The first part is an apt version of the saying of Rabbi Eliezer, son of Hyrkanos: “Repent one day before thy death” (Pirke Abot 2. 15). Whereon the Talmud (Shabbat 153a) records that Eliezer’s disciples asked Browning’s very question, and received precisely the same answer. The second group of stanzas introduces us to a young Sadducee who has doubts as to the existence of the soul. The poet obviously got his information from Mark, but was a trifle confused as to what he read there. The Sadducees (Mark 12. 18) denied the resurrection, and some have supposed their denial to have extended to the belief in immortality. (See Dr. Kohler’s remarks in the _Jewish Encyclopedia_, vol. x, p. 631, top of second column.) To Browning this may have seemed equivalent to questioning the existence of the soul. Assuredly, granted that there be a soul at all, it must be immortal. What is the point of calling Karshook “Hiram’s Hammer?” Browning is probably drawing on Josephus. Hiram, who helped in building the temple, also interchanged difficult problems with Solomon. (_Antiquities_, viii, 5. 3). Hence, Browning uses the name in relation to these puzzles, so wisely answered in the poem. It was also Hiram--not identical with the king of Tyre--who constructed the two temple columns Jachin and Boaz. Or, as Dr. Halper has cleverly suggested, the poet may have had in his mind a confused reminiscence of the Rabbinic praise of Johanan ben Zaccai, who (in Berakot 28 b.) is described as _Right-hand Temple-column, Strong Hammer_. Browning possibly mixed up the Hebrew _hazak_ (strong) with _hiram_, and so transformed the epithet into “Hiram’s Hammer.” If these and similar reminiscences were passing through Browning’s mind, they might well result in the verse which terminates with the brilliant phrase “struck the simple, solemn.” It needs rare wisdom to make a fool think--or even better, make him silent.