troyed, and that
nobody can so much as devise a punishment that they have not deserved by
what they have done, and that you are all provoked against them by those
their wicked actions, whence you have suffered so greatly. But perhaps
many of you are aftrighted at the multitude of those zealots, and at
their audaciousness, as well as at the advantage they have over us in
their being higher in place than we are; for these circumstances, as
they have been occasioned by your negligence, so will they become still
greater by being still longer neglected; for their multitude is every
day augmented, by every ill man's running away to those that are like to
themselves, and their audaciousness is therefore inflamed, because they
meet with no obstruction to their designs. And for their higher place,
they will make use of it for engines also, if we give them time to do
so; but be assured of this, that if we go up to fight them, they will
be made tamer by their own consciences, and what advantages they have in
the height of their situation they will lose by the opposition of their
reason; perhaps also God himself, who hath been affronted by them, will
make what they throw at us return against themselves, and these
impious wretches will be killed by their own darts: let us but make our
appearance before them, and they will come to nothing. However, it is a
right thing, if there should be any danger in the attempt, to die before
these holy gates, and to spend our very lives, if not for the sake of
our children and wives, yet for God's sake, and for the sake of his
sanctuary. I will assist you both with my counsel and with my hand; nor
shall any sagacity of ours be wanting for your support; nor shall you
see that I will be sparing of my body neither."

11. By these motives Ananus encouraged the multitude to go against the
zealots, although he knew how difficult it would be to disperse them,
because of their multitude, and their youth, and the courage of their
souls; but chiefly because of their consciousness of what they had done,
since they would not yield, as not so much as hoping for pardon at the
last for those their enormities. However, Ananus resolved to undergo
whatever sufferings might come upon him, rather than overlook things,
now they were in such great confusion. So the multitude cried out
to him, to lead them on against those whom he had described in his
exhortation to them, and every one of them was most readily disposed t