy Sophocles;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Æschylus, Titan; happy Sophocles;<br /></span> <span class="i0">With soft Euripides unfortunate;<br /></span> <span class="i0">Then Socrates, "Who wrote no books," said Saul,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[329]</a></span> <span class="i0">"Or wrote most living books in living men;<br /></span> @@ -7972,7 +7933,7 @@ quite passed the bounds of Samaria.</p> <span class="i0">"The Hebrew spirit is severe and says,<br /></span> <span class="i0">'The fool it is who in his secret heart,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Rebelling, wills no God.' 'The Hebrew spirit,'<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Said I? Forget those unadviséd words;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Said I? Forget those unadviséd words;<br /></span> <span class="i0">For to speak so is not the Hebrew spirit.<br /></span> <span class="i0">God is a jealous God; His glory He<br /></span> <span class="i0">Will to another not divide; and God<br /></span> @@ -8113,7 +8074,7 @@ quite passed the bounds of Samaria.</p> <span class="i2">'To generation, following hard the line<br /></span> <span class="i2">'Of such as hate Me, endless mercy shown<br /></span> <span class="i2">'To such as love Me and observe My law.<br /></span> -<span class="i2">'Curséd be he who dares to disobey';<br /></span> +<span class="i2">'Curséd be he who dares to disobey';<br /></span> <span class="i0">And Ebal, with its countless multitude,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Thundered to Gerizim a loud 'Amen!'<br /></span> <span class="i0">While heaven above and the wide world around<br /></span> @@ -8152,8 +8113,8 @@ quite passed the bounds of Samaria.</p> <span class="i0">A city here the tetrarch Philip built,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Or raised to more magnificent, which then,<br /></span> <span class="i0">In honor of dishonorable name<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Imperial, Tiberius Cæsar, he<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Called Cæsarea, and Philippi too<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Imperial, Tiberius Cæsar, he<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Called Cæsarea, and Philippi too<br /></span> <span class="i0">Eponymous therewith for surname joined;<br /></span> <span class="i0">But Paneas, earlier name, clung to the place,<br /></span> <span class="i0">As to this day it clings in Banias.<br /></span> @@ -8171,7 +8132,7 @@ quite passed the bounds of Samaria.</p> <p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348"> </a></span></p> -<p>Coming together again at Cæsarea Philippi (Paneas, Banias) +<p>Coming together again at Cæsarea Philippi (Paneas, Banias) after an interval of days, Saul and Sergius cross the southern spur of Hermon. A violent thunderstorm comes slowly up during the afternoon, which gives Sergius occasion, @@ -8467,7 +8428,7 @@ for the last stage of their journey to Damascus.</p> <span class="i0">And land that Moses never was to see,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Save as afar in prospect from the mount,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Because unworthy judged to enter there,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Who unadviséd words in haste let slip,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who unadviséd words in haste let slip,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Unworthy judged, and meekly by himself<br /></span> <span class="i0">Recorded judged unworthy—such a man,<br /></span> <span class="i0">To such a people, so long led by him,<br /></span> @@ -8734,7 +8695,7 @@ his journey on foot, blind, led by the hand into Damascus.</p> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Without the limits of this earthly sphere,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Immeasurable distances beyond<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The region of the utmost fixéd stars,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The region of the utmost fixéd stars,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Nay, high above all height, transcending space,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Transcending time, subsists a different world,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Invisible, inapprehensible<br /></span> @@ -8782,7 +8743,7 @@ his journey on foot, blind, led by the hand into Damascus.</p> <span class="i0">Than yesterday, forever, through more fair<br /></span> <span class="i0">Disclosure, dawn on dawn, eternally<br /></span> <span class="i0">Made of the glory of the face of Him<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In whom to His belovéd God still shines.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In whom to His belovéd God still shines.<br /></span> </div><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Morn such had risen once more in Paradise,<br /></span> <span class="i0">When there a group elect together drawn,<br /></span> @@ -9058,7 +9019,7 @@ his journey on foot, blind, led by the hand into Damascus.</p> <span class="i0">Will kindle the dark earth with many a ray,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Never to be extinguished, of heaven's light<br /></span> <span class="i0">Caught from the torch that this world-wandering man,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">This flying angel fledged with wingéd feet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This flying angel fledged with wingéd feet<br /></span> <span class="i0">Tireless, this heart of love unquenchable,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Has borne abroad, when, now the good fight fought,<br /></span> <span class="i0">Finished his course, the faith full kept, he, last,<br /></span> @@ -9152,382 +9113,6 @@ his journey on foot, blind, led by the hand into Damascus.</p> </div> - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Epic of Saul, by William Cleaver Wilkinson - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EPIC OF SAUL *** - -***** This file should be named 43247-h.htm or 43247-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/4/3/2/4/43247/ - -Produced by David Edwards and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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