H’m, h’m. A strange request. Where do I stand? What will the Sultan with me ... what? I come Prepared for money, and he asks for ... Truth! And this he needs must have as bare and bright As if the truth were coin!... Aye, were it coin, Old, well-worn coin, that men tell out by weight, Such might I find him! But new-minted coin-- The stamp’s enough: you fling it on the board And there’s an end--not thus can Truth be told! Doth he conceive that truth is to be poured From head to head like gold into a bag? Who’s here the Jew, I or the Sultan?... Yet Suppose in very truth he asks for Truth? How then? And verily it were too little, Too paltry a suspicion, to believe He used the truth but as a snare.... Too little! Ah, what is then too little for the great? Why should he break into my house? A friend Would surely knock and listen at the door Before he entered. I must tread with care. But how? but how? To play the stolid Jew, That ne’er will pass ... still less, no Jew at all; For ‘then’ he’ll say, ‘why not a Musalman?’ Let me think.... Ha! I have it now. That saves me! Not children only can one satisfy With fables.... He is coming. Let him come!
I have not come too quickly? Thou hast brought Thy meditation to an end? Then speak! None hears but I.
Nay, all the world may hear For aught I care!
So clear and confident Is Nathan in his wisdom? Ha! this I deem To be a sage indeed! Nothing to hide, Never to palter--but to stake his life, His blood, his goods, and all, upon the truth!
Yea ... if need were ... and if the truth were served....
One of my titles, Betterer of the World And of the Law, I hope from this day forth To bear with right.
Truly, a noble title! Yet, Sultan, ere I trust myself with thee, Wholly and unreserved, I ask thee first To hear a fable from me.
Wherefore not? From childhood I have ever loved to hear Fables, well told.
Well told? ah, that indeed Is scarce a quality of mine!
Again So proudly modest? Well, speak on, speak on!
In the grey morn of Time, there lived i’ the East A man, who owned a ring of priceless worth, Gift of a well-loved hand. For stone it bore An opal, where a hundred lovely tints Played, and where dwelt the magic power to make Well-pleasing in the sight of God and man Whoever wore it in this faith--What wonder It never left the owner’s hand? what wonder He made provision to retain it ever In his own House, an heirloom for all time? Thus did he order it: He left the Ring First to his best-belovèd son, ordaining That he in turn should leave it to the son He dearliest loved; and so to the dearest ever. And still the owner of the Ring, apart From precedence of birth, by that alone Should bear the sway.... Sultan, you follow me?