flattering words.

NATHAN.

And what were they?

DERVISE.

He said a beggar's wants
Are known but to the poor alone; that they
Alone can tell how want should be relieved.
"Thy predecessor was too cold," he said,
"Too harsh, and when he gave, 'twas with a frown.
He searched each case too strictly, not content
To find out want, he would explore the cause,
And thus he measured out his niggard alms.
Not so wilt thou bestow, and Saladin
Will not appear so harshly kind in thee.
Thou art not like that choked-up conduit-pipe,
Whence in unequal streams the water flows,
Which it receives in pure and copious stores.
Al-Hafi thinks, Al-Hafi feels like me."
The fowler whistled, and at last the quail
Ran to his net. Cheated, and by a cheat?

NATHAN.

Hush, Dervise, hush!

DERVISE.

What! is it not a cheat
To grind mankind by hundred thousands thus!
Oppress them, plunder, butcher, and torment,
And singly play the philanthropic part?
Not cheating, to pretend to imitate
That heavenly bounty, which in even course
Descends alike on desert and on plain,
On good and bad, in sunshine and in shower,
And not possess the never empty hand
Of the Most High! Not cheating----

NATHAN.

Dervise, cease!

DERVISE.

Nay, let me speak of cheating of my own,
How now? Were it not cheating to seek out
The bright side of impostures such as these,
That under colour of this brighter side
I might take part in them? What say you now?

NATHAN.

Fly to your desert quickly. Amongst men
I fear you'll soon unlearn to be a man.

DERVISE.

I fear so too. Farewell!

NATHAN.

What, so abrupt?
Stay, stay, Al-Hafi! Has the desert wings?
It will not fly away. Here, stay, Al-Hafi!
He's gone; he's gone. I would that I had asked
About that Templar; he must know the man.

Scene IV.

Daja (_rushing in_), Nathan.

DAJA