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'Your beard, sir? exclaimed Gibbs in horror. 'Yes, Gibbs; for some years I have been a Nazarene that is, a Nazarite, with the top half of my head; now I am going to change about and be a Nazarite with the lower. The razor has kissed my cheeks and my chin and the fluted column of my throat for the last time. 'You cannot mean it, sir! said Gibbs, suspending his murderous task a moment.
And it came to pass, when she pressed him daily with her words, and urged him, so that his soul was vexed unto death; that he told her all his heart, and said unto her, There hath not come a razor upon mine head; for I have been a Nazarite unto God from my mother's womb if I be shaven, then my strength will go from me, and I shall become weak, and be like any other man.
"If she be indeed a Nazarite without faith, let her go; but judge not the simple hastily. First, let me know how far woman's frailty is to blame; how far man's guile for not for nothing was Crawley sent out to the mine by Meadows. Let me consider;" and he smoked calmly again. After a long silence, which Nathan was too respectful to break, the old man gave him his commission for to-morrow.
He was to grow up a Nazarite, forbidden to drink strong drink, neither was his head to be shaved. His strength was very great; but his marriage was sinful, and his doings with the idolatrous Philistines terrible. Though an Israelite and a judge, I fear much he sinned greatly against God. On one occasion he went to Gaza, a city of the Philistines.
"No, my son," was the proud and glad reply; "you must never cut it as long as you live: you are a Nazarite." "Mother, why may I not taste the grapes? The boys say they are so nice and sweet. May I not, next vintage?" "No, never," his mother would reply; "you must never touch the fruit of the vine: you are a Nazarite."
The ideal of his faith was before him, perfect in face, form, dress, action, age; and he was in its view, and the view was recognition. Ah, now if something should happen to identify the stranger beyond all doubt! And that was what did happen. Exactly at the fitting moment, as if to assure the trembling Egyptian, the Nazarite repeated the outcry,
But he said unto me, Behold, thou shalt conceive and bear a son; and now drink no wine, nor strong drink, neither eat any unclean thing; for the child shall be a Nazarite to God, from the womb to the day of his death." The injunction respecting her own abstinence was no arbitrary requirement, but was founded in nature and reason.
Thou goest of our free will as well as thine own. The abbot and I have watched thee long, knowing that the Lord bad need of such as thee elsewhere. We did but prove thee, to see by thy readiness to obey, whether thou wert fit to rule. Go, and God be with thee. Covet no man's gold or silver. Neither eat flesh nor drink wine, but live as thou hast lived a Nazarite of the Lord.
The agitation known as the Nazarite movement was then raging through Western New York, and it was understood that several cases would come before the General Conference on appeal from the expelled members of the Genesee Conference. I was requested to go down to the troubled District and look the ground over before the opening of the Conference.
Then the woman came and told her husband, saying, A man of God came unto me, and his countenance was like the countenance of an angel of God, very terrible: but I asked him not whence he was, neither told he me his name: But he said unto me, Behold, thou shalt conceive, and bear a son; and now drink no wine nor strong drink, neither eat any unclean thing: for the child shall be a Nazarite to God from the womb to the day of his death.
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