s power, and that not he shows its way to the
locust swarm? Does the merchant who gives his wealth to the winds,
which come he knows not whence, and his life to the waves on that abyss
which swallows all, and returns nothing?

"Where is the man without dread in his spirit? Is it the hunter who
chases the nimble deer and on the road meets a lion which mocks at his
arrows? Is it the warrior who goes forth to gain glory with toiling,
and meets a forest of sharp lances and bronze swords which are
thirsting for his life blood? Is it the great king who under his purple
puts on heavy armor, who spies out with sleepless eye the treachery of
overpowering neighbors, and seizes with his ear the rustle of the
curtain lest treason overturn him in his own tent?

"For this reason men's hearts in all places and at all times are
overflowing with sadness. In the desert the lion and the scorpion are
his danger, in the cave lurks the dragon, among flowers the poisonous
serpent. In the sunshine a greedy neighbor is thinking how to decrease
his land, in the night the active thief is breaking through the door to
his granary. In childhood he is incompetent, in old age stripped of
strength. When full of power, he is surrounded by perils, as a whale is
surrounded by abysses of water.

"Therefore, O Lord, my Creator, to Thee the tortured human soul turns
itself. Thou hast brought it into a world full of ambushes, Thou hast
grafted into it the terror of extinction. Thou hast barred before it
all roads of peace, save the one road which leads to Thee. And as a
child which cannot walk grasps its mother's skirt lest it fall, so
wretched man stretches forth his hands toward Thy tenderness, and
struggles out of uncertainty."

Sarah was silent; the prince fell into meditation, and then said,

"Ye Jews are a gloomy nation. If men in Egypt believed as thy song
teaches, no one would laugh on the banks of the Nile. The wealthy would
hide in underground temples through terror, and the people, instead of
working, would flee to caves, look out and wait for mercy which would
never come to them.

"Our world is different: in it a man may have everything, but he
himself must do everything. Our gods help no idleness. They come to the
earth only when a hero dares a deed which is superhuman and when he
exhausts every power present. Such was the case with Ramses the Great
when he rushed among two thousand five hundred hostile chariots, each
of which carried thre