We open the fifth chapter of "Nehemiah" with a shock of pain. The previous chapter described a scene of patriotic devotion in which nearly all the people were united for the prosecution of one great purpose. There we saw the priests and the wealthy citizens side by side with their humble brethren engaged in the common task of building the walls of Jerusalem and guarding the city against assault. The heartiness with which the work was first undertaken, the readiness of all classes to resume it after temporary discouragements, and the martial spirit shown by the whole population in standing under arms in the prosecution of it, determined to resist any interference from without, were all signs of a large-minded zeal in which we should have expected private interests to have given place to the public necessities of the hour. But now we are compelled to look at the seamy side of city life. In the midst of the unavoidable toils and dangers occasioned by the animosity of the Samaritans, miserable internal troubles had broken out among the Jews; and the perplexing problems which seem to be inseparable from the gathering together of a number of people under any known past or present social system had developed in the most acute form. The gulf between the rich and the poor had widened ominously; for while the poor had been driven to the last extremity, their more fortunate fellow-citizens had taken a monstrously cruel advantage of their helplessness. Famine-stricken men and women not only cried to Nehemiah for the means of getting corn for themselves and their families; they had a complaint to make against their brethren. Some had lost their lands after mortgaging them to rich Jews. Others had even been forced by the money-lenders to sell their sons and daughters into slavery. They must have been on the brink of starvation before resorting to such an unnatural expedient. How wonderfully, then, do they exhibit the patience of the poor in their endurance of these agonies! There were no bread-riots. The people simply appealed to Nehemiah, who had already proved himself their disinterested friend, and who, as governor, was responsible for the welfare of the city.