CHRIST AND THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA.

CHRISTUS.

Thou hast well said

I have no husband. Thou hast had five husbands; And he whom now thou hast is not thy husband.

SAMARITAN WOMAN.

Surely thou art a Prophet, for thou readest
The hidden things of life! Our fathers worshiped
Upon this mountain Gerizim; and ye say
The only place in which men ought to worship
Is at Jerusalem.

CHRISTUS.

Believe me, woman,

The hour is coming, when ye neither shall
Upon this mount, nor at Jerusalem,
Worship the Father; for the hour is coming,
And is now come, when the true worshipers
Shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth!
The Father seeketh such to worship him.
God is a spirit; and they that worship him
Must worship him in spirit and in truth.

SAMARITAN WOMAN.

Master, I know that the Messiah cometh,

Which is called Christ; and he will tell us all things.

CHRISTUS.

I that speak unto thee am he!

THE DISCIPLES, returning.
Behold,

The Master sitting by the well, and talking
With a Samaritan woman! With a woman
Of Sychar, the silly people, always boasting
Of their Mount Ebal, and Mount Gerizim,
Their Everlasting Mountain, which they think

Higher and holier than our Mount Moriah!
Why, once upon the Feast of the New Moon,
When our great Sanhedrim of Jerusalem
Had all its watch-fires kindled on the hills
To warn the distant villages, these people
Lighted up others to mislead the Jews,
And make a mockery of their festival!
See, she has left the Master; and is running
Back to the city!

SAMARITAN WOMAN.

O, come see a man

Who hath told me all things that I ever did!

Say, is not this the Christ?

THE DISCIPLES.

Lo, Master, here

Is food, that we have brought thee from the city.
We pray thee eat it.

CHRISTUS.

I have food to eat

Ye know not of

THE DISCIPLES, to each other.

Hath any man been here,

And brought him aught to eat, while we were gone?

CHRISTUS.

The food I speak of is to do the will

Of Him that sent me, and to finish his work.
Do ye not say, Lo! there are yet four months
And cometh harvest? I say unto you,
Lift up your eyes, and look upon the fields,
For they are white already unto harvest!

From the “DIVINE TRAGEDY," by H. W. Longfellow.

THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA.

IN the hot noon, for water cool,

She strayed in listless mood:

When back she ran, her pitcher full

Forgot behind her stood.

Like one who followed straying sheep,

A weary man she saw,

Who sat upon the well so deep,

And nothing had to draw.

"Give me to drink," he said. Her hand

Was ready with reply;

From out the old well of the land

She drew him plenteously.

He spake as never man before ;
She stands with open ears ;
He spake of holy days in store,
Laid bare the vanished years.

She cannot still her throbbing heart;
She hurries to the town,

And cries aloud in street and mart,

The Lord is here: come down."

Her life before was strange and sad,
Its tale a dreary sound:

Ah! let it go, or good or bad,

She has the Master found.

Rev. George MacDonald.

JACOB'S WELL.

ERE, after Jacob parted from his brother,

His daughters lingered round this well, new-made;
Here, seventeen centuries after, came another,
And talked with JESUS, wondering and afraid;
Here, other centuries past, the emperor's mother
Sheltered its waters with a temple's shade;
Here, 'mid the falling fragments, as of old,
The girl her pitcher dips within its waters cold.

And Jacob's race grew strong for many an hour,
Then torn beneath the Roman eagle lay;
The Roman's vast and earth-controlling power

Has crumbled like these shafts and stones away;
But still the waters, fed by dew and shower,
Come up, as ever, to the light of day,

And still the maid bends downward with her urn,
Well pleased to see its glass her lovely face return.

And those few words of truth, first uttered here,
Have sunk into the human soul and heart;

A spiritual faith dawns bright and clear,

Dark creeds and ancient mysteries depart;
The hour for God's true worshipers draws near ;
Then mourn not o'er the wrecks of earthly art:
Kingdoms may fall, and human works decay,
Nature moves on unchanged, Truths never pass away.

283

James Freeman Clarke.

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