. Then she turns her eyes upon the sun, which Christ
had said should not set until she had cursed him, and gazes into its
searing glow until her sight is again dead. Moral: it is sinful to love
the loveliness of outward things; from the soul must come salvation. As
if she had never learned the truth, she returns to her wifely love for
Arcesius. The story is as false to nature as it is sacrilegious; its
trumpery theatricalism is as great a hindrance to a possible return of
Biblical opera as the disgusting celebration of necrophilism in Richard
Strauss's "Salome."

In our historical excursion we are still among the patriarchs, and the
whole earth is of one language and of one speech. Noah, the ark, and
the deluge seem now too prodigious to be essayed by opera makers, but,
apparently, they did not awe the Englishman Edward Eccleston (or
Eggleston), who is said to have produced an opera, "Noah's Flood, or
the Destruction of the World," in London in 1679, nor Seyfried, whose
"Libera me" was sung at Beethoven's funeral, and who, besides Biblical
operas entitled "Saul," "Abraham," "The Maccabees," and "The Israelites
in the Desert," brought out a "Noah" in Vienna in 1818. Halevy left an
unfinished opera, "Noe," which Bizet, who was his son-in-law,
completed. Of oratorios dealing with the deluge I do not wish to speak
further than to express my admiration for the manner in which
Saint-Saens opened the musical floodgates in "Le Deluge."

On the plain in the Land of Shinar the families of the sons of Noah
builded them a city and a tower whose top they arrogantly hoped might
reach unto heaven. But the tower fell, the tongues of the people were
confounded, and the people were scattered abroad on the face of the
earth. Rubinstein attempted to give dramatic representation to the
tremendous incident, and to his effort and vain dream I shall revert in
the next chapter of this book. Now I must on with the history of the
patriarchs. The story of Abraham and his attempted offering of Isaac
has been much used as oratorio material, and Joseph Elsner, Chopin's
teacher, brought out a Polish opera, "Ofiara Abrama," at Warsaw in 1827.

A significant milestone in the history of the Hebrews as well as
Biblical operas has now been reached. The sojourn of the Jews in Egypt
and their final departure under the guidance of Moses have already
occupied considerable attention in this study. They provided material
for the two operas which seem to me the