2. Of the actual extent of her influence, of her relation in particular to the northern tribes, of the cause which immediately determined her to proclaim a rising against the Canaanites, we really know nothing. She summoned Barak, her fellow-tribes- man, to advance from Kedesh, in the extreme north of the country, upon Mount Tabor, with ten thousand men, in order to attack Sisera. Barak refused, unless the prophetess would herself
accompany him ; soldier as he was, he lacked the needful strength
169
I70 THE SIN OF MEROZ
and convictions to brace him for the conflict. Deborah warned him that he would thus forfeit the honours of victory. But she joined him at Kedesh. Upon their reaching Mount Tabor, Sisera brought up the associated Canaanitish forces, and nine hundred chariots of iron. Barak rushed from the heights into the valley ; and at Taanach, by the brook Megiddo, a desperate encounter resulted in the utter defeat of Sisera.
f 3. Sisera fled away, completely routed, and the wild fierce [strong woman who "judged Israel at that time," and the captain of the Israelitish army, sang a splendid proud song of triumph. In it they recount the tribes who had come up to their duty, who had shared the labour and the glory of the fight. And then, in the midst of the torrent of song, there comes this other strain of fiery indignation. One town or village, Meroz, had hung back. Hidden away in some safe valley, it had heard the call which summoned every patriot, but it knew it was in no danger. It had felt the shock of battle on the other side of the hills, and nestled and hid itself only the more snugly. " Curse ye Meroz, said the angel of the Lord, curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof; because they came not to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against the mighty."
^ Joan of Arc was not stuck at the Cross Eoads either by rejecting all the paths like Tolstoy or by accepting them all like Nietzsche. She chose a path and went down it like a thunder- bolt. Yet Joan, when I come to think of her, had in her all that was true either in Tolstoy or Nietzsche — all that was even tolerable in either of them. I thought of all that is noble in Tolstoy : the pleasure in plain things, especially in plain pity, the actualities of the earth, the reverence for the poor, the dignity of the bowed back. Joan of Arc had all that, and with this great addition : that she endured poverty while she admired it, whereas Tolstoy is only a typical aristocrat trying to find out its secret. And then I thought of all that was brave and proud and pathetic in poor Nietzsche and his mutiny against the emptiness and timidity of our time. I thought of his cry for the ecstatic equilibrium of danger, his hunger for the rush of great horses, his cry to arms. Well, Joan of Arc had all that ; and, again, with this diff'erence, that she did not praise fighting, but fought. We know that she was not afraid of an army, while Nietzsche for all we know was afraid of a cow. Tolstoy only praised the peasant ; she was the
JUDGES V, 23 171
peasant. Nietzsche only praised the warrior ; she was the warrior. She beat them both at their own antagonistic ideals ; she was more gentle than the one, more violent than the other. Yet she was a perfectly practical person who did something, while they are wild speculators who do nothing.^
I
What was the Sin of Meroz?
i. Neglect of Duty.
1. Meroz was neutral,, impassive,.jtseless. It did not turn traitor ; it did not play the spy ; it did not succour the foe. It was neither Israelite nor Canaanite. It was neither on this side nor on that. It did not fight. It just did nothing.
Meroz is gone. No record of it except this verse remains. The most ingenious and indefatigable explorer cannot even guess where it once stood. But-the ciy:se_remaijis^: — the violent outburst of the contempt and anger which men feel who have fought and suffered and agonized, and then see other men, who have the same interest in the result as they have, coming out cool and unwounded from their safe hiding-places to take a part of the victory which they have done nothing to secure. Meroz^ standa iovjkoi,. It sometimes happens that a man or a town passes com- pletely away from the face of the earth and from the memory of men, and only leaves a name which stands for ever as a sort of symbol or synonym of some quality, some virtue or some vice. So Me^Qz stands for-^he-shirl^firi, for-hiliL who ia willing. to see jother people fight thja,.h&ttle§_oll^ej(j7.hileJhfijBimpl3L£^^ iake
the.apfiils.
^ " The old war-horse was out to-day," I used to say when the Dean had shaken his head with an upward look of grave defiance, as at some threatening onset that he foresaw bearing down. The war-horse ! Yes ! That was again and again the picture that rose in my mind as the slight figure drew itself together, and the eyes flashed. There would be no flinching in him when the trumpet began to blow : that was clear, as his mouth grew stern. After all, behind all the smiling veils, this world (one felt) is an arena in which the battle of the Lord goes forward. We shall not get through without a tussle, a fierce bout. Evil is strong,