BOOK III.

THE ARGUMENT.

Joy and Sorrow. The Prodigal Son. Feast at Bethany. The Anointing. Judas Iscariot. The offence. Mount Tabor. Soliloquy. Satan-and Judas. Revenge. The Sanhedrim.

THE BETRAYAL.

BOOK III.

Are there, who ignorantly deem, of joy,
That it is only sorrow's antidote:

A balm that ever breathes its fragrancy
Over the ills of life? Say not they err !
For he that, to the health of pleasure lost,
Hath made a passion and a lust of life,
Shall make that deeming good. The rather, say,

How more than that, of these alternities,

Is true. Not more the fourfold seasons blend,

And bind around the brow of the same world

Their annual wreath: the day and night not more—

The same sun high-or lights her mirror, this

Or setting―kindles her pale fires afar

The other, on his track: they mingle not

Those faint, and full-those dim, and deepening hues,

Within that heaven-writ amulet of peace

That hangs upon the bosom of the sky

O nothing more are these a harmony,

Than, to this fallen world, are mutual

Its sorrow and its joy!

The brightest ray

That falls in gladness on the heart of life

Is mellow'd with a care.

How blessedly

Comes a lost feeling to the spirit back!
There slumbers music in the silent strings

Of sadness oftentime, whose wakening

The very burthen is of minstrelsy.

A breathing and a gifted strain it is,

That whoso hears shall well account of ill,

And say, how while its scorching fingers swept,

Wantoning with its chords, the lyre along,

And left it tuneless and unstrung, they left

An unction there!

Nor yet in youth alone,