The Norton Anthology of English literature. Volume 2

3. A stone used to treat snake bites. 7. Forsooth; in truth. 4. I.e., in the last letters. 8. A sticky bile is observable in fevers occurring 5. The Roman commander (9�79 C.E.; emperor, every other day. 69�79) who invaded Palestine in 66. His son Titus 9. I.e., pays me for a medicine. destroyed Jerusalem four years later. 1. A salve derived from a plant. 6. The small village where Lazarus lives, located 2. A hard rock against which the substance is two miles east of Jerusalem. pounded with a pestle.

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KARSHISH , TH E ARA B PHYSICIA N / 129 1 60 Thou hadst admired one sort I gained at Zoar' But zeal outruns discretion. Here I end. Yet stay: my Syrian blinketh gratefully, Protesteth his devotion is my price� Suppose I write what harms not, though he steal? 65 I half resolve to tell thee, yet I blush, What set me off a-writing first of all. An itch I had, a sting to write, a tang! For, be it this town's barrenness�or else The Man" had something in the look of him� Lazarus 70 His case has struck me far more than 'tis worth. So, pardon if�(lest presently I lose In the great press of novelty at hand The care and pains this somehow stole from me) I bid thee take the thing while fresh in mind, 75 Almost in sight�for, wilt thou have the truth? The very man is gone from me but now, Whose ailment is the subject of discourse. Thus then, and let thy better wit help all! Tis but a case of mania�subinduced4 so By epilepsy, at the turning-point Of trance prolonged unduly some three days: When, by the exhibition0 of some drug administration Or spell, exorcization, stroke of art Unknown to me and which 'twere well to know, 85 The evil thing out-breaking all at once Left the man whole and sound of body indeed,� But, flinging (so to speak) life's gates too wide, Making a clear house of it too suddenly, The first conceit0 that entered might inscribe idea 90 Whatever it was minded on the wall So plainly at that vantage, as it were, (First come, first served) that nothing subsequent Attaineth to erase those fancy-scrawls The just-returned and new-established soul 95 Hath gotten now so thoroughly by heart That henceforth she will read or� these or none. either And first�the man's own firm conviction rests That he was dead (in fact they buried him) �That he was dead and then restored to life IOO By a Nazarene physician of his tribe: �'Sayeth,0 the same bade "Rise," and he did rise. he says "Such cases are diurnal,"5 thou wilt cry. Not so this figment!�not, that such a fume,6 Instead of giving way to time and health,

105 Should eat itself into the life of life, As saffron7 tingeth flesh, blood, bones and all!

Town north of the Dead Sea. 6. A vapor standing for a hallucinated belief. Brought about as a result of something else. 7. Yellow-colored dye made from the plant of the Occur every day. same name, also used as a spice.

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