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[162]
And now, when the multitude were gotten together to an assembly,
and every one was in indignation at these men's seizing upon the sanctuary,
at their rapine and murders, but had not yet begun their attacks upon them,
(the reason of which was this, that they imagined it to be a difficult
thing to suppress these zealots, as indeed the case was,) Ananus stood
in the midst of them, and casting his eyes frequently at the temple, and
having a flood of tears in his eyes, he said, "Certainly it had been
good for me to die before I had seen the house of God full of so many abominations,
or these sacred places, that ought not to be trodden upon at random, filled
with the feet of these blood-shedding villains; yet do I, who am clothed
with the vestments of the high priesthood, and am called by that most venerable
name [of high priest], still live, and am but too fond of living, and cannot
endure to undergo a death which would be the glory of my old age; and if
I were the only person concerned, and as it were in a desert, I would give
up my life, and that alone for God's sake; for to what purpose is it to
live among a people insensible of their calamities, and where there is
no notion remaining of any remedy for the miseries that are upon them?
for when you are seized upon, you bear it! and when you are beaten, you
are silent! and when the people are murdered, nobody dare so much as send
out a groan openly! O bitter tyranny that we are under! But why do I complain
of the tyrants? Was it not you, and your sufferance of them, that have
nourished them? Was it not you that overlooked those that first of all
got together, for they were then but a few, and by your silence made them
grow to be many; and by conniving at them when they took arms, in effect
armed them against yourselves? You ought to have then prevented their first
attempts, when they fell a reproaching your relations; but by neglecting
that care in time, you have encouraged these wretches to plunder men. When
houses were pillaged, nobody said a word, which was the occasion why they
carried off the owners of those houses; and when they were drawn through
the midst of the city, nobody came to their assistance. They then proceeded
to put those whom you have betrayed into their hands into bonds. I do not
say how many and of what characters those men were whom they thus served;
but certainly they were such as were accused by none, and condemned by
none; and since nobody succored them when they were put into bonds, the
consequence was, that you saw the same persons slain. We have seen this
also; so that still the best of the herd of brute animals, as it were,
have been still led to be sacrificed, when yet nobody said one word, or
moved his right hand for their preservation. Will you bear, therefore,
will you bear to see your sanctuary trampled on? and will you lay steps
for these profane wretches, upon which they may mount to higher degrees
of insolence? Will not you pluck them down from their exaltation? for even
by this time they had proceeded to higher enormities, if they had been
able to overthrow any thing greater than the sanctuary. They have seized
upon the strongest place of the whole city; you may call it the temple,
if you please, though it be like a citadel or fortress. Now, while you
have tyranny in so great a degree walled in, and see your enemies over
your heads, to what purpose is it to take counsel? and what have you to
support your minds withal? Perhaps you wait for the Romans, that they may
protect our holy places: are our matters then brought to that pass? and
are we come to that degree of misery, that our enemies themselves are expected
to pity us? O wretched creatures! will not you rise up and turn upon those
that strike you? which you may observe in wild beasts themselves, that
they will avenge themselves on those that strike them. Will you not call
to mind, every one of you, the calamities you yourselves have suffered?
nor lay before your eyes what afflictions you yourselves have undergone?
and will not such things sharpen your souls to revenge? Is therefore that
most honorable and most natural of our passions utterly lost, I mean the
desire of liberty? Truly we are in love with slavery, and in love with
those that lord it over us, as if we had received that principle of subjection
from our ancestors; yet did they undergo many and great wars for the sake
of liberty, nor were they so far overcome by the power of the Egyptians,
or the Medes, but that still they did what they thought fit, notwithstanding
their commands to the contrary. And what occasion is there now for a war
with the Romans? (I meddle not with determining whether it be an advantageous
and profitable war or not.) What pretense is there for it? Is it not that
we may enjoy our liberty? Besides, shall we not bear the lords of the habitable
earth to be lords over us, and yet bear tyrants of our own country? Although
I must say that submission to foreigners may be borne, because fortune
hath already doomed us to it, while submission to wicked people of our
own nation is too unmanly, and brought upon us by our own consent. However,
since I have had occasion to mention the Romans, I will not conceal a thing
that, as I am speaking, comes into my mind, and affects me considerably;
it is this, that though we should be taken by them, (God forbid the event
should be so!) yet can we undergo nothing that will be harder to be borne
than what these men have already brought upon us. How then can we avoid
shedding of tears, when we see the Roman donations in our temple, while
we withal see those of our own nation taking our spoils, and plundering
our glorious metropolis, and slaughtering our men, from which enormities
those Romans themselves would have abstained? to see those Romans never
going beyond the bounds allotted to profane persons, nor venturing to break
in upon any of our sacred customs; nay, having a horror on their minds
when they view at a distance those sacred walls; while some that have been
born in this very country, and brought up in our customs, and called Jews,
do walk about in the midst of the holy places, at the very time when their
hands are still warm with the slaughter of their own countrymen. Besides,
can any one be afraid of a war abroad, and that with such as will have
comparatively much greater moderation than our own people have? For truly,
if we may suit our words to the things they represent, it is probable one
may hereafter find the Romans to be the supporters of our laws, and those
within ourselves the subverters of them. And now I am persuaded that every
one of you here comes satisfied before I speak that these overthrowers
of our liberties deserve to be destroyed, and that nobody can so much as
devise a punishment that they have not deserved by what they have done,
and that you are all provoked against them by those their wicked actions,
whence you have suffered so greatly. But perhaps many of you are aftrighted
at the multitude of those zealots, and at their audaciousness, as well
as at the advantage they have over us in their being higher in place than
we are; for these circumstances, as they have been occasioned by your negligence,
so will they become still greater by being still longer neglected; for
their multitude is every day augmented, by every ill man's running away
to those that are like to themselves, and their audaciousness is therefore
inflamed, because they meet with no obstruction to their designs. And for
their higher place, they will make use of it for engines also, if we give
them time to do so; but be assured of this, that if we go up to fight them,
they will be made tamer by their own consciences, and what advantages they
have in the height of their situation they will lose by the opposition
of their reason; perhaps also God himself, who hath been affronted by them,
will make what they throw at us return against themselves, and these impious
wretches will be killed by their own darts: let us but make our appearance
before them, and they will come to nothing. However, it is a right thing,
if there should be any danger in the attempt, to die before these holy
gates, and to spend our very lives, if not for the sake of our children
and wives, yet for God's sake, and for the sake of his sanctuary. I will
assist you both with my counsel and with my hand; nor shall any sagacity
of ours be wanting for your support; nor shall you see that I will be sparing
of my body neither."
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