you'd preach and pray and sing and recite the Law for nothing
so that Heaven might perhaps overlook your hard labour, but as things
are you must take your wages.'

[Illustration: "I work on--on _Shabbos_!"]

The minister had risen agitatedly. 'I earn my wages for the rest of my
work--the Sabbath work I throw in,' he said hotly.

'Oh come, Mr. Gabriel, that quibble is not worthy of you. But far be
it from me to judge a fellow-man.'

'Far be it indeed!' The attempted turning of his sabre-point gave him
vigour for the lunge. 'You--you whose shop stands brazenly open every
Saturday!'

'My dear Mr. Gabriel, I couldn't break the Fourth Commandment.'

'What!'

'Would you have me break the Fourth Commandment?'

'I do not understand.'

'And yet you hold a Rabbinic diploma, I am told. Does not the Fourth
Commandment run: "Six days shalt thou labour and do all thy work"? If
I were to close on Saturday I should only be working five days a week,
since in this heathen country Sunday closing is compulsory.'

'But you don't keep the other half of the Commandment,' said the
bewildered minister. '"And on the seventh is the Sabbath."'

'Yes, I do--after my six days the seventh is my Sabbath. I only sinned
once, if you will have it so, the first time I shifted the Sabbath to
Sunday, since when my Sabbath has arrived regularly on Sundays.'

'But you did sin once!' said the minister, catching at that straw.

'Granted, but as to get right again would now make a second sin, it
seems more pious to let things be. Not that I really admit the first
sin, for let me ask you, sir, which is nearer to the spirit of the
Commandment--to work six days and keep a day of rest--merely changing
the day once in one's whole lifetime--or to work five days and keep
two days of rest?'

The minister, taken aback, knew not how to meet this novel defence. He
had come heavily armed against all the usual arguments as to the
necessity of earning one's bread. He was prepared to prove that even
from a material point of view you really gained more in the long run,
as it is written in the Conclusion-of-Sabbath Service: 'Blessed shalt
thou be in the city, and blessed shalt thou be in the field.'

Simeon Samuels pursued his advantage.

'My co-religionists in Sudminster seem to have put all the stress upon
the resting half of the Commandment, forgetting the working half of
it. I do my best to meet their views--as you say, one should not dig
down a wall--