Mordecai
The wicked Haman would have slain
Even the queen herself and every Jew
That lives within the hundred provinces
Of Xerxes' weak and vacillating rule.
Zeresh
Thy action was no more than self-defense?
Mordecai
Not self-defense of Mordecai alone,
But of my blood, of Esther and the sons
Of Jacob, exiled and defenseless else.
The God of Abraham may chasten, but
He keeps his promises, nor will forsake.
Rameses sat upon his haughty throne
And knew not Joseph, for my people were
Oppressed with bitter bondage and their lives
Made hard in mortar and in brick; but still
They grew in numbers and increased and waxed
Exceeding mighty, till the land was filled
With them. And then the king was sore afraid
And wroth because the Jews had never bent
The knee at Egypt's shrines. He could enslave
But not corrupt the children of the true
And living God. And then he called
The Hebrew midwives and commanded them
To slay thereafter every son that might
Be born to Jacob's sacred blood. God kept
His covenant with Abraham and raised
Up Moses, the deliverer, and when
The plagues had failed to soften Pharaoh's heart,
The Lord smote every firstborn in the land
Of Egypt, save where hyssop mixed with blood
Was sprinkled on the lintel of the door
And on the two side posts, as Moses had
Directed. Saviour of his people, son
Of Amram and of Jochebed, obscure
Levites, found in an ark of bulrushes
Afloat among the flags near by the spot
Where Pharaoh's daughter bathed, and yet, and yet—
Zeresh
Was Moses not selected by the Lord
To lead the Israelites into the Land
Of Promise?
Mordecai
[As in soliloquy.]