A Somewhat Neglected but Interesting Section of the Bible A Spirited Debate-What is the Strongest Thing in the World?-Daring of the Young MenThe Pessimism of Ignorance-Proper Attitude Toward Grief and Death-Dogs in the Bible-Judith and Holofernes-Patriotic Propaganda-Character of Judith-Comparison With Esther-A Discussion of Materialism-The Love of Beauty-Etiquette and Table Manners-Right Use of Wine-Apostrophe to Death-Susanna and the Elders-A Daniel Come to Judgment-Alexander the Great-Career of Judas Maccabeus-Fighting With Elephants-Wisdom, Valour, and Self-government of the Romans-An Ideal Editor-His Pleasant Humour-Torture of the Martyrs-The Mother and Her Seven Sons-The Editor's Farewell. X THE APOCRYPHA The books of the Apocrypha are among the most interesting parts of the Bible; they contain excellent stories, deep wisdom, keen wit, shrewd observation of life, with a continual revelation of human nature. They have been unduly neglected not only by the public, but by Bible students; but they will richly repay an attentive reading. As they are generally unknown to children, one comes to them in mature years with fresh eyes; one is unhampered by previous conceptions of their doctrinal or moral significance; it is almost as if a man of forty read the Psalms or Hamlet for the first time. At the beginning of the Apocrypha, we come upon one of the noblest passages in the Bible; it is in the third and fourth chapters of the First Book of Esdras. It is in the form of a short story, and is an answer to this eternal question, What is the strongest thing in the world? The answer awarded the prize is precisely the one that would meet with the approval of the majority of thoughtful men and women in the twentieth century. King Darius had given a great state feast, and while he was sleeping off the effects, three young gentlemen of his bodyguard wrote three sentences in competition and slipped them under his pillow. When he rose up, he called upon all the princes and the governors and the chiefs of the army and took his place on the throne in the royal hall of judgment; and in the presence of a vast concourse the three young men were summoned and requested to read and defend their opinions; the prize to be awarded by popular vote. The first had written, Wine is the strongest. This statement he defended by showing how wine transformed the character and personality of those who indulged in it, how when they were drunk not only their behaviour but their whole point of view was different from their normal condition; and he insisted, with many amusing examples cited for corroboration, that an element which could so change the very heart of man must be the strongest thing in the world. It is interesting to remember that every one of the examples given by the speaker is just as noticeable to-day as then. may There is no equality in the world like that produced by drunkenness; no matter what their talents or social position, wealth or intellect or disposition be in hours of soberness, drunken men are all on the same plane, both with their contemporaries and with those who have been in the grave three thousand years. One might say that alcohol puts all its victims on the same plane with a spirit level. The second had written, The king is strongest. Then he proceeded to pay tribute to the supreme power of kings, giving many illustrations both in times of peace and in times of war; his eloquence did not conceal his irony, which was in fact so thinly veiled that it is surprising that Darius did not interrupt him with a reprimand. Man, said the speaker, is the highest form of strength produced on the planet, and as the king is always the chief and ruler of men, he must be the strongest thing in the world. Then he showed how both war and taxation depended on the caprice of the king; how the lives of his subjects were in the hollow of his hand; how some would go to war and others work on farms, merely at the king's pleasure; and then, with all the spoils that they had won by blood and sweat, they brought them humbly to the sole profiteer—the king. And while thousands of his subjects were thus fighting and working, "he lieth down, he eateth and drinketh, and taketh his rest." Surely the world affords no such example of strength as the king. He made out a good case for his own time, and for many future generations; but not forever. He had on his side human statutes, but not natural law. The curious thing to a student of history is the long endurance of men and women under the caprices and cruelties of tyrants-why should they have enjoyed such arbitrary power for so many centuries? And, indeed, what the orator said was true of the Tsar Nikolas and the Kaiser Wilhelm so late as |
