"In my turn let me ask, how do you know all this?" said the elder David. "Is it your prophetic spirit that tells you? Have you remembered the sins of these Philistines, the extortions and the miseries with which they afflicted us? Do you know that there still remains much to expiate?"
"It is not just to make a single nation responsible for the crimes of all Christians. The Jews have been persecuted everywhere, and in many lands much worse than here."
"What good is all this discussion?" cried the younger David, rising from his chair. "It is nothing to us who obtains the upper hand. I do not care to decide who are the better, the Russians or the Poles. At least I know how to take a Russian. He is always easily bought; at first he is brutal and insulting, then he holds out his hand, and you have only to oil it with a few pieces of silver, and he becomes sweet and obliging; but your Poles do not inspire me with so much confidence."
Jacob would listen no longer; he arose, and cried indignantly:--
"Then, as such are your convictions I will not insist. I see, with sorrow, that you, as well as others, choose a selfish policy, and always take sides with the strong and not with the right."
"The right? The ancient rulers of the country have not respected us, have they?"
"If I admit that, is it any reason why we should imitate them to-day? The elect people ought to be more virtuous than the people they live with, and set them an example."
The younger David began to whistle, and then said:--
"Who speaks now of virtue and right? In the world of to-day self-interest is the sole right. Virtue! Right! Grand words, in which one no longer believes."--
The old man bowed before his son's superior wisdom, and threw a glance full of pride at Jacob, which seemed to say:--