votary to the gods, who had brought him fafe through fo many perils.

ONE part of the fpoils he had gained, he bestowed in building a noble temple to Diana, after the model of that of Ephefus. The ftatue of that goddefs was of ebony, and exactly like the golden one at Ephefus, and was to be feen in Paufanias's time. The temple was built in the midst of a foreft, watered by the river Helene; and at the entrance of it were infcribed these words, Territory confecrated to Diana. He likewife ordered annual facrifices to her; and, on the day appointed for that festival, the tenths of the product of that territory were offered to the goddess; and the reft were performed with the greatest ceremony, a vaft concourfe of people attending; the edifice being on the high-road between Sparta and Olympia, and about twenty ftades from the temple of Jupiter Olympius. So that this grand feast, which was alfo preceeded with a general hunting of the Sciluntines, and other neighbouring towns, and with other marks of joy, feems defigned, by its founder, as a perpetual monument of this glorious retreat. His fons ufually affifted at the hunting; and it was on their account that he wrote his two treatifes of hunting and horfemanship; in which he endeavours to inculcate the beauty and virtue of making our delights fubfervient to religion, of which all his writings fhew his heart to have been full.

Thus ended this noble expedition, which our author concludes in the following words: "The whole of the way, both of the expedi“tion and retreat, consisted of two hundred

..

and

"and fifteen days march, of eleven hundred "and fifty five parafangs, and of thirty four "thousand fix hundred and fifty ftades; and "the time employed in both, of a year and "three months.”

A fuccinct account of the dreadful perfecution the Jews underwent at Alexandria, and of PHILO'S embaly to the Emperor Caius Caligula.

year of

reign,

THIS dreadful perfecution happened in the and 39th of the Chriftian æra, while Egypt was governed by a Roman knight, named Avillius Flaccus, to whose base connivance it was chiefly owing. Flaccus had governed that province with great reputation, during the five laft years of the reign of Tiberius, who had a particular value and kindness for him. But, upon the death of that prince, and the acceffion of Caligula to the empire, he changed his conduct, grew remifs in the administration of juftice, and made it his whole ftudy to gain the affections of the people of Alexandria ; hoping, by that means, to recommend himself to the favour of the new Emperor, whofe refentment he dreaded; and, indeed, not without reafon; for he was no friend to the fami ly of Germanicus: and was generally thought to have contributed to the difgrace and death of Agrippina, the mother of Caligula. Three crafty Egyptians, Dionyfius, Lampo, and Ifidorus, who had been declared enemies to Flaccus, while he ruled with due feverity, being apprifed

Q

prifed of his fears, remonftrated to him, under colour of friendship, that the fureft means of winning the hearts of the Alexandrians, was to withdraw his protection from the Jews, of whom many thousands lived in Alexandria, and to abandon them to the mercy of the Egyptians, who had ever borne an irreconcileable hatred to the Jewish nation. This counfel Flaccus readily embraced; well knowing, that it would not difpleafe the Emperor, whofe hatred the Jews had provoked, by refufing to acknowledge his pretended divinity. Befides, Flaccus was, of himself, it feems, no friend to the Jewish nation for that people having the year before, in the firft month of Caligula's reign, decreed him all the honours which were confiftent with their religion, and configned the decree to Flaccus, that, by his means, it might be conveyed to the Emperor, he, intead of tranfmitting it to Rome, as he promifed to do, fuppreffed it; which was doing them the greatest unkindness imaginable, and drawing upon them the refentment of a cruel and ambitious prince.

In the mean time, Agrippa, who had been fet at liberty by Caligula, and declared King of the tetrarchy, which his uncle Philip had held, with the addition of that of Lyfanias, arriving from Rome at Alexandria, on his journey to his new kingdom, was infulted by the populace of that metropolis in a most outragious manner; though, to avoid the concourfe of people, he had entered the city by night. As Flaccus winked at these infults, inftead of reftraining them, the rabble grew more outragious; and, affembling in crowds,

began,

began, with great tumult and uproar, to demand, that the ftatues of Caius might be placed in the Jewish oratories, or places of prayer; of which there were many in Alexandria, and all over Egypt. Flaccus not offering to oppofe, but feeming rather to approve the defign, the rabble thronged immediately to the oratories, cut down the groves and trees about them, levelled fome of them with the ground, and fet fire to others; which, together with the oratories, confumed feveral noble monuments erected by the emperors in honour of the Jews, and a great many adjoining houses. Such oratories as the ioters could not demolish, because the Jews, who lived near them, were very numerous, they prophaned, by placing in them the Emperor's ftatues. In the largest of them all, they erected a ftatue of brafs, reprefenting Caius in a chariot drawn by four horfes, which had been formerly confecrated to Cleopatra, the great grandmother of the laft queen of that name. They did not, as Philo obferves, fhew great refpect for Caius, in dedicating to him what had been formerly dedicated to a woman. But the merit, on which they laid the chief stress, was their increafing the number of temples confecrated to his pretended deity; though, even in that, they did not fo much regard his honour, as the fatisfying their own hatred to the Jews. The Alexandrians took care to acquaint the Emperor with the tranfactions of each day, who is faid to have read their ac counts with incredible fatisfaction, partly be caufe he hated the Jews, and partly because he believed the Alexandrians chiefly actuated,

in afflicting the Jews, by a fincere zeal for his honour. The example of Alexandria was followed by all the other cities of Egypt; in which province there were at this time a million of Jews, and a vast number of oratories, of which the largest and most beautiful were ftyled fynagogues all which were either demolished, or confumed by fire, or profaned with the Emperor's ftatues.

A few days after the Jews had been thus ftript of their oratories, Flaccus published an edict, declaring all the Jews aliens at Alexandria, without allowing them time to make good their claim to the rights of citizens, which they had long enjoyed undisturbed. The Jews, who were never famous for bearing injuries with patience, when they could prevent or revenge them, made, in all likelihood, fome efforts towards the maintaining of their rights; which, though Philo has not thought fit to mention, gave, probably, occafion to greater diforders. For the Alexandrians, confidering them as men abandoned by the Emperor to their mercy, laid hold of this opportunity to vent their rage upon a people whom they had ever abhorred, and looked upon as enemies to the rest of mankind. The city of Alexandria was at that time divided into five quar ters, which took their names from the first five letters of the alphabet. In each of these fome Jews dwelt; but two were almost entirely peopled by them, and thence called the quarters of the Jews. They were, therefore, by the outragious multitude, violently driven out of all the other parts of the city, and confined to one quarter; the houses from which

they