llute this holy house with the blood of both foreigners
and Jews themselves? I appeal to the gods of my own country, and to
every god that ever had any regard to this place; [for I do not suppose
it to be now regarded by any of them;] I also appeal to my own army, and
to those Jews that are now with me, and even to yourselves, that I do
not force you to defile this your sanctuary; and if you will but change
the place whereon you will fight, no Roman shall either come near your
sanctuary, or offer any affront to it; nay, I will endeavor to preserve
you your holy house, whether you will or not." [11]

5. As Josephus explained these things from the mouth of Caesar, both the
robbers and the tyrant thought that these exhortations proceeded from
Titus's fear, and not from his good-will to them, and grew insolent
upon it. But when Titus saw that these men were neither to be moved by
commiseration towards themselves, nor had any concern upon them to have
the holy house spared, he proceeded unwillingly to go on again with the
war against them. He could not indeed bring all his army against them,
the place was so narrow; but choosing thirty soldiers of the most
valiant out of every hundred, and committing a thousand to each tribune,
and making Cerealis their commander-in-chief, he gave orders that they
should attack the guards of the temple about the ninth hour of that
night. But as he was now in his armor, and preparing to go down with
them, his friends would not let him go, by reason of the greatness of
the danger, and what the commanders suggested to them; for they said
that he would do more by sitting above in the tower of Antonia, as a
dispenser of rewards to those soldiers that signalized themselves in the
fight, than by coming down and hazarding his own person in the forefront
of them; for that they would all fight stoutly while Caesar looked upon
them. With this advice Caesar complied, and said that the only reason
he had for such compliance with the soldiers was this, that he might be
able to judge of their courageous actions, and that no valiant soldier
might lie concealed, and miss of his reward, and no cowardly soldier
might go unpunished; but that he might himself be an eye-witness, and
able to give evidence of all that was done, who was to be the disposer
of punishments and rewards to them. So he sent the soldiers about their
work at the hour forementioned, while he went out himself to a higher
place in the tower of