FRIAR. Thank you, thank you— From poorer men I’d steal—but nothing now! Only allow me to refresh my name In your remembrance; for I too may boast To have of old put something in your hand Not to be scorned. NATHAN. Excuse me, I’m ashamed, What was it? Claim it of me sevenfold, I’m ready to atone for my forgetting. FRIAR. But before all, hear how this very day I was reminded of the pledge I brought you. NATHAN. A pledge to me intrusted? FRIAR. Some time since, I dwelt as hermit on the Quarantana, Not far from Jericho, but Arab robbers Came and broke up my cell and oratory, And dragged me with them. Fortunately I Escaped, and with the patriarch sought a refuge, To beg of him some other still retreat, Where I may serve my God in solitude Until my latter end. NATHAN. I stand on coals— Quick, my good brother, let me know what pledge You once intrusted to me. FRIAR. Presently, Good Nathan, presently. The patriarch Has promised me a hermitage on Thabor, As soon as one is vacant, and meanwhile Employs me as lay-brother in the convent, And there I am at present: and I pine A hundred times a day for Thabor; for The patriarch will set me about all work, And some that I can’t brook—as for example— NATHAN. Be speedy, I beseech you. FRIAR. Now it happens That some one whispered in his ear to-day, There lives hard by a Jew, who educates A Christian child as his own daughter. NATHAN (_startled_). How FRIAR. Hear me quite out. So he commissions me, If possible to track him out this Jew: And stormed most bitterly at the misdeed; Which seems to him to be the very sin Against the Holy Ghost—That is, the sin Of all most unforgiven, most enormous; But luckily we cannot tell exactly What it consists in—All at once my conscience Was roused, and it occurred to me that I Perhaps had given occasion to this sin. Now do not you remember a knight’s squire, Who eighteen years ago gave to your hands A female child a few weeks old? NATHAN. How that? In fact such was— FRIAR. Now look with heed at me, And recollect. I was the man on horseback Who brought the child. NATHAN. Was you? FRIAR. And he from whom I brought it was methinks a lord of Filnek— Leonard of Filnek. NATHAN. Right!