in a whirlwind by a chariot and horses of fire (2 Kings ii. 11). Therefore he did not need to be raised from the dead; he had only to come back from heaven. Thus the popular idea accepted him as the forerunner of Messiah, since Messiah was to introduce the great and terrible day of God's vengeance.

Another topic must be added. The final prophecy of [the true] Isaiah, given in our books as chapters xxxiv., xxxv., is an intense invectiv against the land and people of Edom. David, if we believe the frightful story (1 Kings xi. 15, 16) had kept his chief captain Joab with all Israel (that is, with his whole military force) six months on Idumean soil, "until he had cut off every "male in Edom." Such murderous attempts never succeed entirely, but they always succeed in bequeathing untractable enmity of the weaker nation against the generally innocent posterity of the stronger. Israel long suffered miseries from Edomite retaliation, and bitterly cursed these enemies, while herself mourning by the waters of Babylon (Psalm cxxxvii. 7-9). It cannot surprize us to find Isaiah, a century earlier, vehement against Edom, predicting her utter desolation, and the joy of her deserts that nothing but wild beasts and birds liv there (xxxv. 1). It does surprize to find this utterance suddenly turn into a quasi-Messianic description of the ensuing kingdom of God. Messiah indeed (i.e. God's chosen captain) is not named: but in his own high poetry the prophet declares, "Then the eyes of the blind shall "be opened and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped : "then shall the lame man leap as a hart, and the tongue "of the dumb shall sing." From these words* the

Chapter xlii. 7, of [the later] Isaiah speaks of opening blind eyes in very obvious metaphor. It was quite pardonable there to believe that the servant of the Lord meant an individual Messiah, if one had no means of studying the whole series of the prophecy, and comparing xlix. 3, and other passages.

vulgar managed to deduce that when Messiah came, he would work miracles of healing. That no Gamaliel so reasoned, we may infer with some confidence from Gamaliel's great pupil, Paul of Tarsus; who seems quite unaware of any Messianic miracles.

To turn from Israel to other nations, it is interesting to read Virgil's Eclogue called Pollio, which opens by suggesting that he is reproducing a Cumaan song; that is, one concerning the blessed age predicted by the Sibyl of Cumac. In Virgil the scene of Paradise does for a moment recall Isaiah to us, as likewise his announcement of an auspicious birth impending. But Virgil's picture is blurred by his dream that history recurs in a circle. The Argonautic expedition is to be repeated, and a second Achilles is to fight at Troy! This sweet poet barely shows how widely spread was the idea that a great Deliverer was about to be born; who would rule over the world with Justice and Glory.

In the pages of Tacitus and Suetonius it is curious to find traces of a Gentile Messiah in the person of a Roman Emperor. The expectation had been widely diffused, that a great deliverer would come from the East. After the tumultuous alarms and suffering from the contests for Empire caused by the death of Nero, Vespasian coming from the Roman armies in Judæa was by many believed to be this mighty saviour. Omens and oracles confirmed the idea, and Vespasian to his great perplexity found himself expected to work miracles on the sick. The two historians are in substantial agreement. Tacitus details two of the cases somewhat more amply, and it may be of interest to my readers to have the whole passage set before them. It occurs in his Histories, book iv. chapter 81.

"In the course of those days, while Vespasian was "waiting at Alexandria for summer seas and safe voyage,

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many marvels occurred, to display the favor of Heaven "towards him. A certain man of the Alexandrian "populace, known to suffer from wasted eyeballs, clasped "his knees and with a moan claimed of him a remedy "for his blindness. The goddess Serapis, whom above "all other deities this superstitious race honors, had "urged him to this step, and he kept imploring the "prince, to deign to spatter saliva on his cheeks and

eyeballs. Another, who was crippled in the hand, "prompted by the same deity, begged that the foot and "step of Cæsar might trample on his limb. Vespasian 66 at first laughed at it, and refused; but when the "patients persisted, he at one moment dreaded the dis"credit of silly assumption; at the next was moved into "hope by their urgent entreaties and by the flattering "cheers from others. Finally, he ordered the physicians "to form a judgment, whether such blindness and such "disablement were within human aid. The physicians "discussed the case on several sides, saying: that in the "blind eye force of sight was not extinct, but only "impeded that the crippled limb was dislocated, yet "possibly force wisely applied might restore it; that "perhaps the gods had such a result at heart, and a "Prince had been chosen for a divine ministration. In "fine, if the remedy succeeded, Cæsar would win the "glory if it failed, the poor wretches would hav to "bear the ridicule. Thereupon Vespasian, thinking all things open to his fortune, and nothing any longer "incredible, put on a joyful countenance, and while the "crowd around gave earnest attention, performed the "bidding [of the patients.] Instantly the hand became "manageable, and light re-illumined the blind eye. "Each fact is asserted by bystanders, up to the present "day, when falsehood has nothing to gain."--So far Tacitus. As he probably wrote full thirty years later, it

is open to conjecture that in place of "bystanders" he ought to hav written, "those who ar said to profess to "hav been present."

But it is a fair inference that a belief had gone widely abroad in Western Asia and Egypt, even reaching to the Greek and Italian Sibyls, that a great Deliverer was to come from the East; also, that when he came, he would work miracles of healing on various classes of disease. No other note of Messiah can be named as popular in Asia.

CHAPTER IV.

ROMAN CONQUEST OF JUDEA.

THE Greek monarchy in Syria received its first shock from the Romans (B.c. 190) under the two Scipios, which established in Asia Roman power from the coast to Mount Taurus. After this their predominance was undisputed, until their own Italian and domestic conflicts emboldened the Greek cities to insurrection, aided by Mithridates, king of Pontus or Cappadocia. This war lingered on until in B.C. 66 Pompey the Great was sent to conduct it, then at the height of his celebrity for his wonderful rapidity of success against the ubiquitous pirates of the seas. He was eminently mild and humane; but, entrusted with a great army, he was quite aware that more would be expected of him in Rome than to put the last stroke to an old war. He had traversed Armenia and approached the Caspian Sea, but now resolved to march into Syria. He did so, and conquered

it from north to south; deposed the XIth Antiochus, and made a present of Syria and Palestine to the Roman people.

The Romans had been glad to win the Jews as allies against kings of Syria, and ordinarily accounted allies as a second morsel to be devoured. But this time the foreiner invited the Roman commander in. There were three parties in Jerusalem; a popular party which disliked royalty, and two brothers, Hyrcanus and Aristobulus, in civil war for the pontifical throne. Pompey listened to the pleas of all three, but deferred his verdict until he could hear what the Idumean chief Aretas, ally of the elder brother Hyrcanus, had to plead. Meanwhile Pompey commanded abstinence from warlike action. Aristobulus was too fierce, or dreaded to lose all by losing time. His disobedience and activity seem to hav thrown Pompey on to the side of Hyrcanus. Before long, the Romans found self-defence needful, and a stubborn conflict ensued. Though Hyrcanus largely controuled the rural populace, and had many partizans in Jerusalem itself, yet from no city in Syria did Pompey meet with resistance so formidable. These Jews were stricter in observance of the sabbath than those of Maccabean times. At the earlier era, when it was perceived that to allow the enemy's works to proceed without molestation during the sabbath, was to yield themselves to slaughter, they had worked against him in those sacred hours, though reluctantly. But Pompey, besides important aid from one faction, encountered men too scrupulous to work against him on the sabbath; who indeed calmly continued their incense, their sacrifices or expiation, while slaughtered by his missiles. Finally, only in the third month of his siege was he able to surmount the inner wall of the temple, though at the head of a veteran army. He marvelled at the scene, as