• Miriam.

Javan.

Miriam.

Javan, tempt me not,
My soul is weak. Hast thou not said of old,
How dangerous 'tis to wrest the words of truth
To the excusing our own fond desires?
There's an eternal mandate, unrepeal'd,
Nor e'er to be rescinded, "Love thy Father!"
God speaks with many voices; one in the heart,
True though instinctive; one in the Holy Law,
The first that's coupled with a gracious promise.
Yet are his words, "Leave all, and follow me,
"Thou shalt not love thy father more than me”—
And dar'st thou disobey them?

While I tread
The path of duty, I am following him,

And loving whom I ought to love, love him.'-p. 94. Her lover, at length, desists from urging her, and they part as those who are never to meet again on earth. Javan remains behind and pronounces a long lamentation on the approaching ruin of his native city. The lines are spirited, but we do not think their introduction in this place judicious or natural.-How a Jewish Christian might feel under such circumstances, we know not; but, for ourselves, we were, at this period of the drama, by far too full of Miriam, to have any room left in our hearts for the elders or Levites of Jerusalem.

*

We are now again transported to the streets of the city, where a wretched and terrified crowd is assembled, all eagerly discussing the multiplied portents and presages of evil by which their nation had long been menaced. One tells how the meteor, in form of a fiery sword, which had for many months hung over the city, had now been thrice moved and brandished-another goes back to the feast of Pentecost, and the ghastly light which had then broken forth from the altar, and 'withered men's faces to a hue like death.' A third tells how all the northern sky had been seen' rocking with armed men, and fiery chariots.' And a Levite enters who relates that, even now, the great eastern gate of the temple had spontaneously burst open with all its bolts and bars, and defied the utmost strength of men and engines to close it again.

On a sudden, music is heard from the house of Simon, where

* The mention of this incident by Crowne may be given as a favourable specimen of his

manner.

• Matthias.

Sagan.

What means that fiery sword's mysterious ray,
Which o'er our shaking towers, night and day,
In heaven's bright canopy does proudly shine,
As brandish'd by the Majesty Divine ?

Methinks Jerusalem at her solemn feast,
Seems treated like the tyrant's trembling guest,
In purple clad, her table richly spread,
But death and horror hanging o'er her head.

the

the nuptial ceremonies have begun. Songs are sung illustrative of the forms of a Jewish bridal; and their rich and luxurious harmony forms a terrible contrast with the surrounding desolation and danger. What follows, it is impossible to abridge, and, long as the extract is, our readers, we are convinced, will thank us for it :

\ (At a distance.) · To the sound of timbrels sweet,

Moving slow our solemn feet,
We have borne thee on the road,
To the virgin's blest abode ;
With thy yellow torches gleaming,
And thy scarlet mantle streaming,
And the canopy above
Swaying as we slowly move.
Thou has left the joyous feast,
And the mirth and wine have ceast;
And now we set thee down before
The jealously-unclosing door;
That the favour'd youth admits
Where the veiled virgin sits
In the bliss of maiden fear,
Waiting our soft tread to hear;
And the music's brisker din,
As the bridegroom's entering in,
Entering in a welcome guest
To the chamber of his rest.

Second Jew. It is the bridal song of Amariah

Voice within.

First Jew.

And fair Salone. In the house of Simon

The rites are held; nor bears the bridegroom home
His plighted spouse, but there doth deck his chamber;
These perilous times dispensing with the rigour

Of ancient usage

Woe! woe! woe!

Alas!

The son of Hananiah! is't not he?

Third Jew. Whom said'st?

Second Jew.

Art thou a stranger in Jerusalem,
That thou rememberest not that fearful man *

Fourth

That fearful man!' as he is here admirably described from the historian of the Jews, is thus introduced by Crowne :

'Alas!

We in Jerusalem did daily see

A greater and a living prodigy;

A man like Echo pind into a sound,

A walking vault that does one tone rebound;

And night and day does in our streets proclaim
With restless soul, Woe to Jerusalem!

VOL. XXIII. NO. 45.-Q. R.

28

(The

Fourth Jew. Speak! speak! we know not all.
Second Jew.

Within.

Why thus it was:
A rude and homely dresser of the vine,
He had come up to the Feast of Tabernacles,
When suddenly a spirit fell upon him,
Evil or good we know not. Ever since,
(And now seven years are past since it befell,
Our city then being prosperous and at peace,)

He hath gone wandering through the darkling streets
At midnight under the cold quiet stars ;

He hath gone wandering through the crowded market
At noonday under the bright blazing sun,

With that one ominous cry of "Woe, woe, woe!"
Some scoff'd and mock'd him, some would give him food;
He neither curs'd the one, nor thank'd the other.
The Sanhedrim bade scourge him, and myself
Beheld him lash'd, till the bare bones stood out
Through the maim'd flesh still, still he only cried,
Woe to the City! till his patience wearied
The angry persecutors. When they freed him,
'Twas still the same, the incessant Woe, woe, woe!
But when our siege began, awhile he ceased,
As though his prophecy were fulfill'd; till now
We had not heard his dire and boding voice.
Woe! woe! woe!

Joshua, the son of Hananiah.

Woe! woe!

A voice from the east! a voice from the west!
From the four winds a voice against Jerusalem!
A voice against the Temple of the Lord!

A voice against the bridegrooms and the brides!
A voice against all people of the land!

Woe! woe! woe!

Second Jew. They are the very words, the very voice

Which we have heard so long. And yet, methinks,
There is a mournful triumph in the tone

Ne'er heard before. His eyes, that were of old
Fix'd on the earth, now wander all abroad,
As though the tardy consummation
Afflicted him with wonder-Hark! again.

(The prophet enters.) Joshua.

CHORUS OF MAIDENS.

Now the jocund song is thine,
Bride of David's kingly line!

From the four winds, and the earth's hollow womb,

A voice, a voice-a dreadful voice is come!

A voice against our elders, priests and scribes,"

Our city, temple, and our holiest tribes;

Against the bridegroom and the joyful bride,
And all that in Jerusalem reside,

Woe! woe! woe!

How

Joshua.

How thy dove-like bosom trembleth,
And thy shrouded eye resembleth
Violets, when the dews of eve
A moist and tremulous glitter leave
On the bashful sealed lid!

Close within the bride-veil hid,
Motionless thou sit'st and mute;
Save that at the soft salute
Of each entering maiden friend
Thou dost rise and softly bend.
Hark! a brisker, merrier glee!
The door unfolds,-'tis he, 'tis he!
Thus we lift our lamps to meet him,
Thus we touch our lutes to greet him,
Thou shalt give a fonder meeting,
Thou shalt give a tenderer greeting..
Woe! woe!

A voice from the east! a voice from the west!
From the four winds a voice against Jerusalem!
A voice against the Temple of the Lord!
A voice against the bridegrooms and the brides!
A voice against all people of the land!

Woe! woe.

First Jew.

Didst speak?

Third Jew.

No.

Fourth Jew.

[Bursts away, followed by Second Jew.

Look'd be on us as he spake ?

First Jew (to the Second returning.) Thou followed'st him! what now? Second Jew. 'Twas a true prophet!

The Jews.

Second Jew.

Third Jew.

Levite.

High-Priest.

Second Jew.

High-Priest.

Wherefore? Where went he?

To the outer wall;

And there he suddenly cried out and sternly,
"A voice against the son of Hananiah!

Woe, woe!" and at the instant, whether struck
By a chance stone from the enemy's engines, down
He sank and died!

There's some one comes this way--
Art sure he died indeed?

'Tis the High-priest.
The ephod gleams through the pale lowering night;
The breast-plate gems, and the pure mitre-gold,
Shine lamplike, and the bells that fringe his robe
Chime faintly.

Israel, hear! I do beseech you,

Brethren, give ear!

Who's he that will not hear

It was but now

The words of God's High-priest?

I sate within the Temple, in the court
That's consecrate to mine office-Your eyes wander--

Jews.

Jews. Go on!

High-Priest. Why hearken, then-Upon a sudden

Jews.

High-Priest.

Jews.

First Jew.

The pavement seem'd to swell beneath my feet,
And the Veil shiver'd, and the pillars rock'd.
And there, within the very Holy of Holies,
There, from behind the winged Cherubim,
Where the Ark stood, noise, hurried and tumultuous,
Was heard, as when a king with all his host
Doth quit his palace. And anon, a voice,
Or voices, half in grief, half anger, yet
Nor human grief nor anger, even it seem'd
As though the hoarse and rolling thunder spake
With the articulate voice of man-it said,
"LET US DEPART!"

Most terrible! What follow'd?

Speak on! speak on!

I know not why, I felt
As though an outcast from the abandon'd Temple,
And fled.

Oh God! and Father of our Fathers,
Dost thou desert us?

CHORUS OF YOUTHS AND MAIDENS.

Under a happy planet art thou led,
Oh, chosen virgin! to thy bridal bed.
So put thou off thy soft and bashful sadness,
And wipe away the timid maiden tear,-

Lo! redolent with the prophet's oil of gladness,
And mark'd by heaven, the bridegroom youth is here.
Hark--hark! an armed tread!

The bold Ben Cathla!

Second Jew.
Ben Cathla. Ay, ye are met, all met, as in a mart,
T'exchange against each other your dark tales
Of this night's fearful prodigies. I know it,
By the inquisitive and half-suspicious looks
With which ye eye each other, ye do wish
To disbelieve all ye have heard, and yet

Ye dare not If ye have seen the moon unsphered,
And the stars fall: if the pale sheeted ghosts
Have met you wandering, and have pointed at you

This fearful incident is thus curiously dramatized by Crowne:
Hark! a voice does from the vault rebound.

Matthias.

Phineas.

Matthias.

(A great voice is heard from under the stage, like a tube.)
A voice! 'tis thunder, or some pagan god
Groans here tormented, chaced from his abode.
'Let us depart,' the horrid voice does cry!
What art that call'st? and whither shall we fly?
The Temple lives! it moved before and broke
The bars that fettered it, and now it spoke.
It rather dies! and these affrightful groans
Are its departing soul's contending moans.