highest ideal of morality; the Temple was despoiled by its dignitaries even before the enemy forced his way into it with his weapons of murder. From this time, according to tradition, the visible signs of divine mercy ceased to appear in the Temple. Like some cankerous affection, this demoralization of princes and high priests extended ever more and more to the classes closest to them, producing evils which are depicted in dark colors by the pen of a contemporary. Since the penal laws were administered in the name of the emperor, and were placed under the control of the governors, the judiciary became dependent upon the Romans and the wealthy and influential classes. Selfishness, bribery, calumny, and cowardice, according to the painter of the manners and morality of that period, were ever increasing. "They throw off," he bitterly exclaims, "the yoke of heaven, and place themselves under the yoke of men; their judgments are false and their actions perverse. The vain and thoughtless are made great, while the nobler citizens are despised." Frivolity in the women and licentiousness in the men were so completely the order of the day that the most eminent teacher of morality of that time, Jochanan ben Zaccai, found himself obliged to abolish the ritual hitherto used in cases of suspicion of adultery. With deep sorrow, the nobler-minded Judæans lamented a state of things in which outward forms of worship stood higher than morality, and the defiling of the Temple caused more scandal and wrath than an act of murder. In the lower classes, crime of another but of a not less alarming nature appeared. The frequent insurrections which had been stimulated and fomented by the Zealots since Rome had arrogantly treated Judæa like a conquered province, had given rise to bands of free troops, which roved wildly about the country, confounding liberty with licentiousness, and trampling upon both customs and laws. They crowded the caves and hollows which abound in the rocky mountains of Judæa, and from those retreats made frequent irruptions to gratify their love of unbridled liberty. Some bands of Zealots, led by Eleazar ben Dinai and Alexander, were incited by feelings of patriotism to deeds of cruelty. They had sworn destruction and death to the Romans, and they included among the latter all those who consorted with them; they would not recognize them as Judæans, and deemed it no crime to plunder and destroy them. The degenerate friends of Rome were, according to their views, and the oaths they had taken, mere outlaws, and the Zealots kept their oath only too well. They attacked the nobles as often as they fell in their way, ravaged their possessions and did them as much harm as lay in their power. If there was any wrong to be avenged upon the enemy of their country, they were the first to lend their sword in defense of their outraged nationality.