ewes clean for
the winter as by cutting their throats in the Temple. All the same
stooping over ewes makes one's back ache, he repeated, for the words
evoked the old shepherd, and he waited for Jacob to answer in the words
spoken by him forty years ago to Joshbekashar. Himself had forgotten his
words, but he thought he would recognise them if Jacob were inspired to
speak them. But Jacob kept silence for shame's sake, for his hope was
that the flock would be given to his charge as soon as old age obliged
Jesus to join his brethren in the cenoby.

Thou'lt be sorry for me, lad, I know that well, but thou hast begun to
look forward to the time when thou'lt walk the hills at the head of the
flock like another; it is but proper that thou shouldst, and it is but
natural that the time should seem long to thee; but take on a little
patience, this much I can vouch for, every bone in me was aching when I
left the cavern this morning, and my sight is no longer what it was.
Master Jesus, I'd as lief wait; the hills will be naught without thee.
Dost hear me, Master? Jesus smiled and dropped back into his meditations
and from that day onward very little sufficed to remind him that he
would end his days in the cenoby reading the Scriptures and interpreting
them. In the cenoby, he said, men do not think, they only read, but in
the fields a shepherd need never lose sight of the thought that leads
him. A good shepherd can think while watching his sheep, and as the
flock was feeding in good order, he took up the thread of a thought to
which he had become attached since his discovery that signs and sounds
of God's presence are never lacking on earth. As God's constant
companion and confidant he had come to comprehend that the world of
nature was a manifestation of the God he knew in himself. I know myself,
he said one day, but I do not know the God which is above, for he seems
to be infinite; nor do I know nature, which is beyond me, for that, too,
seems to run into infinite, but infinite that is not that of God. A few
moments later it seemed to him he might look upon himself as an islet
between two infinities. But to which was he nearer in eternity? Ah, if
he knew that! And it was then that a conviction fell upon him that if he
remained on the hills he would be able to understand many things that
were obscure to him to-day. It will take about two years, he said, and
then many things that are dark will become clear. Two infinites, God and