guarded. Yet did not he by any means think of
fighting against them, but, before they came to blows, to try
what persuasions would do. Accordingly, Jesus, the eldest of the
high priests next to Artanus, stood upon the tower that was over
against them, and said thus: "Many troubles indeed, and those of
various kinds, have fallen upon this city, yet in none of them
have I so much wondered at her fortune as
now, when you are come to assist wicked men, and this after a
manner very extraordinary; for I see that you are come to support
the vilest of men against us, and this with so great alacrity, as
you could hardly put on the like, in case our metropolis had
called you to her assistance against
barbarians. And if I had perceived that your army was
composed of men like unto those who invited them, I had
not deemed your attempt so absurd; for nothing does so
much cement the minds of men together as the alliance there is
between their manners. But now for these men who have invited
you, if you were to examine them one by one, every one of them
would be found to have deserved ten thousand deaths; for the very
rascality and offscouring of the whole country, who have spent in
debauchery their own substance, and, by way of trial beforehand,
have madly plundered the neighboring villages and cities, in the
upshot of all, have privately run together into this holy city.
They are robbers, who by their prodigious wickedness have
profaned this most sacred floor, and who are to be now seen
drinking themselves drunk in the sanctuary, and expending the
spoils of those whom they have slaughtered upon their unsatiable
bellies. As for the multitude that is with you, one may see them
so
decently adorned in their armor, as it would become them to be