X. THE beauty of this region, my mother, which lies on the shores of the Jordan, would delight your eye which so loves to dwell on the works of nature. If Tivoli and the Alban hills, the base of Soracte, the sea views of Baia and Naples, draw you so often from the heated walls of Rome, and send you back again so much happier and better, as you do ever affirm, not less would this Jewish world minister to both mind and body, to the eye loving beauty alone, and to the soul, seeking God in beauty as in all things. Indeed to thy spirit, which ever seems half caught away from earth by its familiar musings upon the future and unseen, this land would supply a nourishment others never can. Even I have come to perceive and feel the difference. It is like no other spot of earth. The mind thinks of the many times through so many centuries that the spirit of the Universe, the infinite and incomprehensible energy on which all depend, while from other nations he hath hidden himself in a silence and darkness never violated, hath here made himself visible, hath here conversed with man, and taught and guided him as a child, that through one people so instructed truth might be then spread abroad in the worldand thinking thus, a dread falls upon it in the midst of the scenes, where such things have been, which, though it awes the soul, yet strangely adds to the pleasure with which it gazes and contemplates. The very leaves of the trees as they tremble on their branches seem shaken by the invisible God; the dark woods and the silent grotto are here entered with a hesitating step, as if there especially would be felt his presence. On the banks of the sacred Jordan the ear hears Him in the murmuring of its waters. And over the face of the whole land, and in the overhanging air there seems brooding the spirit of Him, who hath indeed made all, and is the Father of all, but is in a nearer sense, as the past hath proved, the Father and Protector of this people, and may at any moment and in any place again make himself suddenly to be seen, and heard, and felt. Now especially are all looking and waiting for the place and the hour, when He shall shine forth and put in some soul his mind and his power, and establish his kingdom as of old in the sight of all men. Every rumor of what is strange is caught up and mag nified, and wherever it goes finds those full of feverish expectations, who are prompt to believe. Is this feeling that holds all alike, the high and the low, the slave and the lord, the Pharisee, the Sadducee, and the Herodian, the mother and the child, the sound and diseased of mind, the whole and the possessed, the Samaritan as well as the Jew, - is this a delusion? or is it indeed stirred up within us by the visitings of God himself, as a preparation for that which is to be soon unfolded? Oh, my mother, who can doubt, that hath dwelt upon the writings of our Scriptures, as I have lately done, whether it be of a divine origin, this general moving and heaving of the common mind? The time spoken of by the prophets hath come, and as they are true, must the kingdom of God quickly appear. And of a surety if ever this people is to be saved, it must be now; if ever they are to be snatched from the jaws of the devourer, it must be now ere they are quite swallowed up. A little while and they will be dissolved and lost in the mighty mass of the Leviathan, whose teeth are now gnashing upon them ready to destroy. Concerning this I have now at length somewhat of moment to say unto thee. But let it come in its order. It was on the first day of the week, the day. following that on which Saturninus supped with Onias, that as I sat reading, not as in Rome, Ennius or Virgil or Seneca, but the Prophets, Judith with steps light as a falling leaf, drew near, and wished to converse. For Judith I was ready, alas! how ready, to close even the Prophets. I saw at once that some trouble had come into her clear spirit to stir and cloud its depths. "What is it?" said I, as she placed herself at my side; your eye is often sad, but never troubled as now. speak?" Of what wouldst thou "Of my father, Julian of Onias." -- "And what of Onias?" "is it not well with him?" said I with alarm; "Yes, it is well with him," she replied, "and yet is he sick. He is not as he used to be. He is silent; he hears not what is spoken; by night he wakes, and dreams by day. Then, as thou knowest, he leaves the harvest, and the care of his fields, where once was all his delight, for the company of those in Beth-Harem, whom formerly he knew not, for those long visits to Machærus, and journeys to and fro over Judea. I know not what it all portends." "Confides he not in thee, Judith?" "Alas! not in all things. My mother, as 1 have heard, shared not only his love but his trust also. Me, though he loves as fondly as father, methinks, ever did, yet doth he still deem a child to be loved indeed, but not wholly trusted." "But to me, Judith, will he entrust, less of himself than to thee. I am a stranger in comparison of thee. He has spoken to me only of things common to all. On our journey hither, indeed, he talked more largely, but since, he has been closer to me than even to thee." "Yet," said Judith, "do I guess from the looks which from time to time he fixes on you, that to you he will ere long impart that, whatever it may be, which causes his anxiety. But I would that before that, nay at once, you might tear his secret from him, and so either deliver him from his yoke, or, if it be worthy, share it with him, laying on me also an equal weight." "Do you not," said I, "even so much as surmise what it is that hath so possessed him?" "I cannot, Julian, but think I do; yet may God grant it to be an error. I know nothing; but, as thou sayest, I surmise. I fear then, that Onias plans a rising in Israel. Since my memory can tell of anything, it tells of nothing with such clearness and strength as of Onias's worship of the names and deeds of the Maccabees, and of Judas of Galilee. In the morning and the evening prayer these are the names, |