Scene II.
Recha, Nathan, and Daja.
RECHA.
And is it you! your very self, my father?
I thought you had but sent your voice before you,
Where are you lingering still? What mountains, streams,
Or deserts now divide us? Here we are
Once more together, face to face, and yet
You do not hasten to embrace your Recha!
Poor Recha! she was almost burnt alive!
Yet she escaped----But do not, do not shudder.
It were a dreadful death to die by fire!
NATHAN.
My child! my darling child!
RECHA.
Your journey lay
Across the Tigris, Jordan, and Euphrates,
And many other rivers. 'Till that fire
I trembled for your safety, but since then
Methinks it were a blessed, happy thing
To die by water. But you are not drowned,
Nor am I burnt alive. We will rejoice,
And thank our God, who bore you on the wings
Of unseen angels o'er the treacherous streams,
And bade my angel bear me visibly
On his white pinion through the raging flames.
NATHAN (aside).
On his white pinion! Ha! I see; she means
The broad white fluttering mantle of the Templar.
RECHA.
Yes, visibly he bore me through the flames,
O'ershadowed by his wings. Thus, face to face,
I have beheld an angel--my own angel.
NATHAN.
Recha were worthy of so blest a sight.
And would not see in him a fairer form
Than he would see in her.
RECHA (smiling).
Whom would you flatter--
The angel, dearest father, or yourself?
NATHAN.
And yet methinks, dear Recha, if a man--
Just such a man as Nature daily fashions--
Had rendered you this service, he had been
A very angel to you.
RECHA.
But he was
No angel of that stamp, but true and real.
And have I not full often heard you say
'Tis possible that angels may exist?
And how God still works miracles for those
Who love Him? And I love Him dearly, father.
NATHAN.
And He loves you; and 'tis for such as you
That He from all eternity has wrought
Such ceaseless wonders daily.
RECHA.
How I love
To hear you thus discourse!
NATHAN.
Well, though it sound
A thing but natural and common-place
That you should by a Templar have been saved,
Is it the less a miracle for that?
The greatest of all miracles seems this:
That real wonders, genuine miracles,
Can seem and grow so commonplace to us.
Without this universal miracle,
Those others would scarce strike a thinking man,
Awaking wonder but in children's minds,
Who love to stare at strange, unusual things,
And hunt for novelty.
DAJA.
Why will you thus
With airy subtleties perplex her mind,
Already overheated?
NATHAN.
Silence, Daja!
And was it then no miracle that Recha
Should be indebted for her life to one
Whom no small miracle preserved himself?
Who ever heard before, that Saladin
Pardoned a Templar? that a Templar asked it--
Hoped it--or for his ransom offered more
Than his own sword--belt, or at most his dagger?
RECHA.
That argues for me, father! All this proves
That my preserver was no Templar knight,
But only seemed so. If no captive Templar
Has e'er come hither but to meet his death,
And through Jerus'lem cannot wander free,
How could I find one, in the night, to save me?
NATHAN.
Ingenious, truly! Daja, you must speak.
Doubtless, you know still more about this knight;
For 'twas from you I learnt he was a prisoner.
DAJA.
'Tis but report indeed, but it is said
That Saladin gave freedom to the knight,
Moved by the likeness which his features bore
To a lost brother whom he dearly loved,
Though since his disappearance twenty years
Have now elapsed. He fell I know not where,
And e'en his very name's a mystery.
But the whole tale sounds so incredible,
It may be mere invention, pure romance.
NATHAN.
And why incredible? Would you reject
This story, Daja, as so oft is done,
To fix on something more incredible,
And credit that? Why should not Saladin,
To whom his race are all so dear, have loved
In early youth a brother now no more?
Since when have features ceased to be alike?
Is an impression lost because 'tis old?
Will the same cause not work a like effect?
What, then, is so incredible? My Daja,
This can to you be no great miracle;
Or does a wonder only claim belief
When it proceeds from you?
DAJA.
You mock me, Nathan!
NATHAN.
Nay, 'tis the very tone you use yourself.
And yet, dear Recha, your escape from death
Remains no less a miracle
Of Him who turns the proud resolves of kings
To mockery, or guides them to their end
By the most slender threads.
RECHA.
O father, father!
My error is not wilful, if I err.
NATHAN.
No, I have ever found you glad to learn.
See, then, a forehead vaulted thus or thus,
A nose of such a shape, and brows that shade
The eye with straighter or with sharper curve,
A spot, a mole, a wrinkle, or a line--
A nothing--in an European's face,
And you are saved in Asia from the flames!
Is that no wonder, wonder-seeking folk?
What need to summon angels to your aid?
DAJA.
But, Nathan, where's the harm,--if I may speak--
In thinking one was rescued by an angel
Rather than by a man? Are we not brought
Thus nearer to the first mysterious cause
Of our life's preservation?
NATHAN.
Pride, rank pride!
The iron pot would with a silver tongs
Be lifted from the furnace, to believe
Itself a silver vase! Well! where's the harm?
And "where's the good?" I well may ask in turn.
Your phrase, "It brings you nearer to the first
Mysterious cause!" is nonsense--if 'tis not
Rank blasphemy:--it works a certain harm.
Attend to me. To him who saved your life,
Whether he be an angel or a man,
You both--and you especially--should pay
Substantial services in just return.
Is not this true? Now, what great services
Have you the power to render to an angel!
To sing his praise--to pour forth sighs and prayers--
Dissolve in transports of devotion o'er him--
Fast on his vigil, and distribute alms?
Mere nothings! for 'tis clear your neighbour gains
Far more than he by all this piety.
Not by your abstinence will he grow fat,
Nor by your alms will he be rendered rich;
Nor by your transports is his glory raised,
Nor by your faith in him his power increased.
Say, is not all this true? But to a man----
DAJA.
No doubt a man had furnished us with more
Occasions to be useful to himself;
God knows how willingly we had seized them!
But he who saved her life demanded nought;
He needed nothing--in himself complete
And self--sufficient--as the angels are;
RECHA.
And when at last he vanished----
NATHAN.
How was that?
Did he then vanish? 'Neath yon spreading palms
Has he not since been seen? Or have you sought
Elsewhere to find him?
DAJA.
No, in truth we've not.
NATHAN.
Not sought him, Daja? Cold enthusiasts!
See now the harm: suppose your angel stretched
Upon a bed of sickness!
DAJA.
Sickness, what!
RECHA.
A chill creeps over me. I shudder, Daja!
My forehead, which till now was warm, becomes
As cold as very ice; come, feel it, Daja.
NATHAN.
He is a Frank, unused to this hot clime,
Young and unpractised in his order's rules,
In fastings and in watchings quite untrained.
RECHA.
Sick! sick!
DAJA.
Your father means 'twere possible.
NATHAN.
Friendless and penniless, he may be lying
Without the means to purchase aid.
RECHA.
Alas!
NATHAN.
Without advice, or hope, or sympathy,
May lie a prey to agony and death.
RECHA.
Where, where?
NATHAN.
And yet for one he never knew--
Enough for him it was a human being--
He plunged amid the flames and----
DAJA.
Spare her, Nathan!
NATHAN.
He sought no more to know the being whom
He rescued thus--he shunned her very thanks----
RECHA.
Oh, spare her!
NATHAN.
Did not wish to see her more,
Unless to save her for the second time--
Enough for him that she was human!
DAJA.
Hold!
NATHAN.
He may have nothing to console him dying,
Save the remembrance of his deed.
DAJA.
You kill her!
NATHAN.
And you kill him, or might have done at least.
'Tis med'cine that I give, not poison, Recha!
But be of better cheer: he lives--perhaps
He is not ill.
RECHA.
Indeed? not dead--not ill?
NATHAN.
Assuredly not dead--for God rewards
Good deeds done here below--rewards them hero.
Then go, but ne'er forget how easier far
Devout enthusiasm is, than good deeds.
How soon our indolence contents itself
With pious raptures, ignorant, perhaps,
Of their ulterior end, that we may be
Exempted from the toil of doing good.
RECHA.
O father! leave your child no more alone.--
But may he not have only gone a journey?
NATHAN.
Perhaps. But who is yonder Mussulman,
Numbering with curious eye my laden camels?
Say, do you know him?
DAJA.
Surely your own Dervise.
NATHAN.
Who?
DAJA.
Your Dervise--your old chess companion.
NATHAN.
Al-Hafi do you mean? What!--that Al-Hafi?
DAJA.
No other: now the Sultan's treasurer.
NATHAN.
What, old Al-Hafi? Do you dream again?
And yet 'tis he himself--he's coming hither.
Quick, in with you! What am I now to hear?