3
" No, my friend; if I do not turn Christian like so many others, it is not because of the religious practices. It is because I do not want my grandchildren to hate the Jews. There is too much hate in the world as it is; in this country it flourishes like the weed. Here even the poets hate one another. Very well, I stay a Jew, I do not go over on the side of the haters. I do not buy my way up, so that I too, can spit down on my people. Do you think I love the Jews so much? How can I tell, when I am one? But I am sick of those who hate them, because I am sick of hate. What we need is more politeness in the world. Let people shake hands and say, Come in. "
― Robert Nathan , The Bishop's Wife
4
" I grieve for your grandparents,” continued Michael. “But after all, that was in another land, and in a different time. I need not point out to you the advantages of the Church to this country in which you operate. It is the Church which saves the home, by confronting with a determined mien the practices of immorality. The home, following the Church, conforms to design, and consists of the father, the mother, and the child. That home, Mr. Cohen, furnishes the basis for your credit in the markets of the world. The father produces, the mother buys, the child consumes. I ask you: can you do without it? Do you wish to see this country sunk in wickedness, the father drunk, the mother divorced, the child debauched? Would you like to see the mills idle, the mines closed, the farms overgrown with weeds? "
― Robert Nathan , The Bishop's Wife
11
" Now a new era had dawned upon the world, which quivered with the impact of tremendous forces, of discoveries and inventions. Man rode upon the air, sent his voice across the seas, divided the indivisible, and penetrated the impenetrable. Audacious, optimistic, and indefatigable, he might even forget God altogether, and raise his limitless towers like altars to none other than himself. "
― Robert Nathan , The Bishop's Wife
12
" There were many candidates for this office, but none, thought the bishop, of the stuff of which an archdeacon is made. And he went over in his mind the qualities he wished to find in his assistant. In the first place, the archdeacon of St. Timothy’s must be a man of firm and fundamental views. He must believe in Heaven and Hell, and in the miracles. He must believe that God was watching . . . that was no reason, the bishop thought, for him to be tactless. God, he reflected, and the bankers, love a tactful man. For himself, he had, he felt sure, piety enough for both; but he needed help with his accounts. A good hand at figures, a tongue of fire in the pulpit, a healing way with the doubtful, a keen eye for the newspapers "
― Robert Nathan , The Bishop's Wife
14
" Through their history ran the strong golden thread of the Bible and the miracles. . . . Ah, the miracles; that was it, that was what he was coming to. Why were there no more miracles, he wondered. Was it because they were no longer necessary? No; for the world was as badly off as ever. Men needed light, as always. And he rehearsed in his mind the miracles in order, from the parting of the waters of the Red Sea, to the healing properties of the bones of certain saints in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. These bones did not interest him; what interested him was the visit of angels to the earth. They used to come, he thought, long ago, to assist and to strive with mankind. There were the two angels who visited Lot; and there was the angel who wrestled with Jacob. Heaven was full of those sons of light: they came and went between Heaven and earth. Their divine presences made fragrant the homes of the Jews. "
― Robert Nathan , The Bishop's Wife
