CHAPTER XL.

THE QUEEN’S VISION OF THE “AGE OF GOLD AND FIRE.”

“Oh, moist eyes, And hurrying lips and heaving heart! The world we’ve come to late is swollen hard With perishing generations and their sins; The civilizer’s spade grinds horribly On dead men’s bones, and can not turn up soil, That’s otherwise than fetid. All successes Prove partial failure.... ... All governments, some wrong; The rich men make the poor who curse the rich, Who agonize together, rich and poor, Under and over in the social spasm. ... Who being man and human, can stand calmly by And view these things, and never tease his soul For some great cure.”—MRS. E. B. BROWNING: “_Aurora Leigh_.”

“They went up into an upper room, With the woman and Mary the mother of Jesus.”

“Many signs and wonders were done. All that believed had all things common.”—ACTS.

“I’m anxious for the coming of the people to-day; Beulah said, a week ago, at her wedding, that she’d have the old Druse camel-driver at this service; though he ran away from her marriage feast.”

“I’ve heard that she and her grandmother had a convert to our faith, nearly ripe,” replied Cornelius to his wife.

At this instant one of the “Bethany Sisters” timidly approached the speakers, evidently anxious to deliver some communication.

“’Tis ‘Brightness’ by name and by nature,” remarked Miriamne.

“Well, sister Ziha, what is it?” questioned the chaplain.

“Pardon me; but there is waiting without, a grave and taciturn man who says he would speak with the ‘Prophetess.’ He means our Miriamne.”

“Of what flavor is he, Ziha?”

“Surely, I can not imagine, sister Miriamne! His countenance is that of a Persian Jew; his turban is Turkish; his tunic Christian. But his bearing is that of a prince, though all his belongings, except his gorgeously dressed camel, are those of a beggar!”

“I’ll see him, Ziha; bid him enter,” exclaimed Miriamne.

“That I did; but he says his haste is too great and his limbs too stiff for dismounting. In truth, his brow, bleached to the bone, tells of weighty years.”

“Let’s go to him,” said the chaplain.

The missioners going forth, at the easterly side of their temple, were confronted by a majestic figure, mounted on a splendidly caparisoned white camel, evidently a borrowed one.

“_Ullah makum_,” “God be with you,” said the man on the camel with great courtliness and dignity, at the same time extending to the chaplain a parchment roll.

“This for me?” questioned the latter.

“For thee,” replied the rider, bowing as before, but looking past the question with fixed, though reverent, gaze at Miriamne.

“But who are you?” again questions the chaplain.

“God knows,” was the sententious reply of the rider, his eyes still turning, not with curiosity, but with a deferential and affectionate interest, toward the chaplain’s wife.

“What message here, my father?” questioned again Cornelius, in the language of Galilee.

The aged man’s dark face lightened at the words, and turning his reverent gaze from Miriamne toward the questioner, he slowly responded:

“The ‘Angels of the Mount’ are not too proud to call a poor camel driver ‘my father?’ Age has respect here! I might have known this: Nourahmal is full of the odors of this new Bethany!”

“And do you come from Nourahmal?” quickly interrogated Miriamne.

“Nourahmal and I are one, by the voice of God spoken through the holy Hospitaler, who is alluring me daily from the secret faiths of my fathers to learn the prayers that Nourahmal learns here.”

“I see,” continued Miriamne; “I speak with Nourahmal’s consort. Pray dismount for refreshment. We bid you every welcome, Mahmood.”

“Mahmood! called by such fine people by my proper name; not ‘dog’ or ‘here you,’ or ‘old camel goad!’ Wonderful!”

“Will Nourahmal’s spouse dismount?”

“Blessed woman, I’ve had great refreshment in being thus permitted to see thee face to face, and thank thee and thine for what thou hast done for me and mine; but I can not tarry; old age and poverty have bargained to make constant toil my master. I must keep moving or the swifter youths will take away my master and leave me to hire out to starvation;” so saying, the speaker smote his camel and the beast moved away, slowly, along the road toward Jerusalem.

Cornelius, recovering himself from his meditations, called after the departing Druse.

“What of this parchment?”

“The Hospitaler sent it! He said it would talk with ‘the Angels of the Mount.’”

The camel driver had stopped his beast to say this much. For a moment he looked at the missioners, then at their temple and its surroundings. There was a world of questioning, and wonder, and yearning in the old man’s countenance. Again his goad fell on the beast he rode and the latter bore him along.

“Shall we meet again, father?” Cornelius called after him.

“Stay master work! Go master want! ’Till good shade Death takes to the cool rest-land the holy Hospitaler, the Angels of the Mount, my Nourahmal, and may be me; even me the poor, old, camel-driver, Mahmood!” was the slow reply as the Druse departed. A turn in the road soon shut him from view.

“Well, my spouse, Miriamne, our new Bethany sees strange visitants these days,” remarked her husband.

“The mystic Druse is finding something that is finer than the creeds of his mountain clans,” rejoined Miriamne.

“Be not too certain; those Highlanders of Palestine are ever politic; they’ll quote the Koran to one of Islam, kiss the Bible in the company of Christians; but once alone are Druse to the last.”

“That is their character; but we’ve a transforming gospel; no man as old as he and companion of such advocates of the White Kingdom as the Hospitaler and Nourahmal, could talk as did that old man to kill time or conventionally.—But you do not study your parchment.” Cornelius, recalled by Miriamne’s words, unfolded the document given him by the camel-driver, and read aloud:

“My son and my daughter: Greeting; the streams of gospel blessing rising in the springs of your mountain temple reach refreshingly even unto Jerusalem, as I daily perceive. Therefore, for your consolation and for the enkindling of your pious zeal, I herewith send these lines. Work onward, beloved, believing, hoping you have arrived at the dawn of a new revelation and well commenced a true work for God. To-day, as I sought to interpret His prophecies, it came to me that that you are attempting to do is nigh to being a fulfillment of His word as recorded in the manner following by Ezekiel:

“Then the glory of the Lord departed from off the threshold of the house, and stood over the cherubim.

“And the cherubim lifted up their wings, and mounted up from the earth in my sight: when they went out, the wheels also were beside them, and every one stood at the door of the east gate of the Lord’s house; and the glory of the God of Israel was over them above.

“The word of the Lord came unto me, saying:

“Thus saith the Lord God: I will assemble you out of the countries where ye have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.

“And they shall come thither, and they shall take away all the detestable things thereof and all the abominations.

“And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within, and I will take the stony heart.

“That they may walk in my statutes, and keep mine ordinances, and they shall be my people, and I will be their God.

“Then did the cherubim lift up their wings, and the glory of the God of Israel was over them above.

“And the glory of the Lord went up from the midst of the city, and stood upon the mountain which is on the east side of the city.

“These solemn words tell how the glory and favor of God was driven from the people of old by their sinning; how slowly, yearningly, God departed; how in every land He provide _little sanctuaries_ for the faithful few. And more than all this, the Holy Word describes God in Spirit as pausing on the mount to the east of Jerusalem. That pausing place was your Olivet. The Jewish Rabbins in their sacred histories affirm that for three years God, in manifest form, tarried, near where your Temple of Allegory stands, repeating over and over the solemn call, ‘_Return unto me, and I will return unto you!_’ Beloved, since then the eternal voice, through Jesus Christ, has spoken through three ministering years from these mountains to the world. You are now re-echoing the cry. God be with you, as He is, and give you faith to call and call until the ascended Christ come into all hearts.”

“No name to his letter, as usual?” remarked the chaplain.

“He seems to loathe names almost; but recently, when I made bold to ask him his, he sententiously observed, ‘God knows; ’tis in a white stone, I’m to get; for this life I’m only remembered by what I’ve done.’ But what engages my husband’s attention now?”

“I’m trying to interpret the picture yonder, over the door, to the retreat you call the ‘_Mother’s Pillow_.’”

“What think you of it? You perceive it’s the legend of the mother pelican feeding her famishing young with blood drawn from her own bosom, which she has wounded for their food.”

“I think the picture likely to depress nervous mothers!”

“That’s a picture of one side of mother life; look beyond it.”

At that the light from a distant window was let fall, by some unseen attendant, all about the entrance to the “_Mother’s Pillow_!”

“I see a splendid ‘Gabriel’ above the pelican; the angel’s hand points upward.”

“Glorious Gabriel! Angel of mothers and victories, by interpretation, ‘God’s champion!’ You’ve heard his titles, Cornelius?”

“I know that he bore victory to Gideon and lightened the way for Daniel’s conquest of all Babylon; nor do I forget that he was the angel which comforted giant Samson’s mother before her child was born.”

“Yea, he that made the sign of the cross, doing wondrously, above the smoke of Monoah’s altar, was after commissioned to greet and guide Mary, the mother of the Giant King of the new dispensation.”

“You’ve fine insights, Miriamne, but there’s incompleteness in your symbolism here.”

“True, I feel that; all interpretation of motherhood is inadequate; but look further.”

“I see the ‘Queen of Mothers!’ Why have you left her and the babe in such deep shadows?”

“That’s this life’s reality; but look higher.”

The chaplain complied; a vine trellis was swung aside, and he beheld, above the shadowed picture, in an arch reaching nearly to the roof of the temple, another, the latter a marvel of light and color.

“Glorified Mary, uplifted by the babe, now grown and Kingly!” exclaimed the chaplain.

“And so is taught for mothers’ comfort, that the Son of God honored her who bore Him, because she was to Him a true mother. May we not believe that this love for Mary, in the God heart, is widened into peculiar tenderness toward all who give the earth its lords and paradise its elect through the crucifixions of maternity?”

“Oh, Miriamne, I’ve learned in the past to stand, as it were, with bared head, all reverential in the presence of true motherhood; when I see it strengthened by faith, enriched by suffering; the most entrancing example of self-abnegation on earth! To-day I feel, if possible, in these surroundings, a deeper reverence than ever, for that estate of woman. Say on.”

“Paganism worshiped the sun, the earth, woman; whatever brought forth; it was its best attempt at expressing a vaguely realized yet noble sentiment. The religions that repudiated paganism, in their efforts to extirpate all idolatry, went to the extreme of denying merited honor to some most worthy. Then came the Christian revolution, and God turned all eyes toward a pure woman. He proclaimed forever the honors of motherhood by presenting through it to the world His Unspeakable Gift.”

“So heaven’s last appeal to our race, after Sinai’s thunders and the rapt visions of the prophets became ineffective, was made by the eloquence of the life of the silent Mary.”

“Well said! Now filled with that belief, herald the White Kingdom!”

“I’ll help Miriamne, encouraging, upholding her; for the rest I’ve learned to lean and follow.”

“I’m a column of dust, not a pillar of fire; and dust, alas, to dust returns. There is much to do here, more than I shall be able to compass. I’ve hitherto but vaguely taught the meaning, power and blessings of motherhood.”

“I think more than vaguely.”

“The sun rises in the east. I think we’ve sunrise, but the depth, height and breadth have not been sounded nor measured yet. Shall we go toward the west wing?”

“Yea, lead, though I’m charmed in this presence.”

“I’d lead to the ‘_Rest of the Aged_.’”

“To the retreat with door like a castle? What are those amazon forms in armor?”

“The Peri?”

“I bid them welcome in Miriamne’s name, having learned that she is serious as well as cunning in weaving the manna-bearing garlands of every myth about her ideals. Say on.”

“They say there is beneath the Caucasian mountains a wondrous city builded of pearls and precious stones, in which dwells a race of surpassing beauty of person. I’ve utilized the tradition.”

“Oh, the fabled Peri; but I’m mystified.”

“They also say,” continued Miriamne, “that Dives, a wicked genus, wages constant war against the Peri, hoping to possess the treasures of the Peri capital, but that they successfully repel him and make their happiness secure. I have a similitude of the Peri city.”

“In truth, I wonder now. What fitness for such an allegory here?”

“I think I have come near to a profound truth. Listen; here at the west, I have planned to show what makes approaching age a terror.”

“There are many evils which fall upon man’s declining years.”

“Judge me if my philosophy is faulty. I see ever that the fear of being left poor and also old here haunts most lives. This fear is the parent of avarice, and avarice is a serpent of glowing head and deadly sting. It robs society and individuals of the two choicest jewels, plenteous benevolence and serene hopefulness. You will find that most of the wrongs from man to man arise from hearts made cruel by the rigors of avariciousness. If we could stay that master passion, all streams of benevolence would rise to their flood, and hoarding, now a seeming necessity, most frequently a curse, become the occupation solely of a few monomaniacs.”

“Miriamne’s philosophy is as invulnerable as a knight’s hauberk, but how can you make it a general practice?”

“Oh, very easily. I’ve planned to endow our Temple of Allegory so that it may not only teach but also do beautiful things. I’d have it a Pool of Bethesda, stirred continuously to meet every human need.”

“Miriamne will have a vast following; the masses believe in loaves and fishes!”

“True, avarice prompts some to a mean faith, but I seek to slay avarice and blast the love of money, that root of all evil.”

“‘Enthusiast!’ a gainsaying world will cry.”

“And the cry of the world will be then, as often before, a burning lie! So be it. I’m holding up the truth, the royal truth of Christianity. I’ll hold it up while I have breath, and leave that truth, if God gives me grace, as the beacon light on our hill to glow until all Christendom puts on a charity as multiform and broad as the needs of humanity.”

“But there is a large and needy world.”

“I have a rich Father; the earth is His and the fullness thereof. The only difficulty is in securing from His stewards an accounting and a beginning of payment.”

“This, Miriamne, sounds like the dream of a poet. I’ll not waken you from your beautiful trance, but still the rough fates of life as it is, and the very common commonplace confront us.”

“What a world this would be if all mankind was as one family, realizing universal brotherhood!”

“This, too, is the dream of the poet, Socialism; Astarte’s devotees practiced it in the past.”

“Now, I’ll say silence! You speak of heathen socialism. Whatever its form, lust was its corner stone, and a barbarous selfishness, which limited it to those of each tribe or clan, its best expression! I speak of a vastly finer, grander creed! I look out and forward to a day when all shall know the Lord; a day when law shall be love and love shall be law. Then earth shall be an Eden, with plenty for all, such plenty as Divine bounty bestows. Christianity means the bringing in of that day; the ‘Precious Gift’ was an earnest of all needed gifts from on high. When that day comes we shall understand why the Pentecostal fire came to all hearts in the time when all worshipers were thanking the All-Giver for the bounties of the harvest. Then avarice shall cease from the earth, and men, no more harassed by it, learn to practice all bountifulness in youth and mid-life, and also serene restfulness when their powers of bread-winning are paralyzed by the burdens of years. All will be noble, therefore none indolent. There will be no beggars, for charity will run before want, ever glad to serve those that can not serve themselves. Then those who wear the glory-crowns of gray will be nourished reverently and gladly, not as if they were useless paupers; not with a niggardly service which seems to be constantly saying, ‘How long are you going to live!’ There will be no more worriment, no more crowdings of each other, no more dishonesty among men! It is, I say, the constant fear of coming, in the day when the heart is beating the last strokes of its own funeral march, to doled charity or to nothing, that makes men pile up gain in dishonor and hoard it with miserly grasping. Do you remember that Mary returned from ministering to Elizabeth to sing her ‘Magnificat’ with these prophetic strains:

“‘His mercy is on them that fear Him from generation to generation. He hath filled the hungry with good things. He hath holpen His servant Israel.’

“From the song she went to humble, painful ministries in behalf of all the world. Mary supplemented the wondrous work of her Son and King, all the way bearing as best she could her part of His cross; all the way her quivering heart pierced by the sword that finally slew Him. She saw His bloody tears turning to crown jewels as He ascended from Olivet, and with unfaltering faith knelt among His earthly followers that she with them might receive her crown of flame. That room was the highest point of outlook on earth. It was the place of supreme beneficence; the place where God gave Himself up freely for His followers and established the memorial-superlative of the ages. Thither they hasted that they might learn how all-receiving comes from all-giving, that they might realize the measure and splendor of perfect charity, which is perfect love.”

“Miriamne, whence do you get such wondrous insights?”

Then the young wife turned aside to her “own little mountain,” as she called a secret praying place in the chapel. She quickly returned, and handing a manuscript to Cornelius, said:

“Read, please, of Pentecost.”

He complied:

“Then they that gladly received His word were baptized; and the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls.

“And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread and in prayers.

“And fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles.

“And all that believed were together, and had all things common;

“And sold their possessions and goods and parted them to all men, as every man had need.

“And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart,

“Praising God, and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved.”