LITERARY HISTORY OF PARNELL^S ' HERMIx/ 159 



it may have come from Egypt, where adherents of the 

 three faiths of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity existed 

 side by side. In corroboration of this, the simplest form 

 of the European story has for its characters the hermits 

 of the Thebaid. 



The apologue commended itself not only to a crowd of 

 churchmen and divines, but to a poet like Parnell, a fanatic 

 like Antoinette Bourignon, and a doubter like Voltaire. 

 Sometimes it assumes the form of a very practical homily 

 upon everyday life, and at others is bounded by the 

 narrow limits of the artificial virtues of ecclesiasticism ; but 

 in each case the motive is the same. All versions of the 

 legend seek to vindicate the moral order of the universe 

 by an explanation of the seeming contradiction of parti- 

 cular instances. 



The problems of life are essentially the same in all ages. 

 " I have been young,-"^ says the Psalmist, " and now am old ; 

 yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed 

 begging their bread.''^ There are many, however, both in 

 ancient and modern days, who have not been so fortunate, 

 and who have looked out upon a world where the righteous, 

 to all earthly appearance, were forsaken. They have seen 

 the tyrant triumphant whilst none dared to comfort the 

 slave. They have seen Vice seated on the throne and 

 Vii'tue dying in the dungeon. They have seen sorrow and 

 evil in a thousand forms. 



The existence of evil is alike the moral and physical 

 riddle of the universe. Notwithstanding all man^s efforts 

 the sphinx has not relaxed the rigidity of her features, 

 which still proclaim her the keeper of the unsolved 

 mystery. This beautiful Hebrew apologue is one of 

 the many efforts to reconcile the conception of an all- 

 good and all-wise ruler of the universe with the existence 

 of Wrong clothed in purple and fine linen, and of Eight 



