OCR Text |
Show CONDENSED I I CLASSICS I BEN HUR: f A TALE OF THE ? CHRIST I & ' I 4 Br LEW WALLACE ConcfcraaKon tu Pnf. William Ftnwidt Hsnb X ".' V' -a; . i.iS 1 n i i i 71 Lewis Wallace, generally knovro hj the shorter Dame Lew, wbh born in 1827 at Brookvllle, Indiana, Indi-ana, and perhaps was, quite unconsciously, uncon-sciously, potent tn spreading the idea, to some, that in that state is located lo-cated the literary center of this country. He died in 1005. Like the students stu-dents of today la the gtreat strusr-Kle, strusr-Kle, he left his hooka for the Mexican war. He. served ajrain in the Civil War and rose to be major- BCneral in the volunteer army. As after the Mexican episode, he returned UKUin to the law; he was Governor of Ltah from 1S7S to 1SS1, nnd minister to Turkey from 18S1 to 1HS5, when as a good diplomat he won the esteem of the late uulamented Abdul-Hamid and could really put through business with that scientifically dilatory tyrant. He is known by his 'hree books. 'The Fair God" (1N73), "Ben-Hur" (1S.S0), and '-The Prince of India" IlKs;!). The first is a very clever reconstruction re-construction of the story of the conquest con-quest of .Mexico by the Spaniards. The render feels n Rreat sympathy with the hlKhly developed natives who fell helpless help-less before the superior arms of the invaders. The story, however, is by no means to be put in the same class with '-Ben-Hur." The skill, the knowl- j edffe. the reverence with which the story of Christ is told ( largely through the lives of others) have made "Ben-Hur" "Ben-Hur" one of the books to take a secure hold on the public, both as hook and on the stage, where the famous chariot race has won a classic place. J' g IIE workmen put their hands , Jj to the cross and carried it. burden and all, to the place of planting. At a word, they dropped the tree into the hole; and the body of the Xazarene also dropped heavily, and hung by the bleeding hands. Still no cry of pain only the exclamation divinest of all recorded exclamations: " 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.' "The cross, reared now above all other objects, and standing singly out against the sky, was greeted with a burst of delight; and all who could see and read the writing upon the board over the Nazarene's head made haste to decipher it. Soon as read, the legend was adopted by them and communicated, communicat-ed, and presently the whole mighty ' concourse was ringing the salutation from side to side, and repeating it with laughter and groans: " 'King of the Jews ! Hail king of the Jews !' "The sun was rising rapidly to noon ; the hills bared their brown breasts lovingly lov-ingly to it ; the more distant mountains rejoiced in the purple with which it so regally dressed them. In the city the temples, palaces, towers, pinnacles, and all points of beauty and prominence promi-nence seemed to lift themselves into the unrivaled brilliance, as if they knew the nride thov were eivinp- the many who from time to time turned to look at them. Suddenly a dimness began be-gan to fill the sky and cover the earth at first no more than a scarce perceptible per-ceptible fading of the day, a twilight out of time; an evening gliding in upon up-on the splendors of noon. But It deepened, deep-ened, and directly drew attention; whereat the noise of the shouting and laughter fell off, and men, doubting their senses, gazed at enrh other curiously; curi-ously; then they looked to the sun again; then at the mountains, getting farther away; at the sky and the near landscape, sinking in shadow; at the hill upon which the tragedy was enacting; and from all these they gazed at each other again, and turned pale and held their peace. " 'It is only a mist or passing cloud,' Sinionldes said soothingly to Ksther, who was alarmed. 'It will brighten presently.' "Ben-Hur did not think so. " 'It is not a mist or a cloud,' he said. 'The spirits who live in the air the prophets and saints are at work in mercy to themselves and nature. I say to you, oh, Simonides, truly as Cod lives, he who hangs yonder is the Son of God.' "And leaving Simonides lost In wonder won-der at such a speech from him he went where Balthazar was kneeling nearby, and laid his hand upon the good man's shoulder. " 'Oh, wise Egyptinn, hearken ! Thou alone wert right the Nazarene is indeed in-deed the Son of God.' "Balthazar drew him down to him and replied, feebly, 'I saw him a child in the manger where he was lirst laid ; It Is not strange that I knew him s"ii".-er s"ii".-er than thou; but oh that I should live to see this day! Would that I had died with my brethren! Happy Mol-chlor! Mol-chlor! Happy Caspar!' "'Comfort thee!' said Ben-Hur. 'Doubtless they too are here.' Within the frame of the story of Christ is told the tale of Ben-Hur, o glnnlng with the appearance of three wise men, Balthazar, Melchior nnd Caspar, and ending with the sublime tragedy on Golgotha. From the days of the scenes at the manger until the culmination of the great story, the figure of Christ appears bat once, and then for a moment, but over all that happens in the intervening years hovers the gentle spirit; thrilling as the episodes are in themselves, strongly as the characters are portrayed, por-trayed, they are but a preparation for what is to follow, a mere worldy setting set-ting for him who was too great for all save a few to understand at that time. Some twenty-one years after the scenes at the manger, a young Jew. Ben-Hur, a prince of Jerusalem, rich, happy, ambitious, was standing by a parapet of his palace, watching the progress of Valerius Gratus, Imperial governor of Judea. As the Roman passed beneath the wall amid the jeers and insults of the Jews the young prince leaned far out to see the new-governor; new-governor; a tile was displaced and, as bitter fate would have it, fell full upon the governor. The accident was not fatal ; but it was an opportunity for exemplary justice, especially as the estates es-tates of the Jew were very desirable to the governor and his friend Messala, hitherto almost brother to Ben-Hur though the latter had been. The unhappy un-happy Jew was sent as a rower to the galleys, where the limit of life was at most but a year. His mother and sister sis-ter were immured in a secret cell in the Tower of Antonia, where they were doomed to the fate of the lepers. lep-ers. The only act of kindness Ben-Hur Ben-Hur could remember during the years that followed was on the day he was dragged to the galleys. "The hand laid kindly upon his shoulder awoke the unfortunate man, and looking up. he saw a face he never forgot the face of a boy about his own age. shaded by locks of yellowish bright chestnut hair; a face lighted by dark blue eyes, at the time so soft, so appealing, ap-pealing, so full of love and holy purpose, pur-pose, that they had all the power of command and will." That was in Nazareth. How- Ben-Hur in time became a rower on the flagship of Airrus. duumvir duum-vir and admiral, how the flagship was destroyed in a great sea fight, how Ben-Hur rescued the admiral, became his adopted son and heir, learned at Kome the manner of Roman war and Roman sports, returned to the East a Roman officer in the train of a consul con-sul setting forth on a great campaign against the Farthians; how he discovered dis-covered that his father's old steward Simonides had succeeded in saving from confiscation the vast intangible wealth of the Hurs and had multiplied it many times, till the young Roman-Jew Roman-Jew was the richest private citizeu in the world; the discovery that Messala Mes-sala was entered for t lie highest stake in the great sporting event of the orient: how Ben-IIur won the affection of Uderim, the Arab sheik, who had entered his steeds of the desert for the great event all this leads up to the dramatic encounter of the famous chariot race. The author drew his description of the race from one written writ-ten over twenty-three hundred years ago by the tragic poet Sophocles. It is one of the curiosities of literature that the great scene, through the pages i of Lew Wallace's novel, has become ' as famous on our stage as it was so long ago on that of Greece. By his victory in the arena Ben-Hur Ben-Hur exacted ancient Jewish justice on his hated adversary, who was crushed in body and impoverished in fortune, he had wagered on his success suc-cess all the wealth he had stolen from his former friend. The victor almost fell prey, however, to the vampire daughter of Egypt who was rival for his love with the gentle Jewish Esther. But henceforth his thoughts were concentrated con-centrated on him who was attracting nil Tro.-i.,h .... !-;.. Ben-Hur, in his hatred of Rome, in his pride of race, dreamed only of a king of this world, who should right ancient an-cient wrongs and exalt his chosen people. peo-ple. And so he threw himself with nil his force, with all his wealth, with all the knowledge gained at Rome, into making secure and strong the way of the king whom he would follow. But it was for one supreme In things spiritual rather than material that the way was being made ready. And Ben-nur's mother, rescued with her daughter from her long imprisonment by a chance change of jailers, but hopeless lepers both, saw the truth sooner than her son. "'Oh Master, Master!' she cried as he passed upon the road. 'Thou seest our need; thou canst make us clean, lave mercy upon us mercy!' "'Believest thou I am able to do this?' he asked. " Thou art he of whom the prophets spake thou art the Messiah !' she replied. re-plied. His eyes grew radiant, his manner man-ner confident. " 'Woman,' he said, 'great is thy faith; be it unto thee even as thou wilt.' " And so, in the end, Ben-Hur recognized recog-nized what Balthazar bad known from the beginning, "oh wise Egyptian, hearken! Thou alone were right the Nazarene is Indeed the son of God !" Copyrleht, 1919. by the Post riihlislilns Co. (The TinBLon Post). Published by permls-sion permls-sion of, and amusement witti. H:irper & Bros., authorized publishers. |