“Once again you are indignant and shout your abuse at me; and indeed I deserve even harsher treatment for offering advice in fate’s despite and for struggling to save those whom God has condemned. Who is ignorant of the records of the ancient prophets and of that oracle which threatens this poor city and is now on the eve of fulfilment? They foretold that it would be taken when one should begin to slaughter his own countrymen. And is not the city and the whole Temple too filled with the corpses of your fellow-citizens? God it is then, God Himself, who with the Romans is bringing the fire to purge His Temple and desolation upon a city so laden with pollutions.”—_B.J._ VI. 2. 1 (93-110). Footnote 300: The tower or “castle” adjoining the Temple from the stairs of which St. Paul delivered the speech recorded in Acts xxii. Footnote 301: The daily, morning and evening, sacrifice (ἐνδελεχισμός: Heb. _Tamid_); cf. Numb. xxviii. 6. Footnote 302: John of Gischala. Footnote 303: Many MSS insert “standing” (“standing where he might be heard,” etc.). Footnote 304: _i.e._ Aramaic. Cf. Acts xxi. 40; xxii. 2. Footnote 305: Lit. “tasting.” Footnote 306: The Gr. word strictly means “offerings to the dead.” Footnote 307: John of Gischala. Footnote 308: Amplification of 2 K. xxiv. 12; cf. _Ant._ x. 7. 1 (100). (49) Conflagration of the Temple “There shall not be left here one stone upon another which shall not be thrown down.” Titus, to protect his forces, had ordered the gates of the outer court to be set on fire, and from the gates the fire extended to the porticoes. But, after a council of war, it was decided that the main fabric—the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies—must be saved; Titus urging that “if it were burnt, the Romans would be the losers; if preserved, it would be an ornament of his Empire.” His attempts to check the spread of the conflagration proved, however, unavailing. [Sidenote: August A.D. 70] Throughout that day fatigue and consternation checked the Jews from attacking; but, on the following day, about the second hour, with recruited strength and renewed courage, they sallied out through the eastern gate and charged the guards of the outer court of the Temple.