JUSTUS LIPSIUS has been at the pains to compute the numbers of Jews that are said by Josephus to have perished from the beginning to the conclusion of the war; and, for the reader's satisfaction, I subjoin them.

Perished at Jerusalem, by the sword, pestilence,

famine, and during the siege......1,100,000

1,357.490

According to this account, the whole amounts to 1,357,490, besides a vast multitude that died in the caves, woods, wildernesses, common sewers, in banishments, and various other ways, of whom no computation could be made. To which must also be added, ten thousand slain at Jotapata more than our author has mentioned; for Josephus expressly mentions forty thousand, but he only thirty thousand. To these if we add ninety thousand taken prisoners, apparently doomed to a captivity worse than death, and eleven thousand, who are said to have perished either through the neglect of their keepers or their own sullen despair, the amount will be scarcely less than A MILLION AND A HALF! The reader must also keep in view, that a great proportion of these were strangers, who had been invited from remote parts of the world, to come to Jerusalem and assist them in the defence of their religion and liberties, their country, city, and temple; in doing which, they shared in the common ruin. Thus did the providence of God order it, that those who, by their opposition to the gospel, in all parts of their dispersion, had participated in the guilt of crucifying the Lord Jesus, and persecuting his apostles, should also be involved in their punishment.

It is not a little remarkable that Titus, though a heathen, was frequently obliged, during this war, to acknowledge an overruling providence, not only in the extraordinary success with which he had been favoured against them, but also in the invincible obstinacy through which they, to the last, preferred their total destruction to that of accepting his repeated overtures of mercy. Again and again did he, in the most solemn manner, appeal to heaven, that he was innocent of the blood of these wretched people. In almost every chapter, we find

Joseph. Wars, b. 5. ch. 12.

Josephus also ascribing these dreadful calamities, and the final ruin of his nation, city, and temple, to an overruling power; to the offended Deity, or to the sins of the people but no where more pathetically, than in that chapter, in which he sums up a number of dreadful warnings sent before hand, not so much to reduce them to obedience, as to make them discern the almighty hand that was now pouring out the awful vials of his wrath upon them. *

As soon as the Romans had completed their destructive work of fire and slaughter, Titus set them to demolish the city, with all its noble structures, fortifications, palaces, towers, walls, and other ornaments, down to the level of the ground; as though he had nothing in view but to fulfil the predictions of Christ concerning its destruction, as is contained in the twenty-fourth chapter of Matthew's gospel. He left nothing standing but a piece of the western wall and three towers, which he reserved merely as a monument to future ages of what had been the strength of the city, and the skill and valour of its conqueror. His orders were executed so punctually, that, except what has been just mentioned, nothing remained which could serve as an index that that ground had been once inhabited; insomuch that when Titus himself, some time afterwards, passed through it, in his way from Cæsarea to Alexandria, in order to embark for Rome, he wept profusely at the sight of a devastation so dreadful, cursing the wretches that had compelled him to be the author of it. †

Such was the dreadful issue of this war, terminating in the utter downfall of the Jewish state and nation, from which it has never recovered to this day; it involved in it the destruction of the temple and the discontinuance

• Joseph. Wars, b. 6. ch. 5. and b. 5. ch. 13.

+ Ibid. b. 6. ch. 8, 9.

According to this account, the whole amounts to 1,357,490, besides a vast multitude that died in the caves, woods, wildernesses, common sewers, in banishments, and various other ways, of whom no computation could be made. To which must also be added, ten thousand slain at Jotapata more than our author has mentioned; for Josephus expressly mentions forty thousand, but he only thirty thousand. To these if we add ninety thousand taken prisoners, apparently doomed to a captivity worse than death, and eleven thousand, who are said to have perished either through the neglect of their keepers or their own sullen despair, the amount will be scarcely less than A MILLION AND A HALF! The reader must also keep in view, that a great proportion of these were strangers, who had been invited from remote parts of the world, to come to Jerusalem and assist them in the defence of their religion and liberties, their country, city, and temple; in doing which, they shared in the common ruin. Thus did the providence of God order it, that those who, by their opposition to the gospel, in all parts of their dispersion, had participated in the guilt of crucifying the Lord Jesus, and persecuting his apostles, should also be involved in their punishment.

It is not a little remarkable that Titus, though a heathen, was frequently obliged, during this war, to acknowledge an overruling providence, not only in the extraordinary success with which he had been favoured against them, but also in the invincible obstinacy through which they, to the last, preferred their total destruction to that of accepting his repeated overtures of mercy. Again and again did he, in the most solemn manner, appeal to heaven, that he was innocent of the blood of these wretched people. In almost every chapter, we find

*

* Joseph. Wars, b. 5. ch. 12.

Josephus also ascribing these dreadful calamities, and the final ruin of his nation, city, and temple, to an overruling power; to the offended Deity, or to the sins of the people but no where more pathetically, than in that chapter, in which he sums up a number of dreadful warnings sent before hand, not so much to reduce them to obedience, as to make them discern the almighty hand that was now pouring out the awful vials of his wrath upon them.

As soon as the Romans had completed their destructive work of fire and slaughter, Titus set them to demolish the city, with all its noble structures, fortifications, palaces, towers, walls, and other ornaments, down to the level of the ground; as though he had nothing in view but to fulfil the predictions of Christ concerning its destruction, as is contained in the twenty-fourth chapter of Matthew's gospel. He left nothing standing but a piece of the western wall and three towers, which he reserved merely as a monument to future ages of what had been the strength of the city, and the skill and valour of its conqueror. His orders were executed so punctually, that, except what has been just mentioned, nothing remained which could serve as an index that that ground had been once inhabited; insomuch that when Titus himself, some time afterwards, passed through it, in his way from Cæsarea to Alexandria, in order to embark for Rome, he wept profusely at the sight of a devastation so dreadful, cursing the wretches that had compelled him to be the author of it. †

Such was the dreadful issue of this war, terminating in the utter downfall of the Jewish state and nation, from which it has never recovered to this day; it involved in it the destruction of the temple and the discontinuance

• Joseph. Wars, b. 6. ch. 5. and b. 5. ch. 13.

+ Ibid. b. 6. ch. 8, 9.