And here, that same night, there sat that memorable council, assembled to decide the great question (as if it were in _their_ power to decide!) whether the Jewish temple should be preserved or destroyed. Tiberius Alexander was the first to speak; more pagan than the pagans themselves he brought forward several reasons, all tending to show that the existence of the temple was a menace to the safety of the empire. He ended with a religious argument: “If you spare this edifice, O Cæsar, the Jews will boast that their God has put His fear in your heart and that you dare not destroy it. They will see in your leniency both a proof of the divine origin of their temple and an augury of its eternal existence; its preservation will more than ever convince them that they are the favorites of heaven, and are therefore under no obligation to obey an earthly power. “It must be ours to show that Jupiter of the Capitol is supreme over Jehovah of Jerusalem. “Two superstitions, equally fatal to the empire, depend for their existence upon yon temple, that of the Jews and that of the Christians![32] These two superstitions, although contrary to each other, have the same origin: the Christians come from the Jews; destroy the root, and the shoot will quickly perish. Wherefore,” concluded he, with reminiscences of the psalms, “my counsel is, ‘Down with it; down with it, even to the ground!’” But Titus, secretly moved by his infatuation for Berenice, was, of course, disposed to take a milder view. “We ought not,” said he, “from hatred of our enemies to take revenge upon inanimate things. To burn so vast and splendid a fabric is to do hurt to ourselves, seeing that it is an ornament to our empire.”[33] And, perceiving on which side of the question the mind of their general lay a certain minority, who had been disposed to favor the views of Alexander, dropped their opposition. “This, then, is our decree,” said Titus solemnly, “and let the whole army know it--the temple shall be preserved.” He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh; the Lord shall have them in derision! For scarcely had Titus made an end of speaking when from without there came a cry, distant and faint; it was repeated in a louder key; caught up by a thousand tongues, alike by the startled Romans in the camp and by the terrified Jews in the city, the wild tidings came rolling louder, and ever louder, upon the night air, to the mockery and confusion of the military council: =“THE TEMPLE IS ON FIRE!”= CHAPTER XXIV “WATCHMAN, WHAT OF THE NIGHT?” Night, still and beautiful, rested upon the temple-courts; in the immeasurable depths of a purple sky the stars were burning with the brilliancy peculiar to southern latitudes. The battle-toil of the day had given place to a strange quiet; both sides seemed bent on taking rest as a preparation for the greater struggle of the morrow.