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[553]
When Titus came to the knowledge of this wicked practice, he had
like to have surrounded those that had been guilty of it with his horse,
and have shot them dead; and he had done it, had not their number been
so very great, and those that were liable to this punishment would have
been manifold more than those whom they had slain. However, he called together
the commanders of the auxiliary troops he had with him, as well as the
commanders of the Roman legions, (for some of his own soldiers had been
also guilty herein, as he had been informed,) and had great indignation
against both sorts of them, and said to them, "What! have any of my
own soldiers done such things as this out of the uncertain hope of gain,
without regarding their own weapons, which are made of silver and gold?
Moreover, do the Arabians and Syrians now first of all begin to govern
themselves as they please, and to indulge their appetites in a foreign
war, and then, out of their barbarity in murdering men, and out of their
hatred to the Jews, get it ascribed to the Romans?" for this infamous
practice was said to be spread among some of his own soldiers also. Titus
then threatened that he would put such men to death, if any of them were
discovered to be so insolent as to do so again; moreover, he gave it in
charge to the legions, that they should make a search after such as were
suspected, and should bring them to him. But it appeared that the love
of money was too hard for all their dread of punishment, and a vehement
desire of gain is natural to men, and no passion is so venturesome as covetousness;
otherwise such passions have certain bounds, and are subordinate to fear.
But in reality it was God who condemned the whole nation, and turned every
course that was taken for their preservation to their destruction. This,
therefore, which was forbidden by Caesar under such a threatening, was
ventured upon privately against the deserters, and these barbarians would
go out still, and meet those that ran away before any saw them, and looking
about them to see that no Roman spied them, they dissected them, and pulled
this polluted money out of their bowels; which money was still found in
a few of them, while yet a great many were destroyed by the bare hope there
was of thus getting by them, which miserable treatment made many that were
deserting to return back again into the city.
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