Gabriel shrunk within himself; he heard himself thus named for the first time since many years, he made no answer, but Michoel shook his head negatively. "Gabriel Süss.... Süss"--repeated Reb Mordechai thoughtfully, "was not he a bastard? I once heard something about it.... but I have no memory for such trifling matters."
"What happened to him?" asked Michoel inquisitively, "tell us, I pray you."
Reb Nochum--that was the name of the Frankfurt student--complied with Reb Michoel's urgent request, and related Gabriel's history, departing indeed here and there somewhat from the truth, but on the whole correctly enough. His story concluded thus, that Gabriel had once since his baptism been seen by early acquaintances on horseback with several Imperial troopers, but might perhaps, as he had disappeared since that time, have met his death in the Juliers and Cleves war.
"Yes, I have heard something of the kind," said Mordechai, when the Frankfurt student had finished; "but it was not known in Prague that he had become a soldier, it was reported that he had drowned himself; who knows however whether it was true.... Besides you know, he might have been declared legitimate, yes truly," added Mordechai hastily, feeling himself once more on firm ground, "The mothers declaration is worth nothing, Gabriel Süss ought not to be looked upon as a bastard, refer to the Jad-ha-Chasaka cap. 15 &c." ...
"That's all very well, Reb Mordechai," replied Michoel, "but you forget, it was a dying mother, a dying mother will not part from her child with a lie.... and moreover she had ever till then, as this story is told, loved her son.... besides, what would be the use to him? Will any one, will any one person doubt, that he is a bastard? If you had a sister or daughter, would you give her to him to wife? think of that, Reb Mordechai: No power on earth could establish the legality of his birth before our inward convictions!"
Michoel's glance chanced to rest upon Gabriel's face, he noticed the fiery red, and deadly pallor that coursed in quick succession over Gabriel's features.--"Not before inward conviction," echoed Gabriel, feebly.--Reb Mordechai had no answer to make, and a pause ensued. Gabriel might now have got away, but he would not, the conversation was too interesting to him not to hear the end of it.
"The law: that a bastard may not enter into the congregation of the Lord," began Reb Nochum again, "is unreasonable. Why should the innocent be punished for the sins of his parents? Why is he cast forth from the closest, loveliest union? Why may he never lead home a loving woman as wife? Why may he not be happy in the circle of his family? Yet consider, even in this law the spirit of the Lord comes to light, which breathes upon the faithful out of every word of Holy Scripture. Contemplate this bastard, this Gabriel Süss.... he cursed his inanimate mother: ... only a bastard could do that, no man could perpetrate such an iniquity, unless he were born in sin.... The transgression, that called him into life, urges him ever farther forward, and involuntarily he trod the paths of sin.... therefore the Lord in his wisdom may...."
"You are a thinker," Michoel interrupted the speaker, "and I am glad to have met you: such are not often found among students.... A firm faith in God is not shaken by reasonable speculations, if they are kept properly subordinate. But you are in error friend! God forbid, that any man should be obliged to follow a path absolutely fixed beforehand, the path of sin.--Where would his free will be? that is not so. You may not give a daughter or sister to a bastard as wife, so the commentaries enjoin us--but only that and nothing further is declared by the Talmud--that is a command, like many others, a command of the Lord's, obscure and inexplicable to man's mind.... but a bastard may be noble, great, a shining light to his people. Are you not acquainted with the article 'a bastard profoundly versed in scripture is superior in dignity to a high priest who is less deserving.' Is it not true," Michoel turned to Mordechai, "that it is so. Gabriel Süss ought not to have despaired, ought not to have acted as he did. The Lord had blessed him with earthly wealth, had endued him with a powerful intellect: he might have been a benefactor of the poor, a staff to the infirm, a teacher of his people, an example of humble submission. In the enjoyment of the highest mental activity, the undisturbed study of God's word, in strivings for a future state, he might have found consolation, and peace even in this world. His fate was in his own hands.... it was his own fault that he perished."
Gabriel felt as if a blazing thunderbolt had fallen in the depths of his soul. He pressed his hands spasmodically against his heart and was forced to sit down upon the curb-stone. Mordechai, whose understanding was not transcendent enough to appreciate the force of what had just been said, observed this as little as Reb Nochum, whose attention remained entirely fixed upon Michoel's words. It was only the sharp glance of this latter that noticed Gabriel's emotion, which he was incapable of controlling.--The state of frightful excitement, of feverish expectation in which he found himself, had still more intensified and exaggerated the impression of those words. He felt at this moment with the whole power of his comprehension that in the most decisive events of his life the torch of his wild hatred had been his only light, that everything had come grinning to meet him distorted by its gloomy dismal rays.... The words which might once have fallen like assuaging balsam upon his bleeding heart now struck him with the whole weight of their convincing truth. The thought, that might once have saved him, now filled him with nameless unutterable woe. The audacious confidence with which he had believed himself irresponsible for all that he had done was broken--Michoel had shown him what he might have been--how different had he become!
A pause had again ensued. Mordechai now observed with horror that he was almost too late for evening-prayer, and hurried with Reb Nochum into the nearest synagogue. Michoel remained standing before Gabriel who seemed nearly to have lost consciousness. At last he asked, recovering himself, in a dull voice: "Who are you and what is your name?"