ANTIOCHUS DIES IN GREAT TORMENTS.

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the altar profaned, they fell to the ground on their , and they sounded with the trumpets of alarm, they cried towards heaven.

Still, Judas Maccabeus, taking courage, set himself eanse the temple; and on the twentieth day of ninth month, the day on which it had been defiled he heathen, they dedicated the altar anew, with ns and canticles and thanksgivings, and kept the with great joy for eight days, Judas Maccabeus all the Church of Israel decreeing that the feast ld be kept for a perpetual remembrance.

§ 82. The death of the Persecutor.

The youngest of the seven brothers whom iochus had put to death, had said to him: "Thou not yet escaped the wrath of the Almighty God, - beholdeth all these things." This was now to

e true, in a very awful way.

Antiochus, hearing that the city Elymais, in Persia, sessed a temple exceedingly rich in silver and gold, ched against it, intending to pillage it; but the abitants rushed to arms, shut their gates, and eated him. Mortified at this repulse, he set out Babylon, and coming to Ecbatana, he there heard he complete rout of his armies in Judea, and that Jews had grown strong by their spoils of armour money. Swelling with vexation, he vowed that would come to Jerusalem, and make it a common ying-place of the Jews. But the Lord the God of el, that seeth all things, struck him with an urable and an invisible plague. For as soon as he

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had ended these words, a dreadful pain in his bowels came upon him, and bitter torments of the inner parts. To make his case worse, he commanded to urge his chariot forward, in the eagerness of his desire to be revenged on the Jews, so vehemently, that he fell out, and was so bruised that he was obliged to be carried in a litter. His body now began to swarm with worms; his flesh fell off his bones; and the bad smell that came from him was such that his bearers could not endure to carry him, nor his soldiers bear to come near him.

In the midst of his torments he turned a complete coward, and wrote an abject letter to the Jews; and he, who a little before vowed that he would give the Jews to be devoured by the birds and the wild beasts, now professed himself ready to become a Jew, and to go through every place of the earth declaring the power of God. But for all this the wretch did not obtain mercy, nor did his pains cease, for the just judgment of God was fallen upon him. Thus the murderer and the blasphemer, being grievously struck, as he himself had treated others, died a miserable death in a foreign country, among the mountains.

§ 83. Judas Maccabeus sends an embassy to the Romans.

Judas Maccabeus, being continually menaced by attacks from the Greeks, who hated him both for his religion and his victories, heard of the fame of the Romans, of their bravery in war, their moderation, and their willingness to make alliance with other people; and that they had made themselves a senate

THE EMBASSY TO ROME.

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house, and consulted daily three hundred and twenty men, that sat in council always for the people, that they might do the things that were right.

Judas Maccabeus, beginning to believe in the necessity of seeking a human protection against the Greeks, in addition to that of God, chose Eupolemus, and sent him with a suite of followers to seek the Roman alliance. And they went to Rome, says the writer of the first book of Maccabees, a very long journey, and they entered into the senate-house, and said: "Judas Maccabeus and his brethren, and the people of the Jews, have sent us to you, to make alliance and peace with you, and that we may be registered your confederates and friends." And the proposal was pleasing in their sight.

The senators wrote back a friendly letter to the Jews, graven on tables of brass, in which the terms of the alliance were fully stated. Such was the first beginning of the connection with Rome, which ended in the crucifixion of the Messias by the sentence of an officer of this people, and in the total destruction of their holy city and nation. While the embassy was on its way, the son of Antiochus succeeded his father on the throne, when a Greek named Demetrius, profiting by the weakness of the young prince, seized the kingdom for himself. The usurper bore the selfsame hatred to Judas; and his first act was to send his general, Nicanor, with a large army, to reduce Judas to subjection. Nicanor, however, was defeated and slain, and his army cut off to a man. The next year, Bacchides was sent with another army.

884. The death of the hero. Judas Maccabeus dies in battle.

No sooner was the alliance with the Roman State completed than the army of the Maccabees appears to have lost its supernatural courage. A general panic seized upon all the followers of Judas; for out of three thousand that were with him, more than two thousand deserted. Judas, feeling that the hour was come to sacrifice his life for the honour of God and the holy law of his nation, said to them that re

THE ARMY IS STRUCK WITH A PANIC.

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mained: "Let us arise, and go against our enemies, if we may be able to fight against them." But they dissuaded him, saying: "We shall not be able, but let us save our lives now, and return to our brethren, and then we will fight against them: for we are but few." Then Judas said: "God forbid we should do this thing, and flee away from them: but if our time be come, let us die manfully for our brethren, and let us not stain our glory."

The battle was hard fought, and there fell many