Hillel and His Guest

A Talmudic Legend

Boast not thyself of to-morrow; for thou knowest not
what a day may bring forth.-Proverbs xxvii. 1.
HILLEL, the gentle, the beloved sage,
Expounded day by day the sacred page

To his disciple in the house of learning;
And day by day, when home at eve returning,
They lingered, clust'ring round him loth to part
From him whose gentle rule won every heart.
But evermore, when they were wont to plead
For longer converse, forth he went with speed,
Saying each day; "I go-the hour is late-
To tend the guest who doth my coming wait."
Until at last they said: "The Rabbi jests
When telling us thus daily of his guests
That wait for him." The Rabbi paused awhile,
And then made answer; "Think you I beguile
You with an idle tale? Not so, forsooth!
I have a guest, whom I must tend in truth.
Is not the soul of man indeed a guest,
Who in this body deigns a while to rest,
And dwells with me all peacefully to-day;
To-morrow-may it not have fled away?"

ALICE LUCAS.

Akiba

HEART, who art a fable, new and true;
O soul, a legend strange and sweet as joy;
Lover, whose love has built, not razed a Troy;
Akiba, whom heaven and angels taught to woo.

Lover, and lawyer, all Israel's sceptred mind,
Who luminous mists hast orbed into a sun
Of Oral Law, and logic's praises won;
A shepherd's crook you left, a wand to find.

Our blameless Lancelot of lists of lore,

Who made Romance a theme for cherubim;

And love, God's Song of Songs, His heavenly hymn;

And law, a mine where mercy digs for ore.

God's patriot, who heaven with life hast sought, And Holylands in Holyland hast known;

Thou art a part of heaven, thou hast shown,
Thou art a part of "Torah" thou hast taught.

What wonder you have traversed Paradise,
It was your gentle spirit's element;

What wealth to heaven, what penury hell, you sent;

Courage and wisdom hailed you brave and wise.

And virtue named you saint, and greatness, great; Patriotism, patriot; and knowledge, sage.

And love, a lover; your heart, its golden page. And holiness rejoiced to own you, mate.

What, though the foe your frame with fires shod? What, though he drained the wine-vats of your veins?

He only precious made like gems, your pains; Aye, kissed by God, your feet on crowns have trod. ALTER ABElson.

Sunshine After Storm

A Tale from the Talmud

THE rabbi viewed on Zion's hill

A fox the holy ruins treading,

Expanding griefs their bosoms fill,

Who suppliant hands to heaven are spreading.

With dancing eyes and ringing laugh,
Akiba marks the fox descending;
Exulting, waves aloft his staff;

His ill-timed mirth his friends offending.

How canst thou smile? See God's own house,
His holy place wild beasts infesting.

Such would indignant pity rouse,

If grace be still within thee resting.

Why weep? quoth he, when near fulfilled:
Her doom of trouble we're beholding.
Join you with what another skilled
In heavenly purpose, is unfolding.

Comes next, the later, happier seer
Who Salem's glory sees in vision,

Of men and dames whose hundredth year
Abounds in peace and rich provision.

Jeshurun toils through grief to joy.

Whom God would choose, He first must chasten, Let Israel faith and hope employ

His higher destiny to hasten.

WILLIAM DEARNESS.

IN

Who Serves Best

'N stern debate, all through the night they stroveThe sages of the Talmud, to record

What man deserved the favor of the Lord.

The ancient Rabbi Judah, he who throve

On fasting and on prayer, spake of one

Who lavished wealth, as worthy. "Nay," quoth Saul, The scribe and scholar, looming gaunt and tall,

"None but the wise is fit to look upon!"

"Not so," exclaimed the zealot Zadok. "Place Him first who best observes the Law!" Lo, then was heard

A child's sweet voice which thrilled the men who

erred:

"To him alone is vouchsafed God's good grace

Who renders loving service to his kind!"-
And ere they grasped the vision, it declined.

GEORGE ALEXANDER KOHUT.

Be Not Like Servants Basely Bred
ANTIGONUS of Socho said:

Be not like servants basely bred,
Who to their master minister
In hope of gift he may confer.
But be you like those servants still,
Who strive to do their master's will
Without a thought of guerdon given,
And be on you the fear of Heaven.

And this did Rabbi Tarphon say:
The work is great and short the day,
Sluggish the labourers, their Lord
Urgent, but mighty the reward.
He also said: 'Tis not on thee
Incumbent, that thou shouldest end
The work, but neither art thou free
To cease from it. If thou dost spend
Much time in studying the divine
Torah, much guerdon shall be thine,
For faithful thine employer is
Το pay thee for thy labour's sum,
And know thou that the righteous is
Rewarded in the time to come.

And Rabbi Jacob said of old:
Do thou this world of ours behold

Prepare

As though a vestibule it were
Into the world to come.
Thyself the Vestibule within,

That thou the hall may'st enter in.
And further thus his saying reads:
One hour's repentance and good deeds
In this world better is than all
The world to come, but yet withal
In yonder world one hour of bliss
Is better than all life in this.

ALICE LUCAS.

The Commandment of Forgetfulness

RABBI BEN ZADOK, o'er the sacred law

Bending with reverent joy, with sacred awe Read the commandment: "When thy harvest yields Its fruit and thou when reaping in the fields, Dost there forget a sheaf of golden grain, Fetch it not in to thee! It shall remainThe poor, the stranger and the widow's store And the Lord God shall bless thee evermore." Rabbi ben Zadok closed the well-loved book, And, gazing upward with a troubled look, He said: "With joy do I obey, O Lord, Each hest and precept. of Thy holy word, For which Thy name at morn and eve I bless. But this commandment of forgetfulness I have not yet performed as Thou hast willed Since to remember leaves unfilled."

So mused the Rabbi. But when autumn came,

And waves of corn glowed 'neath the sunset's flame,
It chanced at evening, that, his labors o'er,

He stood and gazed upon his garnered, store,"
And suddenly to him his little son

Came saying: "Father, see what thou hast done!