Still goaded day by day with such desire As nobler spirits know, to feel the strain And wrestle of antagonistic thews Tempting his might and stirring up his mind, Saul felt, besides, the motion and ferment And great dilation of a patriot soul, Magnanimous, laboring for his country's cause. He thought the doctrines of the Nazarene Pernicious to the Jewish commonwealth, Not less than was his person base, his life Unseemly, and opprobrious his death. He saw, or deemed he saw, in what was taught From Jesus, only deep disparagement Disloyally implied of everything Nearest and dearest to the Hebrew heart. The gospel was high treason in Saul's eyes; Suppose it but established in success, The temple then would be no more what erst It was, the daily sacrifice would cease, The holy places would with heathen feet Be trodden and profaned, the middle wall Of old partition between Jew and Greek Would topple undermined, the ritual law Of Moses would be obsolete and void, Common would be the oracles of God, To all divulged, peculiar once to Jews-- Of Jewish name and nation what were left? Such thoughts, that seemed of liberal scope, were Saul's, Commingled, he not knowing, with some thoughts, Less noble, of his own aggrandizement. It came at length to pass that on a day The spacious temple-court is thronged with those Come from all quarters to Jerusalem, Or dwellers of the city, fain to hear Once more the preacher suddenly so famed. Present is Saul, but not as heretofore To hearken only and observe; the hour Has struck when his own voice he must uplift, To make it heard abroad. He dreamed it not, But Rachel too was there, his sister. She Had, from sure signs observed, aright surmised That the ripe time to speak was come to Saul. In her glad loyalty, she doubted not That he, that day, would, out of a full mind, Pressed overfull with affluence from the heart, Pour forth a stream of generous eloquence-- Stream, nay, slope torrent, steep sheer cataract, Of reason and of passion intermixed-- For such she proudly felt her brother's power-- Which down should rush upon his adversaries And carry them away as with a flood, Astonished, overwhelmed, and whirled afar; Rescued at least the ruins of the state! So glorying in her high vicarious hope For Saul her brother, Rachel came that morn Betimes and chose her out a safe recess For easy audience, nigh, and yet retired, Between the pillars of a stately porch, Where she might see and not by him be seen.