A source-book of ancient history - The Search For Mecca

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Vespasian; the Jews 485
which had greatly fallen ofif in numbers and had lost honor
through the neglect of his predecessors. After expelling
the unworthy, he chose in their places the most honorable
persons in Italy.
An earnest patron of learning and the liberal arts, Vespasian
granted to the Latin and Greek professors of rhetoric
the yearly salary of a. hundred thousand sesterces
each from the treasury. He bought, too, the freedom of
some one offered
superior poets and artists. . . . When
to convey some immense columns into the Capitol at a
small expense by a mechanical contrivance, the emperor
rewarded him very handsomely for the invention, but refused
to accept the service, saying, "Suffer me to find
maintenance for the poor people."
V. How THE Jews Avoided CAPxmxY
So great was the zeal they were in to slay their wives
and children and themselves also. Nor indeed, when they
came to the work itself, did their courage fail them, as one
might imagine it would have done; but they then held
fast, without wavering, the same resolution which they
had upon the hearing of Eleazar's speech. Yet every one
of them still retained the natural passion of love for themselves
and their families; yet the reasoning they went
upon appeared to them to be very just, even with regard to
those that were dearest to them; for the husbands tenderly
embraced their wives and took their children into their
arms and gave the longest parting kisses to them, with
tears in their eyes. But at the same time did they complete
what they had resolved on, as if they had been executed
by the hands of sti angers; and they had nothing else for
A patron of
learning.
Suetonius,
Vespasian,
18.
In the siege,
of Jerusalem,
70 A.D.
Josephus,
Jrd'ish War,
vii. 9.
A ncient
World, 468 f
This event
happened in
a fortress of
the besieged
city, while it
their comfort but the necessity they were in of doing this
was being
stormed by
execution, to avoid the prospect they had of the miseries the Romans.