Solomon, and the Second Solomon, rest in their unknown graves; their wisdom is corrupted; but their genius survives in the earth. Of old it was said God looked down from heaven on the children of men, and found that there was "none that doeth good, no not one." But it is now man who, with eyes illumined by the brave and cultured Solomons of all lands and ages, looks upon the gods to see if there be one that doeth good. The best of them are defended only by a plea that evil is the mask of their benevolence. But it is not humanly moral to do evil that good may come. Our great Omar Khayyám, by Fitzgerald's help, says: "O Thou, who Man of baser earth didst make, And ev'n with Paradise devise the Snake: For all the Sin wherewith the face of Man Is blacken'd--Man's forgiveness give--and take!" The agreement may be fair enough so far as it concerns Sin, in the theological sense, but no Omnipotence, with unlimited choice of means to ends, could be forgiven for the agonies of nature, even did they result in benefits,--as generally they do not, so far as is known to the experience of mankind. It may be, as the American orator said, "An honest god's the noblest work of man"; and innumerable hearts enshrine fair personal ideals under uncomprehended names for deity; but each such private ideal is unconsciously antagonistic to every "collectivist" deity to whom the creation or the government of the world is ascribed. The human heart kneels before its vision, and with Mary Magdalene cries Rabboni, My Master; but Theology recognizes only the perfunctory Rabbi, and carries her beloved off into union with thunder-god, war-god, or with a deified predatory Cosmos. Yet will not the heart be bereaved of its vision; it still sees a smile of tenderness in the universe. And philosophy, though it regard that smile as a reflection of the heart's own love, may with all the more certainty itself find a religion in this maternal divinity in the earth, ever aspiring to its own supreme humanity. Solomon passes, Jesus passes, but the Wisdom they loved as Bride, as Mother, abides, however veiled in fables. She is still inspiring the unfinished work of creation, and her delight is with the children of men. NOTES [1] The name given to him in 2 Sam. xii. 25, Jedidiah ("beloved of Jah"), by the prophet of Jahveh, is, however, an important item in considering the question of an actual monarch behind the allegorical name, especially as the writer of the book, in adding "for Jahveh's sake" seems to strain the sense of the name--somewhat as the name "Jesus" is strained to mean saviour in Matt. i. 21. Jedidiah looks like a Jahvist modification of a real name (see p. 20). [2] This was continued in rabbinical and Persian superstitions, which attribute to David knowledge of the language of birds. It is said David invented coats of mail, the iron becoming as wax in his hands; he subjected the winds to Solomon, and also a pearl-diving demon.