they represented as desperate, and fond of dying. They ought therefore to be met by the common soldiery. He was commander in chief, and lord of the habitable globe, on whose safety the public interests all hung: his fortunes were too important to be risked in sudden skirmishes with the enemy. These suggestions Titus seemed not even to hear; but opposed those who ran on him, and smote them on the face; forced them back, and slew them. He fell upon great numbers as they marched down the hill, and thrust them forward. His opponents were so astonished at his courage and his strength, that they could not fly directly to the city, but declined from him on both sides, and pressed after those that fled up the hill. Still he fell upon their flank, and arrested their fury. In the mean time, disorder and terror fell upon the Romans, who were fortifying their camp at the top of the hill, on seeing the flight of those who had deserted Titus. The whole legion was dispersed, as thinking that the sallies of the Jews were insupportable, and that Titus was himself put to flight: for they conceived that had it been otherwise, the body would never have been dispersed. This, however, was soon retrieved: Titus continued to press on those that were near him, and enabled the legion to return and fortify their camp. He and his chosen few still opposed the enemy, and prevented them from doing farther mischief. Josephus says, that if he may be allowed neither to add any thing out of flattery, nor to diminish any thing out of envy, but to speak the plain truth, Cæsar twice delivered that entire legion out of jeopardy. The moral he inculcates is, that the success of wars and the danger of kings are under the providence of

God. It is singular that he should call Titus both a king and Cæsar, while Vespasian was alive, and Titus no more than the emperor's son, and the general of the Roman army. Josephus probably considered him as associated in majesty with his father, in consequence of the dreams declaring them both kings, which the historian had recorded in book iii. chap. 2. We must remember here, that the Roman emperors never assumed that title; but the Jews gave it promiscuously, even to tetrarchs, as in the case of Archelaus in the New Testament. "But when he heard that Archelaus did reign in Judea in the room of his father Herod, he was afraid to go thither." -Matthew, chap. ii. "Pilate saith unto them, shall I crucify your king? The chief priest answered, We have no king but Cæsar." -John, chap. xix. John, chap. xix. So Peter states what Christianity requires on this subject: "Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme; or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evil doers, and for the praise of them that do well."-1 Pet. chap. ii.

Titus always exhibited an anxious concern to save Jerusalem; and would have done so, had he not been overruled by the counsels of Providence for the fulfilment of prophecy. On the fifth day of the siege, when no signs of peace came from the Jews, he divided his legions and began to raise banks, both at the tower of Antonia*, and at John's Monument. But knowing that the preservation or destruction of the city would be his own gain or

* This tower of Antonia stood higher than the floor of the temple, or court adjoining; so that they descended thence into the temple.

loss, while he pursued the siege earnestly, he left no means untried to bring the Jews to a sense of their error, and mixed good counsel with military operations. The temple was the peculiar object of his care. He was deeply affected with its danger, for which he reproached John and his party bitterly. "Have you not, vile wretches as you are, put up this partition-wall before your sanctuary by our permission ?" The wall of separation between Jews and gentiles, with its pillars and inscription, and all the other appurtenances of the temple, are fully described by the historian. "Have you not been permitted to erect pillars at due distances, and to engrave a prohibition on them in Greek, and in your own tongue, that no foreigner should go beyond that wall? If any do so, have we not given you leave to kill him, though he were a Roman? And what do you do now, pernicious caitiffs? Why do you trample on dead bodies in this temple? Why do you pollute it with the blood of foreigners, and even of your own Jews? I appeal to the gods of my own country, and to every god that ever had regard to this place, which now seems to be disregarded by all of them; I appeal to my own army, to those Jews who are now with me, and even to yourselves, that I do not compel you to defile this sanctuary; and if you will but change the place of fighting, no Roman shall come near or offer any affront to it: nay, more, I will endeavour to preserve your holy house in spite of yourselves." It is clear therefore that these seditious Jews were the immediate instruments of their own destruction, and that the conflagration of their city and temple was, humanly speaking, the result of their own devices. Both

here and elsewhere, Josephus shows how earnest and constant were the endeavours of Titus to save both. On another occasion, he commanded part of his army to quench the fire, and to make a road for the more easy marching of the legions. He then assembled the commanders, and consulted with them what should be done about the holy house. Some thought it would be best to demolish it, because the Jews were in the habit of assembling there, and would never abstain from rebellion while it was standing. Others gave it as their opinion, that it might be saved if the Jews would leave it, and not make it a depôt of arms: but if they persisted in making it the seat of war, it must be considered not as a temple, but as a citadel; and the impiety of burning it would be on the heads of those who should compel that measure. But Titus said, that although the Jews should fight from that holy house, we should not take vengeance on things inanimate, instead of the men themselves; nor would he vote for setting fire to so vast a work, because the mischief would recoil on the Romans, to whose government it would be highly ornamental. Fronto, Alexander, and Cerealis grew bold on this declaration, and agreed to the opinion of their general. The assembly was then dissolved, and Titus issued orders to the officers, that the rest of the forces should lie still, and the most courageous be selected for this attack.

Titus's speeches, on all occasions, to his troops, are highly animated. He considered that the alacrity of soldiers in war is chiefly excited by hopes and fair words: that encouragement and promises make men forget their hazards, and sometimes even despise death. He begins an exhort

ation to his army thus:-" My fellow-soldiers, to exhort men to what has no peril, is on that very account inglorious both to them and to the speaker, as it proves his cowardice as well as theirs.” The speech is long, and exhibits throughout the notions the Romans had of death, and of their happy state who die bravely in war, contrasted with that of those who die ignobly in their beds by sickness. Ammianus Marcellinus speaks thus of the Alani : - " Judicatur ibi beatus, qui in prælio profuderit animam: senescentes enim et fortuitis mortibus mundo digressos, ut degeneres et ignavos conviciis atrocibus insectantur: nec quidquam est quod clarius jactent, quam homine quolibet occiso: proque exuviis gloriosis, interfectorum avulsis capitibus detractas pelles pro phaleris jumentis accommodant bellatoriis. Lib.

xxxi. cap. 2. Strabo ascribes the same opinions to the Massagetæ, in his account of whom he abridges Herodotus. The whole passage is curious, and shows how superstitions reciprocally connect themselves :

Λέγεται δὲ καὶ τοιαῦτα περὶ τῶν Μασσαγετῶν· ὅτι καλοι κοῦσιν οἱ μὲν ὄρη· τινὲς δ ̓ αὐτῶν πεδία· οἱ δὲ ἕλη, ἅ ποιοῦσιν οἱ ποταμοί· οἱ δὲ, τὰς ἐν τοῖς ἕλεσι νήσους· μάλισα δὲ φασι τὸν Αραξον ποταμὸν κατακλύζειν τὴν χώραν πανταχῆ σχιζόμενον· ἐκπίπλοντα δὲ τοῖς μὲν ἄλλοις σόμασιν εἰς τὴν ἄλλην τὴν πρὸς ἄρκίοις θάλασσαν, ἑνὶ δὲ μόνῳ πρὸς τὸν κόλπον τὸν Ὑρκάνιον· θεὸν δὲ ἥλιον μόνον ἡγοῦνται· τούτῳ δὲ ἱπποθυἱοῦσι· γαμεῖ δ ̓ ἕκαςος μίαν, χρῶνται δὲ καὶ ταῖς ἄλλων οὐκ ἀφανῶς· ὁ δὲ μιγνύμενος τῇ ἀλλοιρίᾳ, τὴν φαρέτραν ἐξαρούσας ἐκ τῆς ἁμάξης φανερῶς μίγνυται· θάναῖος δὲ νομίζεται παρ' αὐτοῖς ἄριςος, ὅταν γηράσαντες κατάκοι πῶσι μετὰ τῶν προβαλείων κρεῶν, καὶ ἀναμὶξ βρωθώσι· τοὺς δὲ νόσῳ θανόντας ῥίπλουσιν ὡς ἀσεβεῖς, καὶ ἀξίους ὑπὸ θηρίων βεβρῶσθαι ἀγαθοὶ δὲ ἱππόται καὶ πεζοί· τόξοις δὲ χρῶνται, καὶ μαχαίραις,