says of this work in his first book against Appion, written long afterwards, near the period of his life.

As for myself I have composed a true history of that war, and of all the particulars that occurred therein, as having been concerned in all its transactions: for I acted as general among those among us who are called Galileans, as long as it was possible for us to make any opposition: and when I was taken captive by the Romans, Vespasian and Titus had me kept under a guard, but obliged me to attend them continually. At first I was in bonds; afterwards I was set at liberty, and was sent to accompany Titus when he came from Alexandria to the siege of Jerusalem during which time nothing was done which escaped my knowledge. What happened in the Roman camp, I saw, and wrote it down carefully; what information the deserters brought out of the city, I was the only man that understood it: afterwards I got leisure at Rome: and when all my materials were prepared, I procured the help of one to assist me in writing Greek. Thus I composed the history of those transactions. And I was so well assured of the truth of what I related, that I first appealed to those who had the supreme command in that war, Vespasian and Titus, as witnesses for me; for to them I first presented those books, and after them to many of the Romans who had been in the war. I also communicated them to many of our own men, who understood the Greek philosophy; among whom were Julius Archelaus, and Herod, a person of great gravity, and king Agrippa himself, who deserved the greatest admiration : all these bore testimony to me that I had the strictest regard to truth; who would not have dissembled the matter, nor have been silent, if through ignorance, or out of favour to either side, I had altered or omitted any thing.'

2. Josephus's History of the Jewish War is an ample testimony to the fulfilment of all the predictions of our Lord, concerning the demolition of the temple and city of Jerusalem, and the miseries to be endured by the nation during the siege, which were such as had never before happened to any people, nor were likely to happen again.

3. The sufferers in these calamities were generally men of the worst characters, robbers and Sicarii, and others too much resembling them. It is reasonable to believe that no christians were then shut up in the city, nor many other good men, to partake in the miseries of that long and grievous siege. As St. Peter says, having instanced in the preservation of "Noah the eighth person, when God brought in the y Contr. Ap. 1. i. sect. 9.

flood upon the world of the ungodly, and then delivering just Lot, when the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were turned into ashes," adds, with a view to other like cases, and probably to the destruction of Jerusalem itself: "The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished," 2 Pet. ii, 5-9.

4. I think it ought to be observed by us that there was not now any pestilence at Jerusalem, but the Jews perished by the calamities of war. It might have been expected that the bad food, which they were forced to make use of in the straitness of the siege, and the noisome smell of so many dead bodies lying in heaps in the city itself, and in the vallies or ditches without the walls, should have produced a plague: but nothing of that kind appears in the History: which must have been owing to the special interposition of Divine Providence. Josephus, in some of the places where he speaks of the putrefaction of the dead bodies, may use expressions equivalent to pestilential; but he never shows that there was an infection: if there had, it would have equally affected the Romans and the Jews, and the siege of the place must have been broken up, and the Romans would have gone off as fast as they could.

5. None can forbear to observe the time when all these

things came to pass. Our Lord says, Matt. xxiii. 36, "Verily, I say unto you, all these things shall come upon this generation." And xxiv. 34, "Verily, I say unto you, This generation shall not pass till all these things be fulfilled." So likewise Mark xiii. 30, and Luke xxi. 32. So it was. All these things foretold by our Lord came to pass before the end of that generation of men. Jerusalem and the temple were no more, before the end of the year 70 of the christian epoch, and within forty years after his crucifixion.

Concerning the time also our Lord said: "And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world, for a witness to all nations:" Matt. xxiv. 14. Comp. Mark xiii. 10.

This we know from christian writings, particularly the books of the New Testament, most of which were written

I est difficile que tant de peuples renformés dans une ville durant les chaleurs de l'été, de si méchantes nourritures et surtout la puanteur de tant de corps morts, n'aient joint la peste à la famine. Joseph n'en parle néanmoins qu'en un endroit, en passant; ce qui marque qu'elle ne fut pas considérable. Till. Ruine des Juifs. art. 67. p. 960.

Vid. De B. Jud. 1. 5. cap. xii. sect. 4.

before the destruction of Jerusalem. They bear witness that the gospel had been preached to Jews and Gentiles in Judea, Syria, Asia, Greece, Macedonia, and Rome, and other places, and with great success: and the preaching of the gospel throughout the world was a testimony to all nations that the calamities inflicted upon the Jewish people were just and fit. They bear witness that the Jewish nation had been called upon to repent, and were faithfully, and affectionately, and earnestly warned and admonished; but they refused to hearken. See the Acts of the Apostles, and Mark xvi. 20; Rom. x. 18; Col. i. 6, and 23.

b

Says archbishop Tillotson: We have this matter related, not by a christian, (who might be suspected of partiality and a design to have paralleled the event with our 'Saviour's prediction,) but by a Jew, both by nation and religion, who seems designedly to have avoided, as much as possibly he could, the very mention of the christian name, ' and all particulars relating to our Saviour, though no his'torian was ever more punctual in other things.'

Says Mr. Tillemont: God had been pleased to choose for our information in this history, not an apostle, nor any ' of the chief men of the church, but an obstinate Jew, whom • neither the view of the virtue and miracles of the christians, ' nor the knowledge of the law, nor the ruin of his religion and country, could induce to believe in and love the Mes'siah, who was all the expectation of the nation. God has permitted it so to be, that the testimony which this historian 'gave to an event, of which he did not comprehend the mystery, might not be rejected either by Jews or heathens; and that none might be able to say that he altered the truth of things to favour Jesus Christ and his disciples.' Dr. W. Wotton says of Josephus: 'Hed is certainly an author very justly to be valued, notwithstanding all his 'faults. His History of the Jewish War is a noble demon•stration of the truth of the christian religion; by showing, in the most lively manner, how the prophecies of our blessed Lord, concerning the destruction of Jerusalem, were literally fulfilled in their fullest extent.'

And Dr. Doddridge, in his notes upon chap. xxiv. of St. Matthew's gospel, says: Christian writers have always

e

b Vol. 2. p. 563. serm. 186, the seventh sermon upon 2 Cor. iv. 3, 4. • Ruine des Juifs, art. i. p. 722.

Preface to his Miscellaneous Discourses relating to the Traditions and Usages of the Scribes and Pharisees, p. xlix. The faults, which he observes in Josephus, may be seen at p. xxxiii. &c.

e The Family Expositor, sect. 160. Vol. 2. p. 373.

'with great reason represented Josephus's History of the 'Jewish War as the best commentary upon this chapter. And many have justly remarked it as a wonderful instance ' of the care of Providence for the christian church, that he, an eye-witness, and in these things of so great credit, • should (especially in so extraordinary a manner) be pre'served to transmit to us a collection of important facts, 'which so exactly illustrate this noble prophecy, in almost 'every particular circumstance. But as it would swell my ' notes too much to enter into a particular detail of those ' circumstances, I must content myself with referring to Dr. Whitby's excellent notes upon the twenty-fourth of Matthew, and to archbishop Tillotson's large and accurate ' discourse on the same subject, in the second volume of his 'posthumous works. Serm. 183-187.'

6

Isidore of Pelusium, who flourished about the year 412, in one of his epistles has these expressions: If you have ' a mind to know what punishment the wicked Jews underwent, who ill-treated the Christ, read the history of their 'destruction, written by Josephus, a Jew indeed, but a lover of truth, that you may see the wonderful story, such as no time ever saw before since the beginning of the world, nor ever shall see. For that none might refuse to give 'credit to the history of their incredible and unparalleled sufferings, truth found out not a stranger, but a native, and a man fond of their institutions, to relate them in a doleful • strain.'

Eusebius often quotes Josephus, and, in his Ecclesiastical History, has transcribed from him several articles at large. Having rehearsed from the gospels divers of our Lord's predictions of the evils then coming upon Jerusalem and the Jewish people, he adds: Whosoever shall compare these 'words of our Saviour with the history of the whole war, published by the above-mentioned writer, must admire our 'Lord's great wisdom, and acknowledge that his foresight was divine.'

In his Chronicle, as we have it from Jerom in Latin, Eusebius says: 'In h subduing Judea, and overthrowing Je

f Lib. 4. ep. 75. vid. et ep. 74.

8 H. E. 1. 3. cap. 8. p. 81. D.

h Titus, Judæâ captâ, et Jerosolymis subversis, DC millia virorum interfecit. Josephus vero scribit undecies centena millia fame et gladio periisse, et alia centum millia captivorum publice venumdata. Ut autem tanta multitudo Jerosolymis reperirentur, causam Azymorum fuisse refert; ob quam ex omni genere Judæi ad templum confluentes urbe quasi carcere sunt reclusi. Oportuit enim in iisdem diebus eos interfici, in quibus Salvatorem crucifixerant. Chron. p. 162.

'rusalem, Titus slew six hundred thousand people: but Jo'sephus writes, that eleven bundred thousand perished by • famine and the sword, and that another hundred thousand 'were publicly sold and carried captives: and he says that 'the occasion of there being so great a multitude of people • at Jerusalem was this, that it was the time of passover; ' for which reason the Jews, having come up from all parts 'to worship at the temple, were shut up in the city as in a prison. And indeed it was fit they should be slain at 'the same time in which they crucified our Saviour.'

It is certainly very fit that christians should attend to the fulfilment of our Lord's predictions relating to the Jewish people, which are so frequent, so solemn, and affectionate. The testimony of Josephus is the most considerable of all: it is the most full, and particular, and exact of any we have, or have the knowledge of: and he was an eye-witness; and he was manifestly zealous for the honour of his country: he had a great respect for the temple, and its worship, and for all the peculiarities of the Mosaic law; and he continued to have the same to the last, as appears from his own life and his books against Appion.

X. Josephus, in the preface to his own work, intimates that some histories of the war had been before written by others: but he represents them as partial and defective, and composed by men who were not well informed. Undoubtedly none of these remain now: they have been lost long since.

Justus of Tiberias, contemporary with Josephus, between whom there were many differences, also wrote a history of the War. Josephus in his Life chargeth him with falsehood, and blames him for not publishing his work until after the death of Vespasian and Titus, and king Agrippa. Josephus owns that Justus was well skilled in Greek learning and he plainly says that he wrote of the war. I do not clearly perceive Eusebius to have known any thing of Justus but what he learned from the testimonies of Josephus, above referred to by me.

1

k

Justus is in Jerom's Catalogue of Ecclesiastical Writers. He seems to ascribe to him two books.

m

Photius I think speaks of but one work of this author,

i Και γαρ 80' απειρος ην παιδειας της παρ' Έλλησιν, ἡ θαῤῥων επεχείρησεν και την ίσοριαν των πραγμάτων τετων αναγράφων, κ. λ. Joseph. Vit. sect. S. Vid. et sect. 65. * H. E. 1. 3. cap. x. p. 86. B.

I Justus Tiberiensis, de provinciâ Galilæâ, conatus est et ipse judaïcarum rerum historiam texere, et quosdam commentariolos de Scripturis componere, &c. De V. I. cap. 14.

m

Ανεγνώσθη 1858 Τιβέρεως χρονικον, κ. λ. Cod. 33. p. 20.