fecture of Syria was confided to Cassius Longinus, under whom served, as procurator of Judea, Caspius Fadus, a stern though upright soldier. But the impatience and hatred of the people were now inflamed to such a degree, that gentleness and severity were equally unavailing to preserve the tranquillity of the country. Impostors appeared on every hand, proclaiming deliverance to the oppressed children of Jacob, and provoking the more impetuous among their brethren to take up arms against the Romans. Various conflicts ensued, in which the discipline of the legions hardly ever failed to disperse or destroy the tumultuary bands who, under such unhappy auspices, attempted to restore the kingdom to Israel. The holy city, which was from time to time beleaguered by both parties, sustained material injury from the furious assaults of pagan and Jew alternately. The predictions of its downfal, already circulated among the Christians, began to mingle with the shouts of its fanatical inhabitants; and already, even at the accession of Agrippa the Second to his limited sovereignty, every thing portended that miserable consummation which at no distant period closed the temporal scene of Hebrew hope and dominion.

Every succeeding day witnessed the progress of that ferocious sect, founded on the opinions of Judas the Gaulonite, who acknowledged no sovereign but Jehovah, and who constantly denounced as the greatest of all sins those payments or services by means of which a heathenish government was supported. In prosecuting their revolutionary schemes, they esteemed no man's life dear, and set as little value upon their own. Devoted to the principles of a frantic patriotism, they were content to sacrifice to its claims the clearest dictates of humanity and religion; being at all times ready to bind themselves by an oath that they would neither eat nor drink until they had slain the enemy of their nation or of their God. This was the school which supplied that execrable faction, who added tenfold to the miseries of Jerusalem in the day of her visitation; and who contributed more than all the legions of Rome to realize

the bitterness of the curse which was poured upon her devoted head.

A succession of unprincipled governors, who were sent forth to enrich themselves on the spoils of the Syrian provinces, accelerated the crisis of Judea. About the middle of the first century, the notorious Felix was appointed to the government, who, in the administration of affairs, habitually combined violence with fraud, sending out his soldiers to inflict punishment on such as had not the means or the inclination to bribe his clemency. An equal stranger to righteousness and temperance, he presented a fine subject for the eloquence of St Paul; who, it is presumed, however, made the profligate governor tremble, without either affecting his religious principles or improving his moral conduct.

The short residence of Festus procured for the unhappy Jews a respite from oppression. He laboured successfully to put down the bands of insurgents, whose ravages were inflicted indiscriminately upon foreigners and their own countrymen; nor was he less active in checking the excesses of the military, so long accustomed to rapine and free quarter. Agrippa at the same time transferred the seat of his government to Jerusalem, where his presence served to moderate the rage of parties, and thereby to postpone the final rupture between the provincials and their imperial master. But this brief interval of repose was followed by an increased degree of irritation and fury. Florus, alike distinguished for his avarice and cruelty, and who saw in the contentions of the people the readiest means of filling his own coffers, connived at the mutual hostility which it was his duty to prevent. In this nefarious policy he received the countenance of Cestius Gallus the prefect of Syria, who, imitating the maxims of his lieutenant, studiously drove the natives to insurrection, in order that their cries for justice might be drowned amid the clash of arms.

But he forgot that there are limits to endurance even among the most humble and abject. Unable to support the weight of his tyranny, and galled by certain insults

directed against their faith, the Jewish inhabitants of Cesarea set his power at defiance, and declared their resolution to repel his injuries by force. The capital was soon actuated by a similar spirit, and made preparations for defence. Cestius marched to the gates and demanded an entrance for the imperial cohorts, whose aid was required to support the garrison within. The citizens, having refused to comply, already anticipated the horrors of a siege; when, after a few days they saw, to their great surprise, the Syrian prefect in full retreat, carrying with him his formidable army. Sallying from the different outlets with arms in their hands, they pursued the fugitives with the usual fury of an incensed multitude; and, overtaking their enemy at the narrow pass of Bethhoron, they avenged the cause of independence by a considerable slaughter of the legionary soldiers, and by driving the remainder to an ignominious flight.

Nero received the intelligence of this defeat while amusing himself in Greece, and immediately sent Vespasian to assume the government, with instructions to restore the tranquillity of the province by moderate concessions or by the most vigorous warfare. It was in the sixty-seventh year of Christianity that this great commander entered Judea, accompanied by his son, the celebrated Titus. The result is too well known to require details. A series of sanguinary battles deprived the Jews of their principal towns one after another, until they were at length shut up in the capital; the siege and final reduction of which compose one of the most affecting stories that are any where recorded in the annals of the human race.

CHAPTER IV.

Literature and Religious Usages of the Ancient Hebrews.

Obscurity of the Subject—Learning issued from the Levitical Colleges-Schools of the Prophets-Music and Poetry-Meaning of the Term Prophesy-Illustrated by References to the Old Testament and to the New-The Power of Prediction not confined to those bred in the Schools-Race of False Prophets Their Malignity and Deceit Micaiah and Ahab-Charge against Jeremiah the Prophet-Criterion to distinguish True from False Prophets -The Canonical Writings of the Prophets-Literature of Prophets Sublime Nature of their Compositions-Examples from Psalms and Prophetical Writings-Humane and liberal Spirit— Care used to keep alive the Knowledge of the Law-Evils arising from the Division of Israel and Judah-Ezra collects the Ancient Books-Schools of Prophets similar to Convents-Sciences-Astronomy-Division of Time, Days, Months, and Years-Sabbaths and New Moons-Jewish Festivals-Passover-PentecostFeast of Tabernacles-Of Trumpets-Jubilee-Daughters of Zelophedad-Feast of Dedication-Minor Anniversaries-Solemn Character of Hebrew Learning-Its easy Adaptation to Christianity-Superior to the Literature of all other Ancient Nations.

THERE is no subject on which greater obscurity prevails than that of the learning and schools of the Hebrews, prior to the Babylonian captivity. The wise institution which provided for the maintenance of Levitical towns in all the tribes, secured at least a hereditary knowledge of the Law, including both its civil and its spiritual enactments. It is extremely probable, therefore, that all the varieties of literary attainment which might be deemed necessary, either for the discharge of professional duties or for the ornament of private life, were derived

from those seminaries, and partook largely of their general character and spirit. An examination of the scanty remains of that remote period will justify, to a considerable extent, the conjecture now made. It will appear that the poetry, the ethics, the oratory, the music, and even the physical science, cultivated in the time of Samuel and David, bore a close relation to the original object of the Levitical colleges; being adapted to promote the principles of religion and morality, no less than of that singular patriotism which made the Jew delight in his separation from all the other nations of the earth.

Our attention is first attracted by the numerous allusions, scattered over the earlier books of the Old Testament, to the Schools of the Prophets. These were establishments, obviously intended to prepare young men for certain offices analogous to those which are discharged in our days by the different orders of the clergy; maintained in some degree at the public expense; and placed under the superintendence of persons distinguished for their gravity and high endowments. The principal studies appear to have been poetry and music, the elements of which were necessary to the young prophet when called to take a part in the worship of Jehovah. In the book of Samuel we find the pupils of one of those seminaries performing on psalteries, tabrets, and harps; and in the first book of Chronicles it is said that the sons of Asaph, of Heman, and of Jeduthun, prophesied with harps, with psalteries, and with cymbals. For the same reason Miriam the sister of Moses is called a prophetess. When preparing to chant her song of triumph, upon the destruction of the Egyptians at the Red Sea," she took a timbrel in her hand, and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dances."

On a similar ground is the expression to be interpreted when used by St Paul in the eleventh chapter of his First Epistle to the Corinthians : Every woman praying or prophesying with her head uncovered, disho

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