oet,
orator, lawgiver, prophet, his greatness is as the sun at morning,
its flood of splendor quenching all other lights, even that of the
first and noblest of the Caesars. After him the judges. And then
the kings--the son of Jesse, a hero in war, and a singer of songs
eternal as that of the sea; and his son, who, passing all other
kings in riches and wisdom, and while making the Desert habitable,
and in its waste places planting cities, forgot not Jerusalem which
the Lord had chosen for his seat on earth. Bend lower, my son!
These that come next are the first of their kind, and the last.
Their faces are raised, as if they heard a voice in the sky and
were listening. Their lives were full of sorrows. Their garments
smell of tombs and caverns. Hearken to a woman among them--'Sing
ye to the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously!' Nay, put your
forehead in the dust before them! They were tongues of God, his
servants, who looked through heaven, and, seeing all the future,
wrote what they saw, and left the writing to be proven by time.
Kings turned pale as they approached them, and nations trembled at
the sound of their voices. The elements waited upon them. In their
hands they carried every bounty and every plague. See the Tishbite
and his servant Elisha! See the sad son of Hilkiah, and him, the seer
of visions, by the river of Chebar! And of the three children of
Judah who refused the image of the Babylonian, lo! that one who,
in the feast to the thousand lords, so confounded the astrologers.
And yonder--O my son, kiss the dust again!--yonder the gentle son
of Amoz, from whom the world has its promise of the Messiah to
come!"

In this passage the fan had been kept in rapid play; it stopped
now, and her voice sank low.

"You are tired," she said.

"No," he replied, "I was listening to a new song of Israel."

The mother was still intent upon her purpose, and passed the
pleasant speech.

"In such light as I could, my Judah, I have set our great men
before you--patriarchs, legislators, warriors, singers, prophets.
Turn we to the best of Rome. Against Moses place Caesar, and Tarquin
against David; Sylla against either of the Maccabees; the best
of the consuls against the judges; Augustus against Solomon,
and you are done: comparison ends there. But think then of the
prophets--greatest of the great."

She laughed scornfully.

"Pardon me. I was thinking of the soothsayer who warned Caius Julius
against the Ides of Ma