Let me read the passage to you: --'Behold his
daughter came out to meet him with timbrels and with dances: AND SHE
WAS HIS ONLY CHILD: BESIDE HER HE HAD NEITHER SON NOR DAUGHTER. And
it came to pass, when he saw her, that he rent his clothes, and said,
Alas, my daughter! thou hast brought me very low, and thou art one of
them that trouble me: for I have opened my mouth unto the Lord, and
I cannot go back.' Now, you read poetry, I dare say--what you call
poetry. I say in all of it--all, at least, I have seen--nothing
comes up to that. 'SHE WAS HIS ONLY CHILD: BESIDE HER HE HAD
NEITHER SON NOR DAUGHTER.'"--(Mr. Bradshaw's voice broke a little as
he went over the words again with great deliberation and infinite
pathos.)--"The inspired writer leaves the fact just as it stands, and
is content. Inspiration itself can do nothing to make it more
touching than it is in its own bare nakedness. There is no thought
in Jephthah of recantation, nor in the maiden of revolt, but
nevertheless he has his own sorrow. HE IS BROUGHT VERY LOW. God
does not rebuke him for his grief. He knows well enough, my dear
friends, the nature which He took upon Himself--nay, are we not the
breath of His nostrils, created in His image? He does not anywhere,
therefore, I say, forbid that we should even break our hearts over
those we love and lose.
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