XV.

JT

Still on the Alert.

Behold, my servant shall deal prudently; he shall be exalted and extolled, and be very high, although many were astonished at him, his visage was SO marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of man.-Isaiah lii. 13, 14.

T is said that families, nations, races are bound to exhaust themselves. The Jew is a proof to the contrary, at least in regard to intellect. Though his blood may, at times, seem impoverished, his appearance old, and his body wasted, even stunted and deformed, yet his mind is always alert; old it may be, by antiquity of culture, but never in the least decrepit or senile. And even when the Jew's body appears to us broken and degraded, this is less the result of years than of suffering. In looking at the pale Jews of certain Eastern and Oriental towns, those Jews, for example, who live on the shores of the lake whence the fishermen set out who have taken the world in their nets, we might say that Israel was an exhausted race. Its degeneration seems to include the soul as well as the body. But even in these bloodless and degraded Jews there abides a secret vitality, a marvelous power of recuperation and rejuvenation. There is sap in them still, and, to convince ourselves of this, it is often sufficient to transplant them from the poor soil of the eastern Jewries to the rich lands of the West.

ANATOLE LEROY BEAULIeu.

Watchman, what of the night, Watchman, what of the night? The watchman said: the morning cometh, although there is now night; if ye will inquire, inquire ye, return! come! -Isaiah xxi. 11, 12.

XVI.

The Man Possessed of God.

PROPHEC

Then said I, oh, Lord, I cannot speak, for I am only a youth. But the Lord said unto me: Say not I am young, for thou shalt go to all that I shall send thee, and whatever I command thee, thou shalt speak -Jeremiah i. 6, 7.

ROPHECY is not a phenomenon peculiar to Israel; all the ancient nations had prophets, that is, men who spoke in the name of God, or of supernatural powers. The prophet differs from the priest. The latter is a personage without special originality, the guardian of an established ritual, the potency of which is not at all dependent upon the personality of the priest. The prophet is the man possessed of God, and through whom the Will of God is revealed to men. But among the other nations, and even in Israel in ancient times, the prophet, seer, diviner, sorcerer, vacillates between the charlatan and the inspired one. What is unique in Jewish prophecy is that it became the allpowerful weapon of men so truly inspired, of souls so truly enlightened; the mind and the conscience of humanity found in their prophecies its first successful

and lasting expression. The work of these prophets. survives in a hundred pages of the Bible and in Three Religions.

RUTH is eternal, but her effluence

JAMES DARMStetter.

With endless change, is fitted to the hour;

Her mirror is turned forward to reflect

The promise of the future, not the past.

First find thou truth, and then,

Although she strays

From beaten paths of men

To untold ways—

Her leading follow straight

And bide thy fate.

XVII.

JN

The Force of Ancient Words.

The Lord will enter into judgment with the ancients of His people and the princes thereof; for ye have eaten up the vineyards (of the land), the spoil of the poor is in your houses. What mean ye that ye beat my people to pieces, and grind the faces of the poor?-Isaiah iii. 14, 15.

Woe unto them that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, as if they alone were set in the land. . . Of a truth! Many houses shall be desolate, even great and fair, and without a single inhabitant.-Isaiah v. 8, 9.

the presence of the iniquities of the world, the heart of the prophets bled as though from a wound of the Divine spirit, and their cry of indignation

re-echoed the wrath of the Deity. Greece and Rome had their rich and poor, just as Israel had in the days of Jeroboam, and the various classes continued to slaughter one another for centuries; but no voice of justice and pity arose from the fierce tumult. Nations were born and perished, living from day to day at the mercy of the accidents and the appetites of the hour, without comprehending that a nation, in order to live and to deserve to live, needs an ideal that may determine its destiny. In default of such, it must perish, with no reason for its existence, "its future hangs before it in tatters." Therefore these ancient words, fierce and violent, have more vitality at the present time, and answer better to the needs of modern souls than all the classic masterpieces of antiquity, Therefore these stray pages, sent forth twenty-six centuries ago among two imperfectly civilized tribes, and exposed to the vicissitudes of national life, constitute a production that will live forever.

OPPRESSION shall not always reign;

There comes a brighter day,

When freedom, burst from every chain,
Shall have triumphant sway.

Then right shall over might prevail,

And truth's full armed array,

The hosts of tyrant wrong assail,
And hold eternal sway.

JAMES DARMSTETTER.

XVIII. The Suffering Witness for God.

Thou, O God, hast proved us; Thou hast tried us, as silver is tried. Thou broughtest us into a net (for our feet). Thou laidest affliction upon our loins. Thou hast caused men to ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water, but Thou broughtest us out to liberty.-Psalm lxvi. 10, 12.

FOR the sufferings of Israel, transformed by triumphant prophecy after the exile, are no longer, as at the time of Jeremiah and of militant prophecy, only the expiation of her faults, the ignominious punishment for her sins; they are now conceived of as the price of salvation of the human soul. God has placed his spirit in Israel, through her to acquaint the nations with justice. It is, therefore, not in vain that Israel suffered, that she was despised and rejected of men, a people of sorrows, acquainted with grief. Sent by the Lord to preach His Word, she was not rebellious, and recoiled not from the burden of sorrow. She gave her cheek to those that struck her, her face to those that insulted her, and hid not her countenance, although reviled and spat upon. As the lamb that is led to the slaughter, as the sheep that is dumb before the shearer, she opened not her mouth, and therefore she shall not die. Men believe her stricken of God, whereas she was afflicted to reclaim them from their sins; it was for their salvation that she was chastised. And she is growing neither weary nor discouraged, so that justice may be