tribute paide vnto Pharao so that Ioseph enriched Pharao by meanes of the yearely tribute and saued Pharaos life and all Egipt by Gods prouidence and his wisedome that at that time hee was called in Egipt Pater patriae but soone forgotten in Egipt as was seene after in the tyrannie of the Egiptians towards Iosephs children and the whole stocke of the Hebrewes Victories and ouerthrowes by warres gotten imposed such tribute as pleased the cōquerer For among the Romanes before their Empire grew great the Lucanians payed for their tribute but swine the Brusians oxen the Frizians the skinnes of oxen others paid diuers kindes of wine others waxe others fish and such like And as the olde Romanes tributes were but cattell corne wine fish and such so were their tryumphes had ouer the Samnites the Volscians Sabines Tarentines and olde Gaules but the weapons armors coaches garments cattells and such like of the enemies To the Persians while yet the Monarchie was in Persia the Aethiopians payed but Ebanye Iuory Elephantes teethe Frankencense and certaine measures of base gold euery third yeare So the Capadocians payed to the Persians for yearely tribute fiue hundred Horse two thousand Moyles So likewise the Townes and small Villages about Babilon were to prouide and feede the dogges of the king of Persia. But the Citie of Babilon it selfe paide for tribute to the king of Persia Artabas plenas argento certaine accounts of mony euery day The Arabians likewise paide to the King of Persia certaine measures of such sweete odours as the country did abound as Frankincense and such like These were but small tributes as swine oxen corne wine fish in former time which the Romanes had in respect of their tributes had ouer Asia Affricke and Europe afterwards which commaunded not only corne nauies horses souldiers and armours but also after this a farre greater tribute beganne in the time of Paul Aemilius who after he had subdued the Macedonians and Persius their king the Illyrians and their king Gentius hee imposed vppon the Macedonians and Illyrians halfe the tribute which they were wont to paie to their former kings So Scypio Affrican after hee had conquered Hanibal at Zama and brought the Carthagineans to such composition as pleased himselfe to paie two hundred talents yearely for fiftie yeares with such conditions that the Carthagineans should depart from Sardinia and Cicilia to restore the Romane souldiers which Hanniball brought captiue with him out of Italy and to deliuer vp their Elephants and all their nauies tenne excepted To such greatnesse grewe the tributes of the Romanes by their victories that Hispaine and Carthage were to pay yearely stipendary tributes not onely in money but also horses corne nauies armours and to maintaine stipendary souldiers And among all other conquered nations by them they had in their cities and townes places called Cripta for corne and prouisions for souldiers but especially in Egipt which was for their prouisions called the storehouse or barne of Rome But now to the victories of Dauid againe which after hee had raigned twentie yeares king quietly in Ierusalem he lost two great battels in the one he lost seuentie thousand and in the other battell hee had welnigh lost both himselfe and his kingdome in the first battell Dauid committed great faults in setting out his power his glorie his victories and his greatnesse and most ambitiously to commaund Ioab to number all Israel from Berseba euen vnto Dan as though power strength and victorie came from him and not from the Lord. Here Dauid consulted not with the iudgement of Vrim and Thummim and therefore he lost the victory and Sathan gaue him a buffet Dauid againe in the second battel was ouerthrowne by prouokemēt of the former enemie not only to looke vpon the beauty of Bethseba from the roofe of his house but also to send for her and lie with her and to hide the first wicked great fault he committed a greater he sent Letters to Ioab his captaine to put Vriah Bethsebas husband in the front of the battell to bee slaine in this battell also Dauid did not call for the Ephod nor asked counsell of the Lord as he was wont to do therefore Sathan gaue two such great buffets to Dauid that he lost the field and two victories one after an other of these buffets and stratagems Paul speakes that he was buffetted of Sathan least he should glory too much by reuelation shewed vnto him Moses also had a buffet of Sathan at the water of Meribah for his incredulitie that the Lord said vnto him that hee should not enter into the land of Canaan but dye in mount Nebo Iob also had a buffet in the land of Huz Sathan vseth many such stratagems whereby hee giueth many such buffets If Moses Iob Dauid Paul and others were thus buffeted by Sathan who can thinke himselfe free from the stratagems of Sathan wee must therefore watch if wee will not bee deceiued and wee must fight if we thinke to haue victorie our battell is not against flesh and bloud but against power and states of heauens against the prince and ruler of darknesse and against spirituall enenemies But the Prophet Nathan was sent to Dauid to open vnto him the rewards of adultery and murther that the sword should not go from Dauids house the banishment the punishment and miserie that should fall vpon him for offending the Lord. First his sonne died gotten in adultery by Bethseba the rauishment of his women by his owne sonne Absolon the incest of his daughter Thamar by her brother Ammon the murthering of Dauids eldest sonne Ammon by his brother Absolon and the rebellion of his sonne Absolon against his father the King Thus Dauid sawe the iust iudgement of the Lord and the tragicall end of his children for offending the Lord. Euen Dauid that subdued so many nations that got so many victories that fought with a beare with a lyon and with a gyant and subdued them is now subdued by a woman had Dauid after these victories so much temperance and chastitie at the sight of Bethseba as hee had faith and courage at his combat with Golias hee had conquered both alike but the Lord punished Dauid and his house The sonne of Emor for that he violately abused Dina Iacobs daughter her bretheren tooke at it such a spite that Simeon and Leui Iacobs sonnes went and slew Sichem and his father Emor and all the men within Sichem and tooke Dina theyr sister away with them Thus the gadding abroad of Dina to Sichem to see the manner and fashion of the Sichemites was the cause of the ouerthrowe of Sichem and the Sichemites The going of the Sabine virgins to the feast of Consus to see playes in Rome were rauished and taken by the Romanes to the number of six hundred were the onely cause of the warres between the Sabines and the Romanes In Siloth likewise on
not when Thermutes laide the diademe vpon the childes head which Moses being but a very childe with both his handes tooke the diademe from his head and threw it to the ground and treaded it vnder his feete whereat the Priestes of Egipt were so astonished that they told the king that that childe shoulde bee the ouerthrow and destruction of Egipt they all counselled Pharao to take away the feare of Egipt and the hope of the Hebrewes Notwithstanding Moses as he was by the prouidence of God preserued saued from killing drowning being a childe so likewise then was he kept from the enuy and malice of the Priestes and of the Egiptians who sought to kill him as the Iewes thought to kill Paul but as Paul preuailed ouer the Iewes so Moses preuailed ouer the Egiptians and marched forward with this Hebrew army towards Aethiope gaue them two great battels ouerthrew them chased them and daunted the courage of the Aethiopians that they were brought lower by the Hebrewes then the Egiptians were before by the Aethiopians The Aethiopians thus being brought lowe Moses brought his armie and besieged Saba the chiefe citie of Aethiope at what time the king of Aethiope his daughter named Tharbis hauing hard such great report of Moses fortitude and prowesse went vp on the walles of the citie to behold the armie of the Hebrewes where she saw Moses manfully and valiantly fighting before his armie she much admired his courage and wondred at his prowesse doubting much the destruction of her countrey she sent some of her chiefe seruants vnto Moses by whom shee opened her fauour her loue towards Moses offering her selfe to him in marriage and to cōclude peace between the Aethiopians the Egiptians which Moses accepted vpon her oath that the citie Saba should be yeelded vp into Moses hand and peace concluded betweene Aethiope Egipt which presently was yeelded vp and the marriage performed notwithstanding Moses at his returne to Egipt his seruice was more maliciously accused and suspected then thankfully accepted such hatred malice grew in Egipt towards Moses by meanes of the Priestes and the king himselfe suspected him for his greatnesse and successe of his victories ouer the king of Aethiopia that Pharao doubted that Moses might doo the like in Egipt by these meanes traps and snares were laide to destroy Moses that Moses was in such feare of his life the rather for that he kild an Egiptiā that abused an Hebrue that he was forced secretly to flie through the wildernesse vnto the Madianites where he maried Zephora Iethro his daughter and there continued fortie yeares from whence he was called by the Lord to lead his people from Egipt to Canaan whose greatnesse then was more knowne then before as is set downe in Exodus so that Appian with his Egiptian Authors with their fained fables against Moses are worthie to be scoft at for their impudent lies for Moyses was brought vp with Thermutes the kings daughter heire of Egipt and married to Tharbis the kings daughter of Aethiope But let vs omit Appian with his fellow lyers and come to Moses marching with his Hebrew campe CAAP. IX Of certaine military lawes and marshall exercise of the Hebrewes vnder Moses in the wildernesse AFter that Pharao and the Egiptians were drowned in the red sea the Hebrewes had such rich spoyles by their dead bodies found on the sea shoares that now the Hebrewes became from poore shepheardes called Hicsos in Egipt to be rich souldiers that neither Phillip king of Macedonia had such spoyle in Delphos nor his sonne Alexander in Babilon nor Nabuchodonozer in Ierusalem as the Hebrewes had of the spoyle of the Egiptians vpon the shoare For now the Egiptians paie them their hires for the seruice and bondage of foure hundred and thirtie yeares So Philo said that the borrowing of Iewels of siluer and Iewells of Golde was nothing else but to paie the due debt vnto the Hebrewes for their long bondage and seruice So Rupertus saide the wages and hires which the Egiptians kept so long vniustly from the Hebrewes by an honest guile the Hebrewes obtained their long deteined due for the Lord commanded the Hebrues to borrowe Golde and siluer of the Egiptians and the spoyle which is gotten of the enemies is due by the lawe of armes The Hebrewes marched vnder Moses with Egiptian weapons with songs of hymnes and Psalmes for the victorie vnto the Lord. Myria Moses sister the women and virgins of Israel with violls harpes and tabrets and with great melodie gaue thankes vnto the Lord so that it was afterwardes a custome among the Virgines of Israel to sing Psalmes and Songes to thanke the Lorde for their victories and withall to aduaunce the fame of the Generalls and Captaines as they did to Saul and Dauid The Lorde sets downe certaine martiall lawes to Moses to gouerne and to rule his people commaunding him to make two siluer Trumpets to assemble the armie to call the congregation and for the remouing of the Campe and charged the sonnes of Aaron to sounde out the trumpets in any seruice onely the Priests were appointed by the lawe to sound the trumpets to carry the arke which was their office for euer When thou goest out with the host against thy enemies keep thee then from all wickednes be clean from pollution in the night for the Lorde may not abide in the hoste any souldier that is any way vncleane before he be washt with water and purified and when a souldier must serue the necessitie of nature amōg other weapons he must haue his paddle staffe to dig the earth and after to couer his excrement for the Lord would haue his people pure and holie both in soule and bodie for the Lord walketh in the midst of the campe among his souldiers The Hebrues were also commanded whē they went to any battell that the Priest should stand before the whole armie being called together with the sound of a trumpet to exhort the armie and to encourage them to feare nothing the multitude of their enemies but to fight valiantly the battels of the Lorde assuring them that the Lorde would be their Captaine and goe before them and therfore not to doubt of the victorie So the Lord promised and said to Moses I will goe before thee to Egipt against Pharao So the Lord said to Ioshua that he would goe before him and his armie to Iericho So the Lord with the like words spake to Nabuchodonozer when he went against Ierusalem And euen so he spake to Cyrus when he went against Babilon All battels victories are mine saith the Lord. As the Lord promised not only to Moses to Ioshua and to others but also to Nabuchodonozer Cyrus Heathen Princes to goe before them in his own battels and therefore the Heathen kings made their souldiers beleeue that the Gods taught them stratagems to ouercome their enemies Archidamus vsed a
his souldiers to hide themselues in ambush he hauing but fewe souldiers prouoked them of the Towne to come out faining himself to flye the enemie following with great furie after Luc. Cornelius with all his hidden souldiers returned vpon the sudden with such a terrible crye that the enemies turned theyr backes and fled to the Towne and the Romanes followed after them close at the heeles and entred the Towne with them all together So Pompey the Consull Generall for the Romaine Army in Albania perceiuing the enemies both in horsmen and in footemen to be farre more in number then the Romanes practised this stratagem placed his footemen behind the horsemen being in a straight and commaunded his horsemen to couer their helmets least by the sight of the helmets they should be seene of the enemies and to take vpon them to flye to draw the enemies forwards into the midst of the Army of footemen and then the Romane horsemen to turne backe and deuide themselues and to set on both sides of the enemies By this stratagem Pompey got a great victorie ouer the Albanians Iphicrates the Athenian compared an Army in this sort the light horsemen to the hands the men of armes to the feete the battel of footemen to the stomacke and breast the captaine to the head But the Hebrewes for all the victories of Ioshuah of Iudah and of Gedeon were still vnthankful and wrought wickednesse in the sight of the Lord for all the battels that the Lord fought for them they were so well acquainted with the gods of the Gentiles yea they serued the gods of Acron the gods of Sydon the gods of Moab and the gods of the Philistines and forgat the god of Israel they serued straunge gods and attributed victories vnto their Idols and honoured them and gaue no glory vnto the Lord of Israel and therefore the Lord gaue them ouer and solde them to their enemies and were eighteene yeares sore tormented and vexed by the Ammonites and Philistines and the enemies proudly went ouer Iorden to fight against Iudah against Beniamin and against the house of Ephraim but they cryed vnto the Lorde according to theyr custome in extremitie and were aunswered by the Prophet from the Lorde Let the Gods whome you serue saue you and whom you trust vnto defend you for you waigh not me neither will I defend you and then they put away their straunge gods from among them Thus the Israelites did not onely rebell vpon the death of Ioshuah but also vpon the death of Iudah Ehud Deborah and others neither did they esteeme the victories which they got by Deborah a woman and by Gedeon a Husbandman who with three hundred souldiers slew a hundred and twentie thousand but euer forgetfull and vnthankefull to the Lord more willing to returne to Egipt to be slaues vnto Pharao then to stay in Canaan to serue the Lord. The name of Leonidas was famous among the Lacedemonians for his victorie at Thermopyle where Leonidas with three hundred ouerthrew twentie thousand of Xerxes Army being innumerable The Athenians gloried much for theyr great victorie at Marathon by Milciades and Callimachus hauing but 10000. Grecians in their army ouerthrew the generall of king Darius Army and made a great slaughter of the Persians to the number of two hundred thousand The Romanes bragge much of the victorie of Marius with fewe souldiers ouer the Cymbrians at the riuer of Xextas of Sylla ouer Mithridates at the battell of Orchomenon and of Lucullus ouer Tigranes king of Armenia being three great victories with infinite slaughter with the losse of fewe Romanes The very Schythians can boast and bragge of the ouerthrow of Cyrus hauing two hundred thousand in his Army and that by a woman which encreased the fame of the Scythians to the greatest infamy of the Persians All Nations can bragge and boast of theyr victories and be thankfull vnto their Idols and to their gods with sacrifices with vowes with games and playes with rearing of Aultars and building of Temples but the Hebrewes and the people of the Lord who had greatest cause and occasions to remember theyr victories and triumphes that they had ouer so many Kings and so many Nations before they came to the Land of Canaan by fire haile-stones thunder and great stones from heauen and though the Lords presence went before them in the Arke and the Arke among them in the midst of the campe yet were the Israelites stiffe necked people euer offensiue to the Lord seditious against theyr leaders and enuious one towardes an other so the Lord cryed out against them and said I haue nourished and brought vp children and they are fallen away from me the Oxe knoweth his Lord and the Asse his Maisters stall but Israel knoweth not me wicked children sinfull people a froward generation which are ouerladen with blasphemies Nothing could instruct them to obey the Lord neither the Arke of couenant neither the Tabernacle of Moses neither the pillar of fire where the Lord appeared vnto them and after the vse of the Tabernacle neither the Temple of Salomon nor the Prophets to whom the Lord manifested himselfe in Ierusalem yea euen in Samaria among the wicked Samaritans they had the Prophets of the Lord Elias and Elizeus to instruct them CHAP. XVIII Of Iepthas victories ouer the Ammonites and Ephraimites the ciuill warres the tyrannie of Sylla and Marius in Rome Of the slaughter of the Philistians by Sampson the reuenge of pulling out his eyes and of the battell of Saul at Mich-mash NOw after Gedeon the Lord sought out Ieptha beeing fledde and chased by his bretheren from his countrey to the Land of Tob from whence hee was called by the Lord who alwayes appointed a generall ouer Israell while they serued him to leade his people against the Ammonites which the Lord deliuered into Iepthas hand At that time Ieptha made a rash vowe to the Lorde that if hee should haue victorie ouer the Ammonites that which came out of the doores of his house when he returned home in peace shal be the Lords and he wil offer it vp a burnt offering He foolishly performed that which he rashly vowed Though some of the Rabines do excuse Ieptha that his daughter died not but was seperated to dwell by her selfe from common conuersation in a solitary place to bewaile her virginitie according to the custome and manner of the virgins of Israel to liue in prayers and to consecrate her selfe vnto the lord Yet some of 〈◊〉 best diuines as Augustine Ambrose which both were of a cōtrary opiniō that she was sacrificed according to Iepthas vow But the Lord gaue the victory to Ieptha ouer the Amonits with the ouerthrow of twentie cities and with exceeding great slaughter Ieptha againe after his first victory ouer the Ammonites had another victory ouer the Ephraimites who enuied the former victory of Ieptha most ambitiously as they before did vnto
Gedeon threatning to burne the Generall in his house wherevpon Ieptha with all the men of Gilead gathered themselues together against the Ephraimites ouercame them and slue two and fortie thousand of the Ephraimites the greatest cause of this slaughter was that the Ephraimites called the Gileadites runnagates of Ephraim And yet both the Ephraimites and Gileadites were Israelites much like to the battell betweene Silla and Marius being two Romains who for meere malice one towards another continued their ciuil warres ten yeares in the which were slaine a hundred and fiftie thousand Romanes fiue and twenty flaine that haue bene Consulls in Rome threescore that had bin in Rome in the office called Aediles welnigh two hundred Senators slaine equall in number almost to the slaughter of Hannibal for Consuls Senators Praetors and other magistrates Cinna then Cōsull with his Romane legions and Marius with his banished men fugitiues entred the citie of Rome at what time Sylla was with his armie in Greece slue many of the chiefe citizens of the Senators and of diuers that had bin Consuls that whē the heads of these slain mē were presented to Cinna Marius at their banquets it was cōmanded by Cinna the Consull that some should be set vp in the market place some in the Oratory some in other places Such was the ti◅āny of Marius thē in Rome that the rest of the Senators that were left vnslaine sought to escape the hand of Cinna the crueltie of Marius the rage of Fimbria and the force of Sertorius and to flie to Sylla in Greece for succour At whose return Marius with his cōfederates fled from Rome where Sylla plaid a part of a second tragedie destroying all that hee knew or heard of to be Marius friends setting downe in his first proscription fourescore of the chiefest of Marius side besides Marius himselfe Carbo Norbanus and Scipio who had bin all Consulls of Rome Marius being at that time in his seuenth Consulship and died in the beginning of it but too late to his countrey yet left Sertorius Carbo Cinna others to plague his country after him But as before I spake of Iepthas victories of the sacrificing of his daughter so now I thinke good by comparisons to shew the maner and custome of the Gentiles in the like The report of Iepthas sacrificing his daughter came as it seemed first from the land of Canaan into Greece wherby Agamemnon sacrificed his daughter Iphigenia in the citie of Aulis in Baeotia to please Diana For their voyage to Troy and after ten yeares warres in Troy after victory had they slue Polixena king Priamus daughter vpō the graue of Achilles for a sacrifice to Neptune for their safe returne from Troy to Greece againe So Ericthius king of the Athenians sacrificed his daughter as Agamemnon did to haue a victorie ouer Eumolpus generall of the Thracian Army It is not onely a common thing among the Gentiles to sacrifice their seruants and their children to their Idols but also among the Hebrewes as Achab Manasses and other kings of Israel offred their sonnes and daughters for sacrifice vnto Molech and as Ieptha sacrificed his daughter according to his rash vow so Saul king of Israel would haue slaine his sonne Ionathan to perform his foolish oath These kind of sacrifices onely vnto Idols are otherwise then the sacrifice of Abraham being commanded by the Lord to offer his only sonne Isaac which was the true type of Christ Iesus the onely son of God but these wicked Idolatrous kings Achab Manasses offered their childrē to dumbe Idols and wodden gods not following Abraham in sacrifice they far differed frō Ieptha he vowed to sacrifice his daughter to the Lord and not to Idols and Ieptha differed farre from Abraham in that Abrahams faith was accepted without sacrificing of his sonne and Iepthas affection was reiected though he sacrificed his daughter for so the Lord himselfe testified saying I haue no pleasure in your feasts and sacrifices neither do I delight in your new moones how much lesse is he pleased with the killing of an innocent virgin as Ieptha did These bloudy sacrifices of Achab and Manasses were not like the sacrifice of Gedeon which was but a Kid a fewe cakes made but of an Epha flower a peece of flesh in a basket and a litle broath in a pot this sacrifice did the Lord accept of Gedeon vnder the oake of Ephrah as a signe of his victory against the Madianites The Lord strengthened Sampson to plague the Philistines sundry times burning their corne and their vinyards killing a thousand of them at once with the iawe bone of an Asse and destroyed the fiue Princes of the Philistines and aboue sixe thousand Philistines besides by pulling downe of a house vppon them their wiues their children their friends and their seruants at a banquet Because Sampson being molested vexed by meanes of his wife Dalyla to whom he trusted too much as many do by opening his secrets where his strength lay to his wife who betraied him to her owne brood stocke the Philistines who came and tooke him bound him and put out his eyes at what time the fiue princes of the Philistines so reioyced that they gathered themselues togither to offer sacrifice vnto Dagan their god for that Dagan deliuered Sampson into the Philistines handes as they supposed being mery and glad they sent for Sampson to this great feast where they offered solemne sacrifice vnto their god Dagan to laugh and scoffe at him that at that feast so many Philistines came to see Sampson that three thousand for want of roome were forced to take theyr place vpon the roofe of the house Sampson being agreeued that he offended the Lord praied vnto the Lord that hee might be reuenged vpon the Philistines and the Lord strengthened Sampson that he reuenged their scoffes their flouts and the pulling out of his eyes vppon the princes of the Philistines Dagans seruants that Sampson sacrificed himselfe vnto the Lord slue sacrificed them vnto their god Dagan Many armies haue bene taken slain ouerthrowne in the midst of banquets as the Syrians were at the besieging of Samaria making merry in their tents banquetting were forced to flie and in their flight to be slaine So was Simon the high Priest at Ierusalem with his two sonnes slaine at a banquet by the stratagem of Ptolomeu who married Simons owne daughter after he had receiued them into his house and were merry at theyr banquet So Tryphon slue Ionathan and both his sonnes So Ismael being receiued of Godoliah into his house and well entertained Ismael slue Godolias in his owne house too many such stratagems are extant CHAP. XIX Of the Priesthood taken away from the house of Elie and gouernment of Iudges taken from Samuel and his posteritie and of the first electiō of kings in Israel and of Saul the first
could bee as though he were their true and lawfull king but being brought to Rome before Caesar who found by the hardnesse of his hands and rudenesse of his behauiour that hee was not brought vp like a Kings sonne and therefore Caesar hauing found his falshood bound him all his life time as a galley slaue and commaunded all his counsellors and conspirators to bee killed with the sword This house continued vntill the last destruction of Ierusalem So that the Iewes after Christ his death beeing euery where afflicted and oppressed from Babilon were forced to flie to Zeleucia the chiefe Citie in all Syria which Zeleucus Nicanor builded a Towne where Greekes Macedonians and Syrians dwelt together there also the Greekes and the Syrians conspired together against the Iewes that there dwelt and slew trecherously of them to the number of 50000. So sedition also began between the Iewes in Alexandria and the Aegiptians in Samaria betweene the Samaritans and the Iewes and all the Iewes which dwelt in Rome in Sardinia other places of the Romaine Empire were from thence banished These Iewes had not so much as a place to rest vpon the earth but were scattered like rogues vagabounds euery where without credit or loue without Prince Priest law or religion the iust iudgement of the Lord for their blasphemy against the sonne of God saying his bloud be vpon vs and our children Thus the Iewes whom Moses Aaron brought out of Egipt to the number of six hundred thousand died all in the wildernesse for their rebellious mutinie Moses and Eleazer after Aarons death numbred the people in the wildernesse where all the other died and they found sixe hundred thousand seuenteen hundred and thirtie able and sufficient men for the warres and yet not one of them which Moses Aaron numbred in the desart of Sinai after they came out of Egipt sauing Ioshua Caleb but died in the wildernesse for disobedience and stubbernesse euer preferring the cucumbers melons oynions garlicks of Egipt before Māna quailes and sweete water which they had from euery rocke in the wildernesse where neither their cloathes were worne nor their shooes spent for fortie yeares yet Egipt which should be a hel to them was their paradice The tenne Tribes of Israel raigned in Samaria 240. yeares seuen moneths and seuen daies during which time they neither obeyed the lawes of the Lord nor heard the Prophets that forewarned them of these calamities which were to come and therfore the Lord gaue them ouer they were taken prisoners their last king Osea brought captiues by Salmanasser vnto Niniuie So the kingdome of Iudah and the house of Dauid was likewise taken by Nabuchodonozer in the eleuenth yeare of Zedechiah the last king of Iudah who was taken captiue his noble men his children slaine in his sight before his eyes were pluckt out and after led in a chaine vnto Babilon where he died in prison 133. yeares after the kingdome of Israel was destroyed by Salmanasser that was the cause of his miserable end for the contempt he had to the Prophet Ieremy disdaining either to hear him or to read his booke for before any king raigned in Israel Iudges by the Lord appointed ruled 370. yeares the kings of Iudah after Solomons death raigned 395. yeares which agreeth well with Iosephus account And so of the continuance of the Bishops or high Priests euen from the building of the temple of Solomon Sadoc being their first high Priest or Bishop were seuēteene high Priests or Bishops in Ierusalem by succession of the children after their fathers The end of the second booke The third Booke of the Stratagems of Ierusalem CHAP. I. Of the care and diligence which Kingdomes and Countries tooke in military discipline to exercise their souldiers THe Romanes most carefull in all military discipline in no wise trusted strangers but euery Romaine souldier should take a military oath by the Colonell The Persiās also were in this point like the Romains for not admitting of mercenary souldiers seldome is found any constancie or soundnesse in mercenary souldiers as by too many examples the Romanes and others found Iugurth by trechery of fewe Thracians that serued the Romanes in Affrike in the night time betraied the Romanes to Iugurth and made a great slaughter of them In like sort the Thessalians were trecherous to the Athenians whom they trusted but they forsooke the Athenians at the battel of Tanagra wherby through their falsehood and trecherie to the Athenians the victorie fell to the Lacedemonians therefore neither the Romanes nor the Persians trusted any mercenary souldiers for mercenary souldiers and strangers are not to be trusted for they doo not onely forsake their friends in any danger but ioyne with the enemy for any aduantage So did the Gaules in the warres of Carthage slew the watch of the Romanes and fled to Haniball The lawe of armes in euery countrey should holde and maintain the crowne dignity of the prince by the sword so most necessary it is that subiects should be looked vnto with great care and prouision to maintain the willing forward and good souldiers due punishmēts and sharpe corrections for euill leaud wicked disposed men carelesse of their countries good How carefull euery common-wealth hath bene of this you shall read first of euery kingdome country seueral punishments by law appointed after of the rewards honor dignities of good souldiers of which Plato saith Omnis respub paena Praemio continetur Agesilaus therefore appointed gifts and rewards to draw and encourage his souldiers to shoote to throwe the dart the sling to ride to runne and with diligence and care to keepe them seuerely from faults offences and to exercise them in martiall feates which kinde of exercise among the Greekes was most commonly vsed called Pentatlon in the games of Olympia Isthmia to honor Hercules and Thesius two protectors and principall captaines that loued souldiers Alexander the great was so seuere in martiall lawes towards his souldiers that if any souldier or captain shuld lye or be any way proued a lyer hee should be depriued frō his office and place of seruice banished from his camp for so was Antigenes though a valiant captaine otherwise yet was both casseerd banished for making of a lye Alexander after he had banished all bakers cookes brewers and such like frō his campe said that marching in their armour in the night they should prouide them a dinner a stomacke to eate theyr dinner against the next morning as for a supper he said they should not looke for wine nor flesh to sleepe after it but for bread and hee would prouide for water which is the onely foode of a souldier and the most necessary care of a generall Hereby his souldiers being brought vp by Philip king of Macedonia his father were hardned with continuall paine
Mambre where he feasted them and intreated them on the behalfe of Zodome that if ten godly men might be found in it the citie might be saued but none was found there but iust Lot at this verie time vnder the oake of Mambre Isaac was promised to Abraham for so the Lorde named him at that time Sarah his mother being 90. yeares old So Samuel was borne of Anna his mother so Iacob and so Ioseph his sonne were borne of barren women as Isaac was foure also were named before they were borne Ismael the sonne of Abraham by Agar Isaac Solomon and Iosias Now againe to Abraham after Lot was rescued by him Lot dwelt againe in Zodom among reprobates and wicked vngodly men being named iust Lot hard it was for Lot to liue honest or iust among such wicked Zodomites and yet in Zodom Lot saued himself but in Zoar Lot was ouerthrowne Abraham could rescue Lot at the battell at Dan from 4. kings the Angels could saue Lot from the fire brimstone in Zodom yet could not Lot saue himself from drunkennesse in Zoar so fowle a fact by so iust a man may not be much spoken off Hence grew the first beginning of the Moabites and Ammonites enemies vnto God so much may be spoken of Ismael Abrahams sonne by Agar who grew so great so mighty on earth that they would not be called Agareni from Agar the bond-woman their mother from whence they tooke their beginning but they would be called Saraceni as borne of Sarah the true wife of Abrahā as the Ammonites and Moabites were left to plague the Hebrewes as pricks in their sides and needles in their eyes so the Saracens Turkes are now left to plague the Christians with sword and fire Before the battell at Siddim no battels in a manner haue bene fought but what was by Nimrod don who liued within a hundred thirtie yeares of the flood at what time people liued not knowing the name of a king vntill Nimrod grew so mightie and so great that hee brought the people vnder subiection in such feare and awe of him that they rather worshipped him as a God then obeyed him as a king whereof Nimrod waxed so proud that it grew to a prouerbe that if any Monarke or King should waxe too insolent or proud he should be noted named hic alter Nimrod for now Nimrod hauing obtained the Monarchy into his hands without resistance he called the people together to make a Tower frō the earth vnto heauē to reuenge the iniuries of his predecessors and to defend himselfe his Empire and to resist the violence of any further deludge He for want of men to fight withal on earth made a Tower that he might ascend vp to goe fight with the host of heauen So Cyrus imitating Nimrod hauing subdued all nations and kingdomes about him went for want of men to fight against him to fight against women into Scythia Alexander also imitating Cyrus after he had subdued all men and that no king would fight against him he went vnto India to fight with Elephants Leauing Nimrod to build his Towers in the aire Cyrus to fight with women in Scythia and Alexander the great to fight with Elephants in India we come to Ninus who tooke vpon him to be the first Monarch ouer the Assirians 150. yeares after Nimrod who after hee had ioyned his force with Aricus king of Arabia hee went with his army against Babilon subdued it and brought it into Assyria led his army vnto Armenia gaue battell to the Armenians subdued them also tooke their king Barsanes and went conquering all the kingdomes about vntill he came vnto Medea where the king fought with Ninus and the battell was equally fought of both parts but after that in another battell Ninus ouerthrewe the Meades and tooke their King in the battell and hangd him his wife and his seuen children in his owne kingdome So that within seuenteene yeares Ninus subdued all Asia and became so great that if the authors write truth hee had such an armie as none is read to haue the like especially at that time when the world was not populous within 50. yeares after the flood Before Ninus the Greeke nor the Romane writers make no mention of any warre or battell who proceeded forward and marched after he had conquered Arabia Medea and Babilon vnto the Bactrians and fought with Zoroastes their king who is said to haue first found the Art of Astronomy and Magique but this Zoroastes was slain in the field by Ninus and Ninus himselfe slaine with an arrow as Orosius saith others say that hee was slaine by his wife Semyramis It is written of this Zoroastes that when all other Infants weepe at their birth he laught In Ninus time we reade of the first Idolatry in scripture and that by Ninus himselfe who set vp the Image of Belus his father in a Temple which Ninus made dedicated to his father Belus after his death in Niniuie where all the countries and people came to worship and reuerence the name of Belus which grew in such credit in Asia and the East kingdomes that there was no lawe nor religion but what by Baals Priests and Baals Prophets were allowed And at that time that Nabuchodonozer raigned in Babilon a thousand yeares after Ninus Baal was so reuerenced and honored in Babilon that if any man should speake words against Baal or not kneele to him or worship him should die for it So was Sydrach and his fellowes throwne into a hot fierie fornace to be burned So was Daniel throwne into a denne to be deuoured of Lyons but neither Lyons nor fire had power to hurt the seruants of the Lord. This Baal was the onely Idoll in the East countrey vntill Elias found out the shifts of the false Prophets of Baal in the time of Achab King of Israel who first nourished Baals prophets in Israel After Elias Daniel found out in Babilon the falshood of Baals priestes how they cousoned Nabuchodonozer for his great allowance of bread wine and meate Leauing Belus to be the first Idoll and Ninus the first Idolater after whom little mention is made of the most part of the kings of Assyria sauing a catologue of their names though the Greekes as theyr manner is speake more then needs of them for the which Berosus the Chaldean writer doth much reprehend them for it and Plato their owne countrey man called them children for that they are addicted vnto fables and not giuen to learne antiquities but letting the Assirians to sleepe in silence I will returne to the marching of the Hebrewes vnder Moses out of Egipt CHAP. III. Of the calling of Moses and Aaron to lead the children of Israel out of Egipt THe Hebrewes which were 430. years bōdmē slaues vnto Pharao in Egipt vntil they multiplied to be such in number as Pharao doubted either to let them goe
as in Egipt their horses asses oxen camels and sheepe and all their beasts were slaine with a mightie great morraine so the Romane generals their collonels captaines and all kind of souldiers were slain as wel in Rome and Italy as euery where throughout the Romane Empire as well with wars as with diuers sicknesses diseases yet not ceasing to persecute the Christians according to their custome but the martyrs of the Lord the souldiers of God increased still in number in euery country Such euer was the prouidence of the Lord that Septimius the like were either murdered slaine in their country or else banished died out of their country as this Septimius did or as the great Antiochus Epiphanis did being the only enemies of Gods people tyrannizing against Iudah forcing them with sword fire to forsake God their religion lawes strangling men hanging some womē with their childrē about their necks other women they cast downe headlong ouer the walls with their babes hanging at their breasts making search for the bookes of Moses and burning all that he could finde written of the law of Moses prophaned the temple sacrificed swines flesh against the law of the Iews compelled the Iews to eate swines flesh to forsake circumcisiō and to adore his gods his tyrannie was such that the Samaritans sent vnto him messengers for very feare denying themselues to be Iewes but a people comming out of the Meades and Persians therin they said the truth for they were not true Iewes requesting Antiochus that the Temple which they builded in Mount Garisim should be named the Temple of Iupiter and that they would bee gouerned by Appolonius and Nichanor his Lieftenants and become Antiochus seruants Yet the Lord raised those in Iudah that esteemed not his threatnings waighed not his commaundements feared not his tortures for so the Lord said to Elias that he reserued 7000. that neuer bowed nor bended knee to Baall which kept the lawes of the Lord as Mattathias and his fiue sonnes in Modin and diuers other in Iudah not weighing Antiochus nor his Lieftenants When this cursed and cruell Antiochus sawe how little the Iewes weighed his threatnings and how they stil increased in number and how forward they were in their religion he thereby fell sicke and confessed that the euill that he did to the Temple of Ierusalem and to the inhabitants of Iudah was the cause that he must die in a straunge land for before Antiochus had proudly promised to make Ierusalē a graue for al the Iewes burial we leaue Antiochus dead out of his Countrey in Persia and turne to Moses in Egipt This was euer the commaundement of the Lord to Moses rise and stand vp before Pharao and say thy wonted message thus saith the Lord let my people goe Yet nothing moued Pharao but as a sworne enemy against the Lord stiffe necked and hard hatred refused al graces and mercies offred and therfore Moses was commanded to take the ashes out of the furnace to sprinkle it vp into the aire before Pharaos face strait out of the same ashes there brake out sores with blaines botches swellings both in man beast so that Iamnes and Iambres all the Sorcerers of Egipt could not stand before Moses forthey thēselues were plagued with botches biles which Manetho an Egiptiā historiographer falsly fained a fable that these blaines and botches which the Egiptians had to be a leprousie on the Hebrues naming Moses Osarphis a Priest a law-giuer ouer the Hebrues Yet Cheremon named him Tisithes one contrary to another and both cōtrary to the truth and as Iosephus saith both Manetho and Cheremon affirmed that what Moses had done concerning the myracles in Egipt to be done by Magicke So Pliny held the like opinion that Moses was a great Magitian and did all those myracles before Pharao in Egipt by Magicke Pliny had no cause so to say for Nero the Emperour which was instructed with the best Magicians of all the East kingdomes which Tiridates king of Armenia brought with him to Rome yet it helped not Nero at his need neither the Emperor Iulianus Apostata being well learned and throughly instructed in Magick It could do him no good no more then Iamnes and Iambres to Pharao And therefore I will set downe the true History of Moses written by Iosephus a graue a learned Iew and a gouernour of all the countrey of Galiley farre to be preferred before Appian an Egiptian Schoolmaister in Alexandria Who after their fabulous lies most impudently blasphemed their Temple affirming an Asse head all of gold by the Iewes most religiously worshipped and honoured in their temple which was found in the time of Antiochus Epiphanis when he sacked Ierusalem spoyled the temple We wil passe ouer these false Egiptiās writers come to Moses This sixt plague is likened to the sixt persecution vnder Maximinus a most cruell Emperor being puffed vp with pride insolency and wearied with vulgar persecutions proceeded forward to persecute Bishops Doctors and other learned Christians that professed the name of Christ as Polycarpus Bishop of Smyrna Ignatius and such he spared no degrees within the Romain prouinces but as the Egiptians were plagued with soares botches blaines and biles so hee vexed the Christians with sword fire and extreame tortures And as nothing could moue Pharao in Egipt to acknowledge the Lorde to be God so nothing could moue this tyger Maximinus to acknowledge Christ to be the Lord but without mercy and compassion persecuted afflicted the Christians Thus not only the Emperors of Rome tyrannized against Christians but also the kings of Syria little inferiour to the Romans in tyrannie against whom the Lord did not only stirre men but women children to contemne their threatnings and to despise their crueltie as Antiochus king of Syria commanded caudrons brazen pots to be heated straitly charging that he that spake but a word with Moses law should haue his tongue cut out this could not terrifie a woman with her seuen sonnes who one after another denied the eating sacrificing of swines flesh the defiling of their temple with Images refusing to forsake the lawes of Moses and in this to liue and die The king straight commanded that the tongue of the eldest brother should be cut out to pull the skin ouer his head to pare off the edges of his hands feete and after these tortures while yet there was any life in him to be fried in the hote caudron and that in the sight of his mother and his other sixe brethren assuring them that they should suffer the like torments one after another vnlesse they would forsake the religion lawes of the Iewes eat swines flesh and offer sacrifice of swines flesh vnto Iupiter vpon the altars at Ierusalem Samaria but they esteemed the least iot of their lawe more then the greatest tortures that
either the Emperours of Rome which persecuted them or the kings of Syria which tyrannized ouer them could inuēt saying that they wold onely obey the lawes which the Lorde gaue vnto them by Moses and not the commaundement of the king then were the other brethren one after another put to death with the like tortures as their elder brother was in the sight of their mother who spake to her children these words My sonnes I neither gaue you breath nor soule nor life and as you regard not your selues to die for the law es of the Lord so shall the Lord restore vnto you your soules your liues to liue for euer And thus were theyto rtured to death one brother after another and the mother after her sonnes And now I wil returne to Pharao CHAP. VI. Of the seuenth and eight plagues of the Egiptians compared with the seuenth and eight persecutions of the Christians AMd Moses was sent with his seuenth message to Pharao saying How long will it be before thou submit thy self to me saith the Lord But Pharao being marked with Cains marke who could not die though he would faine die or like Esau who would repent could not though he sought it with teares So Pharao though he yeelded victorie to Moses yet could not hee yeeld his heart vnto the Lord but refused the offers of the Lord and despised his mercy and therefore Moses was commaunded to vex Pharao with the seuenth plague which he executed vpon Pharao with thunders haile lightnings fiery soldiers of the Lord this smote the hearbs brake the trees of the field this smote al the land of Egipt both man beast the thunder the raine the haile and the fire mingled together so hurtfull and so greeuous as there was not the like in Egipt since it was a natiō and yet the land of Gosen where the Hebrues dwelt neither hard thunders nor saw fire lightnings nor rain But Pharao stil against his promise staied the Hebrues in extreame bondage in Egipt and yet with terrour and feare of the punishments requested Moses and Aaron to cease the horrible thunders and fierie lightnings which being ceased Pharao ceased not to sinne vpon sin neither gaue he himselfe to seeke the Lord for all the terrors of so many plagues past The Macedonians at any Eclipse of the Moone wold be so frighted and terrified though the naturall cause were opened vnto them of the defects thereof by many of their Captaines yet would they not but against their will at the Eclipse time enter into battell So the old Romanes were so amazed that they tooke the ebbing flowing of the sea to be wrought by some diuine power of the gods So Scipio confessed at the besieging of Carthage and said to his souldier Ducem sequimini Neptunum Though the Romanes and the Macedonians confessed the Eclipse of the Sunne Moone and the ebbing and flowing of the Seas to be the works of God yet Pharao confessed not the wonders which Moses did in Egipt This cruell marching of Pharao against the Hebrues in Egipt resembleth much the cruell persecution vnder Decius Emperour of Rome vnder whom raigned stil persecutiōs of the Christians as vnder others his predecessors But the Lord so plagued the Empire at this time euen from the East vnto the West with plagues and diuers suche sicknesses as not onely the earth was infected but the ayre corrupted with such slaughter of man and beast by sicknesse that there wanted in many places of the Empire men aliue to burie the dead iustly plagued and punished so that betweene the cruell persecutions of Christians in Antioch Caesaria and Alexandria and the multitude of the Romanes that died made the ground of Rome and Italy to stink as Egipt stunk with their bloudie water and dead frogs and as in Pharaos dayes the Hebrewes so multiplied in Egipt for all Pharaos tirany so likewise the Christians encreased in Rome and euery where in the Romane Empire in spite of the Romane Emperours though they sought euery way to deuour them with sword and fire Moses is sent againe to Pharao and to say let my people goe behold to morrowe will I bring grassehoppers into thy land and they shall couer the face of the earth in euery place and quarter of Egipt that the earth cannot be seene and they shall eate the residue which remaineth vnto you and escaped the haile they shall eate all your greene trees vpon the fielde and shall fill your houses and all your seruants houses and these threatnings and cominations of Moses could nothing moue Pharao and yet dissembled like an hypocrite to Moses saying I haue sinned against the Lord and against you forgiue me therefore and pray for me it is to be wondred that Pharao and all Egipt wold suffer such horrible plagues for the Hebrews to them a straunge nation whom they mortally hated and yet stopt and stayed them in Egipt against the lawe of Mena and Bocoris and custome of Egipt and against the custome of all countries The Lacedemonians by Lycurgus lawe would not admit any straunger to stay in Lacedemon In Athens Pericles made a decree that no straunger might dwell in Athens but such as were banished for euer from their Countrey those onely might stay in Athens bringing their gods and their goods with them Likewise the Carthagineans could not abide strangers for those that sailed into Sardinia or to Hercules pillers escaped hardly the Carthagineans handes for that they would suffer no straunger to dwell in their territories So also in India no stranger might stay among them past three daies so straight were strangers looked vnto in all Countries that the Romanes would not admit any mercenarie souldier being a stranger in their warres The Hebrewes suffered no stranger to dwel among them to vse forraine religion therfore it was not lawfull for the Samaritans to come to Ierusalem nor for the Samaritans to conuerse themselues with the Iewes Yet Pharao against the lawes and customes of all countries and against the lawe of his owne country admitted strangers his owne enemies to dwell in Egipt Pharao as I said before had Esaus mark could not yeeld and let these strange Hebrewes goe How fitly this eight Egiptian plague resembleth the eight Romane persecution vnder the Emperor Valerianus who like as Antiochus compelled the Iewes to forsake the Lord their lawes and religion so Valerianus cōstrained the Christians to Idolatrie and forced them to forsake the religion of Christ commanding by his Letters sent to his lieftenants and generalls euery where to burne to kil and to murther all the Christians that professed the name of Christ so odious was the name of the Christians among the Romanes as the name of the Hebrewes among the Egiptians And like as the grasse-hoppers in Egipt did waste spoile and eate all that was left vntouched and vnspoyled by the plague of haile-stones and lightnings before so
this bloudie Emperour Valerianus left no place vnsought to persecute the remnant of the Christians which his predecessors could not find with sword and fire vntil he himself was taken his army ouerthrown by Sapor King of Persia who tooke him and kept him in prison all his life time in bondage and slauery vsing him as a blocke to mount on horsebacke things hard and straunge to the Romanes to haue their Emperour in such slauish seruice to become a vassal and a blocke for Sapor King of Persia to lay his foote vpon his necke to goe on horse And was not the great Turke Pazaites ouerthrown and his Army slaine at Mount Stella by Tamberlane a rude and barbarous Scithian and himselfe taken and kept in a cage vnder his table and carried him in that cage in all his warres during Tamberlanes life so that the great Emperour of Rome died as a blocke for King Sapor in Persia and Pazaites the great Turke died in Tamberlanes cage as a captiue in Scythia So Pharao in diuers battels was ouerthrowne by Moses and vsed as a blocke and at last drawne as it were by a corde like a dogge by Moses from Egipt into the redde sea and there to dye as you shall read in the two next plagues that followe CHAP. Of the ninth and tenth plagues of the Egiptians compared with the ninth and tenth persecutions of the Christians MOses is sent from the Lord to Pharao and commanded to hold out his hand vnto heauen that there was darknesse vpon all the land of Egipt such palpable darknesse that neither fire candle torch or any light might giue thē light it was such palpable darknesse that the Egiptians might feele it and this darknesse continued three daies long that one might not see an other Yet Pharaos heart was so hardned that now in his furie and rage he commaunds Moses and Aaron to goe out of his sight threatning them with death if they came any more before him though in the last plague he requested Moses and Aaron to pray for him and to forgiue him his sinnes but then were his words full of dissimulation and his repentance full of hypocrisie hee could say I haue sinned but he could not say I haue repented and beforie for his sinnes The ninth persecution vnder Aurelianus in Rome may throughly bee likened to the ninth plague vnder Pharao in Egipt The like threatnings of speech and the like words that Pharao vsed to Moses and Aaron in Egipt the like vsed Aurelianus against the Christians in Rome but it contiued not long for he was slaine as others his predecessors were And as for the great palpable darknesse in Egipt so was it in Rome when their minde was more darke then darknesse it selfe The Egiptians hated not the Hebrews so much as the Romanes hated the Christians For Pilate the Romane presidēt in Ierusalem which gaue sentence on Christ to die and sawe many myracles done by him sent Letters to his maister Tiberius the Emperor and to the Senators recyting the myracles that Christ had done before he died saying hee was worthy to bee canonized placed among the Romane goddes which all the Senators with one consent denied though Caesar requested them first and threatned them after yet Christ was not allowed to be a Romane God Tiberius without effect of his good motion died so did that wicked Emperor Aurelianus in the midst of his cruel persecutions After whō succeeded a good valiant Emperor Flam. Claudius so valiāt that he vanquished the Gothes the Illyrians and Macedonians whereby in Rome he was so honoured that the Senators sent to him a goldē Target which afterward was set vp in the shew-place and a golden statue to stand in the Capitoll but he died too timely of a sicknesse at Sirmium After him succeeded his brother Aurel. Quintilius a good moderate Emperour equall or rather to be preferred before his brother but he was slaine within 18. daies after hee was elected Emperour by the souldiers These good Emperors onely I name for that persecutions were euer executed by cruel Kings and Emperors But these cruell Emperours as they cruelly destroyed others so cruelly were they destroyed after as some of them were killed by theyr owne handes as Nero some murthered by their owne seruants as Domitianus some suddenly slaine riding by the high way as Decius some banished died in straunge Countreys as Seuerus others died captiues in bondage and slauerie as Valerianus did in Persia others eaten with cankers wormes as Maximinius others murthered one after an other as Aurel. Tacit. and Florianus Thus were those Emperours slaine and murthered that cruelly persecuted the Christians The Lorde beeing determined now to finish his plague in Egipt and to bring his people away willed euery man and euery woman to borrow of their neighbours Iewels of gold and siluer for Moses was verie great in the land of Egipt with Pharao and with the people for before this Pharao had appointed Moses Generall of the Egiptians against the king of Aethiopia which I wrote in the Historie of Moses Yet said the Lord I will bring one plague more vpon Pharao and vpon Egipt and after that he will let you goe hence for all the first borne of the land of Egipt shall die euen from the first borne of Pharao that sitteth on his seate vntill the first borne of the maide seruant that sitteth in the mill The Lord knew at that time how to saue the Hebrewes in Gosen from all the plagues in Egipt and to saue Noah from the geneall deluge in the Arke to saue Lot from fire and brimstone in Zodome and to saue the Christians from the destruction of Ierusalem in Pella As this tenth plague was the greatest and the heauiest so the tenth persecution was the greatest and the longest vnder Dioclesian in the East parts and vnder Maximianus in the West either of them persecuting and afflicting with such slaughters of martyred Christians that for the space of tenne yeares for so long continued the tenth persecution there was nothing but the wonted bloudie persecution sword and fire by the commaundements of both these Emperours with most extremitie to bee executed and as vnder Nero the first persecution began so vnder Dioclesian it ended For the Church of God so flourished the Christians so encreased and the godly martyrs so multiplyed that these tyrants were wearie to persecute them any longer At that very time when persecution ended vnder Dioclesian then heresie began to spring vnder Sathan for when one stratagem of Sathan faileth he practiseth an other Now Arius marcheth with his Antitrinitary crew and set themselues in battell against the Lord with horrible and blasphemous weapons and as the Poets faine the Gyants set themselues in battell against the Sun the Moone and the Stars so this crew of heretikes set themselues to fight against God the Father the Sonne and the holy
Ghost some denying Christ by nature to bee Cod but onely of accidentall participation of diuine properties as Arius Some affirming that Christ tooke his beginning of the Virgin Mary denying the diuine nature of Christ as Samosatenus and Photinus Others imagined that Christ had not a true and natural body borne of the Virgin Mary as the Marcionites and Manichees The Ebionites affirmed Christ to be naturally born of a woman gotten by man I will omit to speake of Simon Magus and his disciple Menander of Cerdon and his disciple Marcion and of Saturninus and a number more of this crewe who denie one Article or other of our Christian faith confounding the diuine nature of the Trinitie These heretikes possessing diuers seates as Arius in Alexandria Saturninus in Antioch Photinus in Lions and so of the rest which beeing the verie blast and breath of Sathan haue brought into their heresie many kings and princes of Asia and Europe but all these heretikes were by generall councell confuted and condemned The Nicene councell condemned Arius and his partners which denied the deitie and diuine nature of Christ this councell held vnder the Emperour Constantine where 318. Bishops met together to confute Arius and his heresie The second councell at Constantinople vnder Gratianus the Emperour against Eudoxius and Macedonius denying the holy Ghost to be God The third councell at Ephesus vnder Theodosius the great against Nestorius affirming two sonnes the one of God the other of man denying the mistery of the incarnation of Christ. The fourth councell at Calcedon vnder Martianus against Eutiches who confounded the natures in Christ for the vnity of the three persons CHAP. VIII Of the marching of the Hebrewes from Egipt vnder Moses and Aaron toward the land of Canaan Of the life of Moses in Egipt and of his victories against the Aethiopians NOw Moses and the Hebrewes beeing discharged out of Egipt where they had bin in bondage and miseries many yeares and were called Hicsos now they march like souldiers of the Lord vnder Moses and Aaron towardes the lande of Canaan but marke the hardnesse of Pharaos heart for while the Hebrewes were in Egipt beeing extreame enemies vnto Pharao yet Pharao endured tenne horrible and terrible plagues before he would let the Hebrewes goe out of Egipt vntill hee was brideled and hooked by the nosthrils as Senacharib was and compelled to let the Hebrewes goe Yet Pharao with his wonted hardened heart with all the power and force of Egipt followed after beeing two hundreth thousand footemen fiftie thousand horsemen sixe hundreth chosen chariots of the kings owne army a sufficient armie against weaponlesse and vnarmed men Notwithstanding he had infinite number of footemen horsemen and chariots out of all parts of Egipt assuring himselfe by this multitude he would make a full end of the Hebrewes hauing this aduantage the sea being before the Hebrues the mountaines on either side them and Pharao with all the force of Egipt at their back a narrower straight as Pharao supposed then the Greeks had against the Persians at Thermopyla and there Pharao thought to ende his long desired tyrannie vpon the Hebrewes It was to be wondred that after ten great victories in Egipt gotten against Pharao by no other weapon then with a rod in Moses hand durst not looke Moses in the face after these victories in Egipt durst follow Moses hauing sixe hundred thousand Hebrewes marching in his campe this was the time appointed of the Lord to do with Pharao that which Pharao thought to do to the Hebrewes for the Lord commaunded Moses to hold vp his rod and to stretch out his hand vpon the sea and to diuide the seas to let the Hebrues goe through on drie ground and to suffer the Egiptians to follow after vntil the Lord commaunded Moses againe to stretch out his hand vpon the sea a diuine straragem of the Lord to let the waters turnevpon the Egiptians ouerwhelme them So the Lord by water saued the Hebrewes his people and by water drowned the Egiptians his enemies Yet Appian most impudently affirmed Moses to haue done what hee did by Magicke whom the common people in Egipt named Tisithes and Ioshuah Peresephes Appian alleageth Manetho and Cheremon two Egiptian writers to proue his fond assertions Pliny also held that opinion that Moses was a great Magician and did many miracles in Egipt through Magick yet it is more lawfull for Pliny that wrote of so many thinges to lie in some thinges then for Manetho a poore schoole-maister in Alexandria or for Cheremon two fabulous writers of the Egiptian history onely The best Magician that helped himselfe at need was Appollonius Thianeus who beeing accused of capitall crimes before Domitianus the Emperour being demanded by the Emperour what helpe hee could do now to himselfe by his Magick nothing said he but this and vanished away out of the Emperours sight so much could not Iamnes and Iambres do to saue themselues from the botches blaines which as they say was done by Moses Magicke in Egipt And therefore I thinke it best to set downe the true history of Moses before yet he was called by the Lord to leade the Hebrewes out of the lande of Egipt into Canaan Moses the sonne of Amri was of the tribe of Leui and the seuenth from Abraham borne in Egipt brought vp by Thermutes king Pharaos daughter and heire in this childe Moses shee delighted so much being brought vp in all the learning and knowledge of the Egiptians that Moses pleased Thermutes so well that she moued her father hauing no male childe but her selfe that it might please the king to make Moses her adopted sonne least Thermutes also should be barren and want an heire to possesse the crowne This being agreed vpon betweene Pharao and his daughter Moses grew great in Egipt fauoured and well beloued amongst all the Aegiptians It happened at that time that the Aethiopians had warre with the king of Egipt hauing wonne two great victories ouer the Egiptians spoyled and wasted Egipt vnto the verie citie of Memphis The Priests of Egipt being instructed by the Oracles of Ammon to choose an Hebrew captaine to lead their armie against the Aethiopians the king being informed of this Oracle spake faire to his daughter Thermuthes through the perswasion of the Priests who vsed the like pollicie to haue Moses slaine among the Aethiopians as Saul vsed to haue Dauid slaine among the Philistines Thermutes perceiuing the daunger of her fathers kingdome which fell vnto her by succession would knowe of Moses secretly his minde therein Moses being therewith contented the kings daughter brought Moses before her father and the Priests to whom Thermutes in this sort spake Is Moyses the man whome before this time you founde by Oracles shoulde destroy Egipt and now you finde by the same Oracles to haue that man to be your captaine to saue Egipt But the Priests forgat
making the Arke saued himselfe and his family from the deluge Abraham for that he obeyed the Lord and was readie to offer and to sacrifice his sonne Isaac the whole world was blessed in his seed therefore the Lord said to Salomon If thou do all that euer I shall commaund thee thy throne shall be established for euer in Ierusalem The Lord commends the Rechabites for their obedience to Ionadab their father because Ionadab said Non bibetis vinum Mattathias his children answered Antiochus messenger saying Wee had rather obey the lawes of the Lord giuen to Moses and to our fathers then to obey the king So the seuen brethren answered that they had rather die then disobey the lawes of the Lord. The Prophet saith Fire haile snow Ise obey the commaundements of the Lord hee commaunds seas and windes and they obey the Lord he commanded rauens to feede Elias and they obeyed Cyrus King of Persia obeyed the Lorde for Cyrus confest that hee was commaunded to set forwards the Iews to build vp the temple in Ierusalem and as obedience is vnto the Lord most acceptable so is disobedience euen in the least things extreamly punished He that gathered sticks vpon the Sabboth day was stoned to death And the man of God for that he eate bread in Bethel against the Lords commaundement he was deuoured of a lyon and Ionas the Prophet for that he fled from the presence of the Lord he was throwne for his disobedience into the sea and swallowed vp of a whale And Moses the seruant of God with that rod that strooke the rocke that water gushed out with that rod which diuided the red seas that turned all the riuers and waters of Egipt to blood that turned all the dust of Egipt into Lice brought Frogs Flies Grasse-hoppers and wrought so many wonders in Egipt yet for that Moses disobeyed the Lord at the water of Meribah the Lord was so offended with Moses Aaron for their incredulitie and disobedience before the people that the Lord told them that they should not enter into the land of promise and that Moses should die in mount Nebo and Aaron his brother in mount Hor such was the exact iustice of the Lord and his seuere punishment against wilfull and disobedient people that he spared none no not Moses his owne seruant Aaron his owne Priest Ionas his owne Prophet nor Israel his owne people CHAP. XIIII Of the martiall lawes and military discipline of the Gentiles IN all Countries among all Nations where militarie discipline was not obserued there martial lawes were executed As among the Egiptians the Souldier that brake militarie rules to forsake the ranke to goe out of the campe and would disobey the chiefe magistrates officers captaines of the armie and would any waies offend the martiall lawes he should be displaced from his place were he either Serieant Lieutenant or any other officer and be placed in the meanest place of the armie and if he should bewray the counsell of his captaine or speake any thing against the generall he should haue his tongue cut off and sowed vpon his helmet Among the Persians there was a martiall law written that if any cowardly souldier should steale secretly from the campe and become a vagabound or a runnagate frō place to place he should being taken be cloathed in a womans apparell and be chained fast with an Iron manicle vpon his hands sitting with both his legs in a paire of stocks in the midst of the campe to be flouat and scoft at of all the whole armie which in like sort the Thrasians obserued and after hee should be taken for a woman and not for a man The Romanes were somewhat more seuere against disobedient souldiers especially against seditious fugitiue souldiers and against them that forsooke theyr standart and turned their backes to the enemies and from the camp to flee to the enemie these amongst the Romanes were punished with death The law in Sparta was if any soldiers of theirs should in any great and shamefull faultes in the warres offend they should be so noted and defamed that they might not borrow so much as a cup of water or a brand of fire with their next neighbors nor light a candle besides it was not lawfull for any man that met thē in the streets to speak to them These punishmēts far differ from the former punishmēt of the Lord fire frō heauen the opening of the earth the throwing into the feas deuouring by lions such of which I shall speake in another place Now to the marching of Ierusalē vnder Ioshua to whō a charge was giuen of a new army which was borne in the wildernesse after their fathers came out of Egipt to whom the Lord said Moses my seruant is dead as I was with Moses so will I be with thee and will neuer leaue thee nor forsake thee be strong and bold feare not and shewe thy selfe stout and valiant therefore obserue and do according to all the lawes which Moses my seruant commaunded thee What is spoken here to Ioshua was spoken after Ioshua to Iudah and after Iudah to Gedeon to Dauid and others so carefull was the Lord ouer his people that they should not choose them a Generall without the consultatiō of Vrim Thummim to guide and gouerne the armie to fight the battels of the Lord. So among all nations in all ages they were very carefull to haue and to choose wise stout and skilfull Generalls For as the Romane captaine Fabritius said that it was Pirrhus skil that ouercame Leuinus the Consull and not the Epirotes the Romanes and besides the straunge sight of the Elephants which the Romanes neuer sawe before that battell at Heraclea which the Romanes called Boues Lucanias Fabritius thought it a scorne that the Romanes should be ouerthrowne by any nation in the world if they had discreet valiant stout generals The like imaginatiōs the Romanes supposed that they were ouerthrowne at the battels of Trebeia Trasimen Cannes either by the subtill and deceitfull policie of Hannibal or else for that their gods were offended with them and not by the strength of the Carthagineans nor the Affricans But Pirrhus after foure yeares warres with the Romanes was constrained to forsake Italy after his ouerthrow at the battel of Arusina to leaue his Elephants behinde to beautifie Curius Dentalus tryumphe which was the first sight of Elephants in Rome for before nothing could be seene in Rome in former tryumphes but cattels of the Volscians flocks of beasts of the Sabines broken weapons and old armour of the Samnites coaches and couerings of the old Gaules Hannibal the greatest enemy that euer the Romanes had yet after seuenteene yeares warres hee was forced to retire from Italy to Carthage and there in his owne countery to be ouerthrowne at the battell of Zama by Scypio Affrican Hannibal so straightly
besieged the citie Casselina that the Romanes could by no meanes send a conuoy to relieue the souldiers the Romains deuised this stratagem to fill certaine tunnes some with flower and some with meale and to let them goe downe vpon the riuer Vulturnus but the riuer being chained ouer by Hannibal this stratagem was preuented In another stratagem the Romanes deceiued Hannibal they scattered infinite numbers of Nuttes and let them goe downe with the same selfe riuer Vulturnus which neither Hannibal himselfe nor his chaine could preuent so that the souldiers of Casselina were relieued and refreshed for a time with these Nuttes Such a stratagem vsed Hircius to relieue the poore Romane souldiers in Mutina being besieged by Mar. Antonius who wanted chiefly salt Hircius let go infinit numbers of great close bowls made like litle tuns full of salt to swim downe the riuer Saniturnus so relieued Mutina So should we vse such stratagems against Satan that if Satan shuld ouerthrow vs in the first we should arme our selues with spirituall weapons to ouerthrow him in the second Againe to Ioshua The Lord commaunded Ioshua to march forward to vanquish the Canaanites because the cōquest might not be assigned vnto man the Lord commaunded Ioshua all the strong men of warres to goe round about the walls of Iericho once a day for seuen daies and seuen priests to beare seuen trumpets of Rammes hornes before the Arke and to compasse Iericho the seuenth day seuen times and then commanded the priests to blowe the trumpets and all the men of warre without shot or sword to shout with a loud great shout and then the walles of Iericho should fall flat downe to the grounde this was the Lordes stratageme at his battell at which time Ioshua saw a man stand ouer against him with a naked sword in his hand who being asked of Ioshua what he was said I am the Prince of the Lordes host and am therefore comen now to be a Captaine of the Lordes people and Ioshua bowed himselfe worshipped him and thereby acknowledged him to be Christ the sonne of God Now Ioshua being instructed of the Lorde what to do the priests and the warriours by Ioshua the walls being fallen flat downe went vnto the citie destroied both man and woman young and old oxe and sheepe with the edge of the sword after burnt the citie with fire and Ioshua cursed that man before the Lord that would build vp Iericho again to the destruction of himselfe and both his sonnes That captaine that went before Ioshua to the battell at Iericho and was present at the fall of Ierichos wall went likewise before Cyrus as himselfe said to Cyrus I will goe before thee to Babilon and I will breake their brazen gates and crush in peeces their iron barres I wil humble the glorious people of the earth in thy presence The same captaine spake to Nabuchodonozer as hee spake to Cyrus I wil send Nabuchodonozer as the staffe of my wrath and the rod of my punishment and he shall tread my enemies downe like the myre in the streets so that all victories come from the Lord euen to all good kings and to tyrants After the ouerthrow of Iericho the Lord commaunded Ioshua to besiege the citie of Ai where hee slew all that dwelt in Ai and left not one to liue and tooke their king aliue and hangd him on a tree vntill the euening and the citie was burnt and twelue thousand slaine for the Lord said to Ioshua stretch out the speare that is in thy hand towards Ai in tokē of the victory Now mark the victories of the Lord in his battels the victory at Riphidim was had by holding vp of Moses hand the victory of Iericho by sounding of Rams hornes the victory of Ai with the lifting vp of Ioshuah speare the victory at Aphec by shooting of Ioas Eastward the victory ouer the Madianites by Gedeon with the sounding of trumpets and breaking of pitcher pots these are stratagems which are often seene in the battels of the Lord. So also the Lord strengthened many of his people to vanquish ouercome their enemies in seuerall combats one man to ouercome many as Sampson with the iaw bone of an asse slue a 1000. Philistines Samgar with an oxe goade slue 600. Philistines Dauid with his fling litle stone slue the monstrous blasphemous Gyant Golias Who knoweth not that Moses rod Ioshuahs spear Gedeons pitcher pots Sampsons iaw bone Samgars goade or Dauid with his sling litle stone had bin but weake meanes to ouerthrow so many enemies had not the Lord strengthened the meanes by the men These were battels of the lord which were not fought with swords shots nor weapons but armed with spirituall armours and fought with weapons of faith vanquished theyr enemies But such victories were onely graunted to the souldiers of the Lord the people of Israel which victories at that time were to them onely peculiar The great victorie which the Lord gaue vnto Samuel by meanes of thunderboltes lightnings and earthquakes that therby the Philistines were so amazed that Samuel vnlooked for fell vpō thē slew them ouerthrew them and chased them til they came to Cortaeos which is Bethgar such stratagems vseth the Lord against his enemies as thunderboltes lightnings and earthquakes Mar. Aurelius hauing warres with the Germains and Sarmatians his Army being like to be lost for water requested the legion of Christian souldiers to pray vnto their God for helpe and they were heard of the Lord the Emperor confessed the goodnesse of God naming him Iupiter at what time their enemies were stricken with lightning and fire that they perished and therfore these souldiers were called Legio fulminea the legion of thunder by the Emperour himselfe Cornelius a Captaine of an Italian band in Caesaria a iust and a deuout man was by an Angell warned to goe to Ioppa to bee baptised of Peter and to become from a Heathen a Christian Captaine to fight in the battels of the Lord. So likewise the Centurion which was at the death of Christ Iesus in Ierusalem seeing the myracles that were then done confessed him to bee the Lord and glorified God these two were called both to be Christian Captaines In the battell that Iudas Machabaeus had with Gorgias the gouernor of Edumea where the victorie fell to Machabaeus they found vnder the coates of them that were slaine Iewels consecrated to the Idols of the Iamnites but as the Lord commaunded the Hebrewes to burne such Idolatrous Iewels destroy their gilded Images and the gods of the Gentiles and not to take the siluer and golde that is on theyr gods as Achan did against the lawe at the Cittie of Ai and dyed for it by the lawe I will proceed for to shewe in olde time in what sort and after what manner euery Nation entered into battell I thinke it not amisse as well for varietie of
manner of the Gentiles aswell in choosing their Generals as you heard as also in choosing their former auncient kings some by flying of fowles as the old Romains choosed Numa Pomp. some by neying of a horse as the Persians choosed Darius others by swiftnes and agilitie of the body as in Lybia others by strength qualities comelinesse of person as among the Meades So the Aethiopians if they wanted one of the kings stock his name they made a choise as the Meades did of one to bee theyr king of a most comely personage that excelled in strength in qualities So because the Israelites wold haue a king and were weary of those gouernours that the Lord set ouer them the Lord cōmanded Samuel to annoint Saul to be their king who was the tallest and the goodliest man in all Israel from his shoulders vpwardes And so Xerxes though an Infidel among ten hundred thousand men which hee brought in his army from Persia against the Greeks was the only tallest and goodliest man of all his hoste and so in many countries among diuers nations they made such choise of their generals of their kings that they should be such men as should haue Bonum animi and bonum corporis fit and apt qualities both in mind and body to rule and gouerne an army But so did neither the Grecians nor the Romanes for Agesilaus was lame and had one leg shorter then the other Darius king of Persia had one hand longer then another Hanibal for two eyes had but one Caesar for his baldnes was fain to couer it with a garland oflawrel yet lame Agesilaus for his many victories 〈◊〉 warlike know ledge was called Agesilaus the great Hanibal with his one eye was the only captain of his time of all men reputed called Hostis Romanis Caesar though bald yet had not his peere nor his equal in martial exploits captains that farre excelled these goodly and tall kings Saul Xerxes and farre exceeded those comely tall captains whom the Meades the Aethiopians the Lybians were wont in old time to choose to be their kings And as the Lord is indifferent in bestowing his good gifts vpon the simplest meanest that serue him aswell as vpon the comeliest and goodliest men for the Lord hath no respect to the personage of men as we reade in sacred scripture Moses was goodly tall faire of complection and of yealow haire and a seruant of the Lord. Absolon the comeliest best made man from the crown of his head to his toe and yet the seruant of Sathan Ioseph the sonne of Iacob the fairest best fauored in Egipt a godly seruant of the Lord. Saul the tallest man in all Israel frō his shoulders vpwards yet serued not the Lord. So the gifts of nature appeare vpō the good the bad as you heard So may it be said of Elias a Prophet of the Lord being rough and hairy so we read of him of Esau rough hairy like Elias but a reprobate of the Lord for so the Lord said Iacob haue I loued and Esau haue I hated In fine Elizeus was bald for so was he mocked and called baldpate but a bear came out of the wood deuoured 42. childrē in Bethel for calling the prophet bald pate Dauid the least of his brethren not able to carry Sauls armour to fight with Golias and yet valiant inough to kill Golias and to bring his head to Saul Zachaeus so litle a fellow that he could not see Christ among the presse of the people but climbed a figge tree where Christ saw him bad him quickly come down This day wil I dine in thy house said the Lord to Zacheus So that Dauid being but of litle stature Elias rough and hairy and Flizeus bald yet three chosen Prophets of the Lord. Now to the marching of Ierusalam CHAP. XVII How Iudah was elected to be the third Iudge of Israel by Vrim and Thummim of his battell at Besecke Of Ehud Deborah Gedeon with their victories togither with certaine stratagems as well of the Iewes as of the Gentiles AFter Ioshua died Iudah was appointed the third captaine ouer the Israelites by the iudgement of Vrim and Thummim elected chosen to be the leader of the whole army of Israel the Lord from the beginning had appointed iudges and gouernors to lead his people frō Egipt to the land of Canaan as Moses Ioshuah after Ioshuah Iudah now the third captaine who fought the battell of the Lord in Bezeck and slew ten thousand of the Canaanites and the Perezites and tooke Adonizebech not a king but a tirant This king was by the iust iudgement of the Lord vsed in like sort as he vsed other kings for the thumbes of his hands and of his feete were cut off as he most cruelly cut off the thumbes of the handes of the feete of seuentie kings which he kept and fed with the crummes that fell from his table for so he confessed himselfe that as he had done so the Lord rewarded him for hee was brought to Ierusalem and there died Hannibal well nigh plaied the like part who vsed the poore captiue Romanes in like sort being weak wearied he cut off their thumbes pared the soales of the feete of a great number and so left them that they could neither stand nor goe Fabius Seruilianus equall or rather before these tyrants in tyrannie after he had vanquished a great number of the barbarous people of Scythia and had taken captiues Iure deditionis very many yet contrary to the faith and nature of the auncient Romanes hee cut off both the hands of fiue hundred of the principallest souldiers of them and left the poore Scythians without hands as Hannibal left the Romains without feete Thrasibulus being a tyrant for his tyrannie sent one of his chiefe men to Periander another tyrant to consult and to be aduised by him how he might liue without feare and daunger he being a tyrant among the Milesians Periander brought the messenger of Thrasibulus to a ripe corne field where with the staffe he had in his hand he did beat the eares of the corne and turnd to Thrasibulus messenger and said no more but commend me to thy maister Thrasibulus after he heard what Periander did knew his meaning was that he should destroy kill all the chiefe men citizens in Milesia if he would liue in safetie That tyrant must needs fear some of whom all men stand in feare This was such a dumbe stratagem which Periander taught Thrasibulus as Torquine the proud taught his son Sextus by a seruant which he sent to his father whom Torquine brought vnto a garden where with his staffe he beate the head of poppies This was a dumbe stratagem which Torquine sent to his sonne wherby he knew his fathers minde slew the chiefe Citizens and betrayed
king and his battell at Michmash AFter Sampson the last Iudge in Israel died Eli was appointed high Priest to gouerne them who though a godly man himselfe yet brought not vp his sonnes in vertue in the fear of God therefore the Lorde rebuked Eli and said to Samuel I haue sworne that the wickednesse of Eli his house shall not be purged with sacrifice nor offering for euer for the Lord tooke away the priesthood from Eli and from his house for the transgression of his children Likewise the Prophet Samuels sonnes for that they followed not their fathers steps but looked after lucre and tooke rewards were reprehended for corruption and bribery For Samuel being olde not able for age to execute his office he appointed both his sonnes to be Iudges in Bersabe but they loued rewards and bribes and therefore the people complained to Samuel of his sonnes refusing to be gouerned by them but would be gouerned by a king as other nations were Therefore was the Priesthood taken away from the house of Eli for the wickednesse of his children Ophnes and Phineis So was the gouernment taken from Samuel and from his house for euer through the corruption and briberie of his sonnes Ioell and Abiah Who would thinke that so good a King as Dauid should haue so wicked a sonne as Absolon that kild his brother Ammon in his owne house and sought the crowne of Iudah euen from his fathers head a murtherer of his Brother and a notable Traytour to his Father Who would thinke that good king Ezechiah should haue so wicked a sonne as Manasses to succeed him that sawed the prophet Esay in the midst and filled the streets of Ierusalem with blood And againe who would iudge but Salomon being the onely wisest king of the world hauing a thousand Queenes and concubines yet had but one sonne Rhehoboham that he was so brought vp to offend the people that ten of the twelue Tribes forsooke him and went to Ieroboam his fathers seruant Such was the care of kings among all nations that Philip king of Macedonia was glad to haue a sonne born in Aristotles time by whom hee might learne to knowe how to be a king and of whome Alexander the great himselfe was wont to say that he was as much bound to Aristotle his maister for his learning as he was to Philip his father for his birth And therefore Cyrus commaunded his sonne Cambises at his going to warres to Scithia to followe the counsell of Craesus to be ruled and gouerned by him For Cyrus knew Craesus to be so wise that by naming of Solons name he saued his owne life In like sort king Antigonus commaunded his sonne Helenus to be aduised and counselled by Aratus whom he knew to be a great learned man a noble captaine for that he was chosen to be seuenteene times Generall ouer the Achaians The cares of the kings of Persia was such for their children that they made choise of foure principall men in all knowledge to instruct them and to bring them vp The first schoole-maister should teach them the seruice of the gods with their sacrifice and ceremonies The second should instruct their children in the auncient lawes and customes of the kings of Persia. The third should bring them vp in sobrietie temperancy to vanquish lust and incontinency And the fourth should learn them to be valiant and hardy and to be acquainted with military discipline And therfore Alexander the great brought vp three thousand Persian youthes in the martiall discipline of the Macedonians And so Sertorius brought vp all the noble mens sonnes in Hispaine in martiall discipline of the Romanes This much I thought good to write of the good bringing vp and education of children for by the wickednesse of Eli his sonnes and corruption of Samuels sonnes the Priesthood was taken from the one and the gouernment taken from the other and therefore Israel cried for a king therat Samuel was much displeased but the Lord said vnto him heare the voyce of the people they haue not cast thee away but me that I should not raigne ouer them yet saith the Lord Tell them the nature of a king that he will take their sonnes to runne before his chariots to eare his ground to gather in his haruest and the king wil take their daughters and make them dressers of his oyntments his cookes and bakers the king shall take the best of their fields of their vineyards and of their oliue trees and giue them to his seruants he shall take the tenth of their seed and of theyr vines the best of their men seruants and maid seruants their young men and their asses to doo his worke yet though Samuel told al this to Israel from the Lord they would haue a king much like the fable of the frogs The frogs would haue a king being refused of many they came to the storke and would haue him to be their king which he accepted he got him a block as a seate to sit on to heare their causes and to giue iudgement but when the frogs came before their king to complaine he began with his bill to pricke them and after to wound thē that some were wounded some slain some made hast away So Samuel spake to the Israelites to that effect as they found in Saul Ieroboam Achab Manasses others such wicked kings The Apology of Iothan may be now well mentioned who spake in a parable to the Sychemites that the trees would haue a king but the vine the figge and the oliue trees refused to be their king then would the trees haue a bush or a gorsse to be their king who did accept of it This bush or gorsse would easily take fire and burne all the Sychemites in Sychem and did not Abimelech so after hee killed 70. sonnes of Gedeon his bretheren he destroyed Sychem and slew all the Sychemites and sowed salt in that place to make it barren for euer for salt as Pliny saith makes ground barren and vnapt to bring any thing When the Philistines heard that Israel had a king they gathered themselues together to fight against Israel thirtie thousand chariots six thousand horsemen and the footemen were like the sand by the sea side in multitude and they pitched their camp in Michmash and the Philistines seemed so many vnto the Israelites that the Israelites hid themselues in holtes in towers caues rockes and pits and many of them fled ouer Iorden yet the Lord deliuered the Philistines into Ionathans hand Sauls sonne that Israel might know that victorie consists not in multitude nor armour of men but onely in the arme of the Lord and therfore Ionathan smote the Philistines and the Lord turned euery mans sword vpon his fellow so that there was a very great ouerthrow and the battell continued vntill they came that fled for feare of the Philistines
from mount Ephraim and now followed the enemies vnto Bethauen the victory was great which Saul got ouer the Philistines Saul in this battel did binde the souldiers by oath not to eate till euening and cursed him that would eate any foode till night for Ionathan tasted a little hony with the end of his rod and Saul his father would haue put him to death sauing that the souldiers rescued and deliuered him for the Lord had giuen a great victory by Ionathan ouer the Philistines CHAP. XX. Of the victorie of Saul at Iabesh Gilead and after how he was ouerthrowne by the Philistines and slew himselfe in mount Gilboa and of the reward of diuers treasons AFter the battel at Michmash Saul had an other victorie ouer the Ammonites where the Ammonites were slain at Iabesh Gilead the Lord prospered Saul and endued him with such vertues as were meete for a K. yet Saul disobeyed the Lord being commanded to destroy the Amalekites and sley both man and woman both infant and suckling both oxe and sheepe both camel and asse yet he spared Agag king of the Amalekites and the fat beasts and the lambes the sheepe and the oxen that were good against the commaundement of the Lord and therefore Samuel reproued him and tolde him that the Lord had reiected him and that his kingdome should bee giuen to an other and vpon Sauls disobedience Samuel was commaunded to annoint Dauid king ouer Israel so Saul wonne the victory but lost his kingdome and his life in the next battell Saul being forsaken of the Lord for his disobedience the Philistines preuailed against him in diuers battels for Saul was more desirous to kill Dauid the seruant of the Lord then to destroy the Philistines the enemies of the Lord. But Dauid was reserued and ordained to fight the battels of the Lord to destroy the Amalekites the Philistines the rest of the Lords enemies whom Saul spared being commanded to the contrary therfore the Lord gaue Saul to the hands of the Philistins at the battell in mount Gilboa that the Israelites fled and fell before the Philistines and the three sonnes of Saul were flaine and Saul himselfe sore wounded Such was his cruell life seeking to kill Dauid that he had a desperate death for he slew himself with his owne sword seeing the battell so sore against him his sonnes slaine his souldiers killed and all the rest of his army fled This was the end of Saul the first K. of Israel like the end of Zedechia the last king of Israel And whē the Philistins came to the spoyle of them that were slaine they found the body of Saul and his three sonnes in mount Gilboah slaine in the battel and they cut off Sauls head and stripped him out of his armour and they laid vp his armour in the Temple of their god Astaroth and hanged vp his body on the wall of Bethshan in token of victorie and triumph and they sent the head of Saul vnto the land of the Philistines that they might shew it in their cities and publish it in the Temples of their Idols among the people and after to set vp Sauls head in the Temple of Dagon This was the end of Saul whom the Lord raised from keeping his fathers asses to be a king ouer his people for not obeying the commaundement of the Lord thus euer the Lord punished disobedience in Saul in Rehoboam Achab Manasses and Zedechiah that the Lord deliuered Ierusalem and the kingdome of Iudah to the hands of Nabuchodonozer king of Babilon Saul being now slaine in mount Gilboa the Amalekite which brought to Dauid Sauls crowne and his bracelets and tolde Dauid that hee himselfe slew Saul which was a lye for Saul slew himselfe thought to haue a great reward for such good newes but Dauid commanded him to be slaine The like reward had Rechab and Banah that brought Isbosheths head vnto Dauid who disguised themselues as Marchants to buy wheate and went to Isbosheths house who slept on his bed at noone and they slew him tooke his head with them and presented it vnto Dauid at Hebron supposing they should bee better rewarded then the Amalekite was but Dauid rewarded them in this sort that their hands and their feete were cut off hanged vp ouer the poole in Hebron The recompence of such treacherous seruants were euer so rewarded as Bessus the onely chiefe captaine vnder Darius who after he fled from the battell at Arbela was slaine by Bessus and his head cut off and brought vnto Alexander who thought to be aduanced for his trecherous seruice but Alexander commaunded that he should be tyed to the tops of two young trees bending to the ground that he by the swinge and lifting vp of the trees might be torne in peeces So Septimius and Achillas commaunded by Ptolomeus king of Egipt to kill Pompey and to present his head vnto Caesar from him though Pompey before time had restored Ptolomeu his father to his kingdome in Egipt and Septimius had beene Pompey his souldier in diuers warres yet they slew him most trecherously in his boate at Pellusium and cut off his head to please Caesar but they were rewarded of Caesar as Bessus was of Alexander for the king was slaine and his kingdome giuen to Cleopatra his sister When Antigonus sawe Pirrhus head presented vnto him by his sonne though they were both enemies and in the field in armor one against an other yet he couered Pirrhus head with his hat discommending the crueltie of his sonne with such a reward that he made his bloud run about his eares saying how durst thou like a sauage beast bring Pirrhus head from his body being dead whom no prince or captaine in Asia or in Europe durst in the face meet in the field aliue Yet most men think that trecherie is allowed though traitors be not accepted I do not thinke but the head of Darius brought to Alexander by Bessus and the head of Pompey to Caesar were as gratefull as Ciceroes head was to Marc. Antonius brought by Popilius or as Marc. Crassus head sent by Surena to Horodes for thereby had Alexander the kingdome of Persia Caesar the Empire of Rome treason hath better successe then traitors haue To this effect spake Iezabell to Iehu Had Zimri peace which slew his maister Elah as though she should say can traitors haue good successe but she was rewarded by Iehu for that Naboth was stoned to death by her meanes for his vineyard as the rest were Euen cruel Sylla the Romane the enemie of Marius and all his well-willers and especiall of Sulpitius Syllas mortall foe Yet when Sulpitius seruant would haue betrayed Sulpitius his maister vnto Sylla Sylla caused him to bee throwne headlong downe from the rocke Tarpeia So much the olde Romanes hated traitors and treasons that when Viriatus an other Haniball and a great enemie of the Romanes for 14.
that day the feast of the Lorde was kept the virgins of Siloth came abroad to daunce to sing and to play the Beniamites caught the maides of Siloth to the number of 200. and brought them to the land of Beniamin So the abuse of one woman the Leuites wife by the Beniamite cost sixtie foure thousand mens liues and more in Israel For by the taking away of Viriahs wife by Dauid Israel was plagued with the death of seuentie thousand men and the taking away of Menelaus wife from Greece cost the liues of many millions of men and the warres of tenne yeares betweene the Greekes and the Troians And for that the time of the taking away of Vriahs wife by Dauid agreeth with the historie of the taking away of Menelaus wife by Alexander otherwise called Paris After the death of Dauid and Salomon his sonne the kingdome of Israel was established vpon Rehoboam Salomons sonne he forsooke the law of the Lord and reiected his fathers wise and graue counsellors and followed rash young mens counsell and therefore the Lord raised Shesak king of Egipt against Israel and he came with twelue hundred chariots three score thousand horsemen and his footemen were without number for from Egipt came with him the Lybians the Troglodites and the Aethiopians he tooke the strong cities of Iudah and Ierusalem and all the treasures of the Lords house and all the treasures of the kings house and he carried away two hundred targets and three hundred shields of gold which Salomon made and returned to Egipt with a great spoile because Rehoboam forsooke the Lord and therefore was forsaken of the Lord. The temple that Salomon his father builded was spoiled by the negligence of Rehoboam Salomons sonne This was the first victorie that was had ouer Ierusalem by Shesak king of Israel and here began the first battell of the ciuill warre betweene the kings of Iudah and the kings of Israel and such ciuill warre if you consider the slaughter betweene Iudah and Israel and the continuance of their warres you must needs confesse that in one battell betweene Abiah and Ieroboam were more slaine of the Israelites then among the Romanes in fortie yeares to talke of the Romanes ciuill warres which was fortie yeares betweene Sylla and Marius betweene Caesar and Pompey and last betweene Octauius and Marc. Antonius or the ciuill warres of the Greekes called the Peloponesian warre which endured seuen and twentie yeares it was nothing in respect of the murther and bloud betweene Iudah and Israel for in the ciuill warres of the Romanes histories doo not record aboue the deaths of three hundred thousand Romanes Where in this battell being the first ciuill battell betweene Ieroboam king of Israel against Abiah king of Iudah at what time was slaine in the field fiue hundred thousand of king Ieroboams souldiers in one battell which neither Tamberlane nor Xerxes though they could match them in number yet could they neuer match thē in slaughter For as the Romanes were full fiue hundred yeares in conquering the Sabines the Latines the Vients the Fidenates the Samnites Tarentines Hetruscans others frō Romulus time to Scypio Affrican before the Romanes could be Lords of Italy The like may bee spoken of the Israelites in conquequering the Moabites Ammonites Amalekites Philistines and others from Moses time vnto Dauid welnigh fiue hundred yeares and as the Romans held their Empire so long a time as they were in winning of it frō Scypio Affrican who conquered Haniball and Italy vnto the Emperor Probus which was fiue hundred years at what time the whole Empire fell by degrees to decay So Israel as they subdued their enemies from Moses to Dauid fiue hundred yeares as you read before so after Dauid by ciuill warres of Iudah and Israel vnto Zedechias time which was fiue hundred yeares they lost both the kingdomes Iudah and Israel the one taken captiue by Salmanasser vnto Niniuie the other by Nabuchodonozer vnto Babilon so that now the land of Iudah called the land of milke and honey is become Athisme subiect to Pagans Infidels which continued from Abraham the first father of the faith vntill Titus Vespasian two thousand and odde yeares and al through disobedience and contempt of their Lord and God Euen so the Romanes which were wont to be called lords of the world whose Consuls at that time ruled and gouerned the most kingdomes of the world are now left without King Emperor or Consull and many cities in Italy at this day preferred before Rome now gouerned by the Pope a Bishop as Ierusalem is gouerned by the Turk an Infidel so that in all things the Romanes and the Hebrews may be compared for as the greatest enemie that euer Rome had was Italy and the dangerousest foes that the Romanes had were Italians for the Gaules the Cymbres the Carthaginians and the Affricans vexed not the Romans as the Italians did their own country men and next neighbors So Iudah had no enemies but the house of Israel So Israel had no enemies but Iudah for Ierusalem could not away with Samaria for their two Idols the one at Dan the other in Bethell so Samaria could not brooke Ierusalem for the great solemnitie of Salomons temple CHAP. III. The great battell betweene Abia king of Iudah and Ieroboam king of Israel where 500000. were slaine on Ieroboams side Of the victories of Asa and Iosaphat kings of Iudah ouer Zerah king of Aethiopia ouer the Edomites Ammonites and Maobites AS it seemed by the long oration which Abiah made to Ieroboam and his army vpon mount Zemaraim before the battell ioyned together to disswade them from the battell saying that the Lord had giuen the kingdome ouer Israel to Dauid and to his house but Ieroboam contemned Abiahs counsel and thought by his policie and subtill stratagem to haue ouercome the host of Iudah but he himself was deceiued to the losse of fiue hundred thousand of his souldiers that his power and force failed that he was not able during his life to preuaile against Iudah for Ieroboam had gathered to encrease his army all leaud idle and wicked vnthrifts to fight this battell against Rehoboam the sonne of Salomon like Cinna in Rome that made open proclamation that al bondmē wicked doers and banished men should come to Cinna the Consul they should be restored to their former libertie freedome and thus Cinna gathered al the leaud and wicked men within all Italy he then being Consul taking part with Cai. Marius against his other fellow Consull Octauius which helde with Sylla slaine at that time a number more of the citizens of Rome but between Sylla and Marius one reuenging vpon an other fomi◅g in their countries bloud that all the streetes of Rome anne of bloud These two Marius and Sylla began the first Romane ciuil warres as Ieroboam and Rehoboam did and yet were they both compared to
Scypio Affrican for their victories to their countrey though they were compared to Hanibal for the harm hurt which they had done to their countrey Had Ieroboam harkned to the counsell of Abiah king of Iudah vpon mount Zemaraim he had saued fiue hundred thousand Israelites which were slaine at the battel If the Beniamites had taken counsel of their bretheren the Israelites and to yeeld vnto them the wicked mē that abused the Leuites wife the whole tribe of Beniamin had not bin destroied It was the ouerthrow of Iudas Machabaeus by Bacchides at the battell of Laisa for that he would not be perswaded by his friends to refraine the battell for that time Had the Prophet Ieremy beene heard of Zedechiah and the princes of Iudah Zedechiah had saued the liues of his owne children slaine in his sight and had likewise saued his owne eyes in his head which presently were pulled out after he saw his children slaine and himselfe caried captiue and blind vnto Babilon Ierusalem destroyed and the kingdome of Iudah subdued by Nabuchodonozer so it may be said of Saul refusing the counsell of Samuel and so of Iosias disobeying the counsell of Necho After the great victorie that Iudah had ouer Israel by Abiah king of Iudah his sonne Asa fought with Zerah king of Aethiopia an Infidel who brought an host of ten hundred thousand men three hundred chariots from Aethiope to Iudah and came to Maresha a citie of Iudah Asa the king of Iudah came with an army of fiue hundred and foure score thousand into the valley of Zephatah and both the kings set the battel in a ray But Asa began with praiers cryed vnto the Lord by praiers for the victorie putting no trust in his own power or pollicie neither fearing the strength of the multitude of his enemies so with full confidence in the Lord he set vpō the Aethiopians the Lord smote them before Asa and before Iudah that the Aethiopians fled and the army of Iudah followed and pursued them vnto Gerer for the Lord had striken the Aethiopians with such fear that there was no life in them that the slaughter was exceeding great the spoyle exceeding much of camels sheepe and cattell And Asa after the victorie which he had giuen him by the Lord returned to Ierusalem and gaue the Lord thankes who giueth all victories so as all good kings and generals ought to pray to the Lord before they enter into battell so ought they also to giue thankes after the battell for their victories This victory was a requitall and a full reuenge vpon the Aethiopians for the sacking and spoyling of Ierusalem and of the great slaughter of the people by Shesak king of Egipt In like maner as Abiah beganne with prayers before he beganne to battell so did king Asa his sonne follow his fathers rule and order in seeking helpe and aide at the Lords hand which euery King Generall or Captaine should doo So Iosaphat Asas sonne did when it was tolde him that the Moabites Ammonites Edomites came with an infinit number to fight against him he set himselfe to seeke the Lord and to aske counsell of him and all Iudah with him prayed vnto the Lorde to aide and strengthen him to fight the Lords battel wherby hee got a maruellous victorie ouer his enemies for before he went into the battell Iosaphat caused a Psalme of thankesgiuing to the Lord to be sung before the men of armes and so entred the battell and the Lord laide ambushments and shewed such stratagems against Ammon Moab and Edom that euery one helped to destroy another and the Lord turned euery mans sword to kill his fellow Where the Lorde leadeth the armie the victorie is soone gotten so Iosaphat putting his whole trust confidence in the Lord slue all his enemies that none did escape and the spoyle was such of golde of siluer and pretious Iewels that they were three dayes in gathering and in carrying the spoyle away and then they assembled together after the victorie by Iosaphats commaundement to giue the Lord thankes for the victory and called the place where they got the victory Berachab and they returned to Ierusalem with violls harpes and with trumpets These three battels of Abiah Asa and Iosaphat were battells of the Lord and as the Lord had done at that battell at Michmash to Ionathan so the Lord did now at the battell at Beracha to Iosaphat and so the Lord in all the battels of the good kings of Iudah and Israel shewed alwaies his diuine stratagems for the defence of Ierusalem as in Egipt by Moses against Pharao by Elias at the brooke Kyson against Baals prophets by Elizeus at Dothan against king Benhadads souldiers The Gentiles in like sort commence no warre enter no battell before they sing a song vnto their gods as the Lacedemonians brought vp onely in warre from seuen yeares old vsed before they went to the warres to make solemne sacrifice to the Muses to the goddesse Feare with a song to Castor Pollux The Thrasians sing a song to their god Mars and bragge much of Mars for that he was borne in Thracia Others made vowes when they went to any warres As among the Romanes their wiues their children and their friends should make vowes and cause the same to be written in tables and to be set on that gate through the which they went out of the citie to warre that vpon their return home they might see and read their vowes and performe them The three hundred Fabians which were slaine at the battell at Crimera the gate that they went through out of Rome then was euer called after that Porta Scelerata So did the Romains likewise call the field where one of the Vestal virgins called Minutia for her incest carnall fault was buried in the field was called Sceleratus Campus according to the Romain lawes made for the Vestal virgins that so offended We leaue the prophane marching of the Romanes and the Greekes and we will returne to the marching of Israel vnder king Asa and king Iosaphat his sonne who both by praiers obtained great victories as all the Israelites preuailed more by praier then by fight As by praier Ioshua made the Sun to stand stil ouer Gibeon and the Moone ouer Aialon By praier Elias made the cloudes to fall raine By praier Moses made his enemies to flie Elizeus raised the dead to life Solomon obtained wisdom So long as the Lord taketh not away thy praying so lōg he doth not take away his grace mercy from thee for a wicked man cannot pray well and he that praieth wel cannot liue wickedly And therfore praiers are compared to Sampsons haires for as Sampsons strength laie in his haires so our strength lieth in praiers Ester praied to haue that to come to proud Ammon which Ammon wished to haue done to Mardochaeus and the
poore Iewes Iudith praied at the striking and the cutting off of Holofernes head which blasphemed the Lord and wold preferre Nabuchodonozer before the God of Israel Susan praied vnto the Lord for her innocēcy against the false Iudges at Babilō that accused her of incōtinency and they were stoned to death by meanes of Daniel We read also of Iud. Machabaeus a noble captaine of the Iewes that he neuer entred into any battell before he praied yet was hee in twelue set battels and in euery one obtained victorie sauing at the last at what time some write hee praied not where hee was slaine in the field by Bacchides and his people ouerthrowne As you heard of good kings by praiers that wanne victories so also shall you heare of wicked Idolatrous kings as Achas who caused an Idolatrous Altar to be made in Iudah like the Altar at Damascus and consecrated his sonne in fire and offered him to Moloch In like sort the king of Moab supposing his Idol Chemosh to be angry with him slue and sacrificed his eldest sonne that should haue raigned next after him King and offered him as a burnt offering to his God Chemosh vpon the walles of the Towne As Achab and Manasses Kings of Iudah did sacrifice their children in the valley of Hynnon to Moloch for Achab was one of the first kings that brought the name of Baal into Israel and mainteined betweene him and his wife Iezabel foure hundred and fiftie false prophets of Baal Achas had good king Ezechias to his sonne but Achas the father walked not vprightly before the Lorde as his sonne Ezechias did but made moulten Images for Baalim and burnt Incense in the valley of Benhynnon sacrificed his sonnes and burnt them with fire and offered them vnto his god Moloch and sought helpe at the gods of Damascus at Chemosh god of the Moabites Milcombe god of the Ammonites and other straunge gods and therefore the Lord gaue him ouer and deliuered him into the hands of the king of the Aramites and he smote him and slue a great number of his soldiers brought many prisoners of Iudah with him to Damascus Againe the Lord deliuered Achas into the hand of the king of Israel Phaekah and he slue in one day six score thousand in Iudah and tooke two hundred thousand prisoners of women sonnes daughters and brought them into Samaria with all the spoyle The Edomites slue of them of Iudah a great number and carried many captiues away Marke what mischiefe happeneth where an euil king doth raigne The Philistines also inuaded the cities of Iudah and tooke Aialon Gederith and other cities of Iudah and thus were they vexed by the Aramites Edomities and Philistines and by the Israelites being their owne nation for that Achas king of Iudah forsooke the Lord and sought helpe at strange gods and not at the hands of the god of Israel After wicked Achas the good king Ezechias his sonne succeeded he was to commence a battell with Senacherib who blasphemed the Lord and threatned destruction to Ierusalem but the Prophet Esay had instructed Ezechiah that this was the Lords battell that he would be reuenged vpō the blasphemy of Senacherib for proud Ashur challenged the Lord into the field to fight with him saying what god could take Iudah out of his hand he numbred the kings and their gods which he and his fathers destroied and with horrible blasphemy perswaded the king of Iudah not to trust to his god but to yeeld vnto him but the lord did put his hooke in his nosthrils and his bridle in his lips as the Lord had told Ezechiah the king by Esayas the prophet that Senacherib with all his army should not come to Ierusalem nor shoote an arrow there for the battel is mine saith the Lord. And hee sent his Angels that night which destroyed all the princes all the captaines and all the valiant men of Ashur and all the whole army of Senacherib to the number of an hundred foure score and sixe thousand without the drawing of one sword of Iudah and Senacherib fled with tenne men with him some thinke that Nabuchodonozer was one but I thinke time will not so allow for he was at that time but a very childe But Senacherib fled to Niniuie where he was slaine in the temple praying before his Idoll Nisroch whom he preferred before the liuing God that by his two sonnes the iust iudgement of the Lord for his blasphemy to be slaine before his owne god before whom he worshipped and prayed when he was slaine by his owne sonnes and thus we see in all iust battels whē we serue the Lord trust onely in him that victories come not by man but by the Lord. Iosaphat a good king had Ioram an euil king to his son a murtherer of his bretheren Ezechias a good king in Ierusalem had Manasses to his sonne a wicked Idolater who filled all the streets of Ierusalem with bloud Iosias a good godly king had to his fonnes Ioachas and Ioachim who were taken captiues by Nabuchodonozer into Babilon for their transgressions and sins at what time Daniel was taken captiue and many other gentlēmen of Iudah euen Ierusalem whom the Lord had defended frō the sword of Senacherib and from all the kings of Egipt and Ashur yet when the sinnes of Ierusalem were ripe it was deliuered into the hand of Nabuchodonozer to be carried captiue into Babilon as Samaria was to Niniuie by Salmanasher one hundred thirtie and three years before Iudahs captiuitie After Ashur had taken the ten tribes of Israel away he brought from Bethel from Cutha from Anah and frō Amath straunge people and placed them in the cities of Samaria in stead of the children of Israel and of these people came the Samaritans of whom mention is made often in the gospel with whom the Iews would haue no societie for so the woman spake to Christ at Iacobs well that why he being a Iew should aske water of a Samaritan This time Zedechiah the king gaue no hearing to the Prophet Ieremy who forewarned the king of their destruction to be at hand for the which the Prophet was imprisoned first by Fashur high bishop of the tēple who smote Ieremy and put him in the stockes strooke him as Zedechiah the false Prophet strook Micha who was after commaunded by Achab to be imprisoned as Ieremy the Prophet was and by meanes of the nobles of Iudah to king Zedechiah Ieremy was imprisoned in a dirtie dungeon Ieremy notwithstanding spared not to tell them that they should die an horrible death and should lie as dung vpon the earth and no man to burie them wherat they were so moued saying let vs not regard his words and let vs cut out his tongue The citizens of Anathot commaunded Ieremy not to preach vnto them in the name of the Lord if thou do thou shalt
make the Princes of Iudah like coales of fire among the wood and like a firebrand in the sheffe and they shall deuour all people round about them saith the Lord. The foure hornes which Zachary saw which scattered Ierusalem Iudah and Israel but the Lord appoints Carpenters and Smiths with mallets and hammers to breake the hornes of those enemies for Iacob the Patriarke prophesied that the scepter should not depart from Iudah vntill Siloh should come so that after the destruction of Ierusalē vnder Nabuchodonozer to the last destruction of the same vnder Titus Ierusalem cōtinued her gouernment according to the prophesie of Iacob so that neither force power nor strrtagems could preuaile against Ierusalem CHAP. V. Of Semiramis stratagems in India and of Tomiris in Scithia Of the victories of Alexander the great Of Pyrrhus warres in Italy and of the ouerthrow of Xerxes armie in Greece by Leonidas at Thermopyles and by Themistocles at Salamina THe stratagems which Ierusalem vsed in the battells of the Lord were nothing like to the stratagemes of the great Monarchies and Polymarchies of the world who reposed their trust in their dumbe Idolles and woodden gods and in multitude of men and beastes as Semyramis did a woman of great fame and report in histories willing to excell men in martiall actions tooke her voyage into India with such innumerable armies that Staurobates king of India was so frighted with the report thereof that he caused all his Elephants to be brought and to be set in the most shewe to terrifie the Assirians that it made the Assirian armie more willing to returne backe then to goe forwards Semyramis perceiuing that the Assirians were afrighted and amazed at the sight of so many Elephants and that the king did purposely set his Elephants in sight to amaze the Assirians which was the order of the Indiās to terrifie all Princes with the sight of their Elephants she vsed this stratageme caused 300. thousand great oxen to be slaine and their skinnes to be stuffed filled with heye and to be framed in forme and fashion like Elephants in euery one of these she put in a Camell and a man vpon his backe which she placed in the forefront of the battell to terrifie the Indians and their king Staurobates for as Semyramis thought the Indians supposed that all the world could not bring more Elephants into the field then the Indians could After these fained elephants she placed such an infinit number of camels behind the armie that the sight therof much terrified Staurobates his army that Semyramis by this stratagem got two great victories in India But after these fained elephants were betraied by one of Semyramis Captaines taken in the warres who by torture confessed the secresie of Semyramis stratageme that she was glad to leaue India and to returne to her Country Euen so Tomyris Queene of Scythia to requite Cyrus stratageme by a banquet which he made purposely to deceiue the Scythians fained to flie for feare and left his tents full of wine and good cheare and sodainly returning found the Scythians banquetting and feasting and so charged with wine that they were more readie to sleep then to fight whereby Cyrus slue Sargapises Tomyris sonne with two hundred thousand Scythians The like stratagem vsed the Lorde against the Aramites when an Asse head was solde in Samaria for fiftie sickles that such plentie was in Samaria as Elizeus said before that the Aramites left their Tents with all prouisions and fled without any shewe or likenesse to bee done against them but this was a diuine stratagem by the Lord. Tomyris after her great losse which she had by Cyrus of her sonne and her people caused trenches deepe ditches and sharpe stakes to be made secretly and placed armed souldiers in the same being in narrow straight places dissembling that she was not able to giue a secōd battell to Cyrus but faigned her selfe to flie and al her army with her to draw the Persians after her vntill shee brought thē vnto these trenches ditches narrow places where she had set in wait an innumerable multitude of armed Scythiās round about Cyrus hisarmy which vpon the sudden fel vpon the Persians slew two hundred thousand of them that there was not one left aliue to bring tidings vnto Persia of Cyrus death thus Cyrus the great king of Persia was ouerthrowne with all his army by Tomyris Queen of Scythia a woman with the like stratagem as he ouerthrew Tomyris before Sampson who ouerthrew 6000. of the Philistines at one time by the fall of a house at an other time slew 1000. of them with a Iawe bone of an asse who burned theyr rickes and their corne destroyed their vines plagued them euery way Yet this Sampson was taken bound his eyes pulled out solde and deliuered to the Philistins his enemies by a stratagem of a woman Dalyla his wife Moses being chosen general ouer the Egiptians against the Aethiopians hearing by reports of the dangerous passage through the wildernesse frō Egipt vnto Aethiope deuised a stratagem to passe through the wildernesse full of noisome serpēts where Moses must needs passe through he made certain chests of bull-rushes caried out of Egipt with him a number of the birds called Ibes which bird to kill in Egipt was a capitall crime by law made for that they were so beneficiall to Egipt whose naturall hatred is such against serpents that when serpents assaulted Moses in the wildernesse he would let out his birds Ibes who assaulted them chased them slew them that Moses by this means passed safe through the wildernesse to the wonder of both the Egiptians Aethiopians and therby had two victories ouer the Aethiopians Alexander the great twelue hundred yeares after Semyramis taking his iourney with his Armye into India where when his army sawe so many Elephants set in battell raie along vpon the riuer of Ganges side it so amazed the Macedonian army that they told Alexander that they came not to fight with beasts but with mē so fearfull at the sight of the Elephants that the Macedonians would goe no further Alexander being of inuincible courage that nothing could feare him without stratagems but of meere magnanimitie requested the Macedonians the Persians that were in his army not to leaue him their king to such shamefull reports as the sight of a few Elephants might terrifie Alexander the great and his inuincible army The Argyraspides his principall souldiers hauing perswaded the most part of the army to auoyd shame infamy and to stick to their captain Alexander whose only request was to haue them altogither at once to shoote at Porus King of India which being perswaded hardly thervnto were forced for shame to perform the request which Alexander sought at their hands which they performed that so many shots lighted vpō the king at once that he fell to the ground from his
the king of Iudahs side by the king of Israel that two hundred thousand of womē and children were taken prisoners in Samaria so that they wasted and spoyled one another in such sort that frō a happy populous people by forsaking their Lord and God they became a most miserable Idolatrous people to serue strange gods For during the time of Dauid which was 40. yeares the kingdome of Israel was the most famous renowned kingdome of the world For so the Lord spake I will make the Princes of Iudah like coales of fire among the wood and like a fire-brand in the sheafe and they shal deuour all people round about them So Dauid brought all the kings nations about subiect tributary vnto Israel whose happie whole gouernment was such that at his death hee left a hundred thousand talents to his sonne Solomon to build a temple to the Lord which he himself had determined to build but that the Prophet Nathā warned him from the Lord that he should not for that he was a man of blood but that Solomon his sonne should build him a house This kingdom of Israel being so happy as you heard in king Dauids time and in Solomons time so glorious a temple builded and so richly furnished vnto the Lord that in Solomons time such plentie was in Ierusalē mony was no more esteemed thē stones in the streets yet presently vpō Solomons death in the time of Rehoboham his sonne the state of Ierusalem was so obscured altered that the citie was sackt and the temple robd with great slaughter of people by Shesac king of Egipt so that the wealth and treasure of Ierusalem and of the temple was carried by Shesac into Egipt Againe the kings of Israel became so Idolatrous that there were no gods among the Heathens but they were as gods worshipped in Israel so that they were far worse then the Grecians or the Romans who would allow no strange gods to raigne neither in Athens nor in Rome and therefore for that they forsooke the Lord the Lord forsooke them and gaue them ouer and their kingdome to the Assirians by the hand of Salmanasser and so Samaria and other townes in Israel were inhabited by strangers So the kings of Iudah after Israel within 133. yeares after were carried captiues into Babilon by Nabuchodonozer yet the Lord gaue them not ouer but brought them within 70. yeares after againe to Ierusalem stirred vp Cyrus Darius and Artaxerxes three great kings of Persia to fauour and to aide them with license to returne to their countrey to inhabit Ierusalem with money and much treasure to build vp the Temple redeliuering vnto them all the rich vessels of gold and siluer which Salomon left in the Temple at his death and which Nabuchodonozer tooke away from the Temple and brought to Babilon After Cyrus and these kings of Persia the Lord stirred vp a great Heathen Prince Alexander the great who when he came to Ierusalem lighted off his horse and came to meet the high Priest and reuerenced him with great obeysance where were read vnto him the prophesies of Daniel where it was found that a Grecian Prince should subdue the Persian kingdome which Alexander acknowledged to be himselfe and therefore went into the temple sacrificed to the God of Israel and not only freely granted to the high Priest whatsoeuer he would aske but commaunded him to aske what he would haue him do the high Priest asked nothing but that the Iewes that dwelt in Babilon in Medea and in other countreys about vnder his gouernment might enioy and liue according to the lawes of their countrey which Alexander graunted besides his great and liberall gifts which he bestowed vpon the Priest the temple Nabuchodonozer vsed himselfe otherwise then Alexander did against Iudah for he commanded Holofernus to spare no people no kingdome saying Non Parcet oculus tuus vlliregno The terror of Holofernus army therby was such that they came out of euery citie crowned with crownes on their heads and lamps in their hands to receiue him with all kind of musicke and with dauncing songs to please him yet could they not mittigate the fiercenesse of his fury After Alexander the Lord stirred vp Pthol Philadelphus so to fauour the Israelits to loue their lawes that he had the lawes of Israel written in the Greeke tongue in Alexandria and released many prisoners and captiues of the Iews to the number of 120000. which Ptol. Lagus his precessor had brought from Iudah to Egipt with as great bountifull rewards gifts as Alexander did So Zeleucus shewed such fauour to the Iewes dwelling in Antioch in Ionia in Ephesus that he graunted to them the liberties lawes of their countrey After Zeleucus the Lord stirred vp Antiochus the great being before a great enemy of the Iewes after Antiochus many of the kings of Asia so to fauour them that all the cities of Asia where the Iewes dwelt should suffer them to liue according to the laws of their country and to enioy the benefites of the same and though many of the Assirian kings troubled and molested them with great warres which ioyned themselues with the Samaritans to subdue the kingdome of Iudah Yet the Lord raised vp the house of Assamonias Mattathias to resist the violence of the Assyrians and after him his sonne Iu. Machabaeus who slew of the enemies Edumeans and Assyrians that sought the ouerthrowe of his countrey two hundred thirtie sixe thousand and seuen hundred in the defence of Ierusalem and after him his other foure bretheren forsooke not the lawes of the Lord for all the tyrannie of the Romane Emperors and the Assyrian Kings But the Iewes from time to time so reuoulted from the Lord that Aristobulus the sonne of Hircanus made himselfe a King 481. yeares after the returne of the captiuitie of the Iewes from Babilon but hee enioyed his kingdome but one yeare after he famished his mother and killed his brother for in Iudah their kings had no better succession then the kings of Rome had though in both the kingdomes they made great meanes to become kings After this Aristobulus there was no king among the Iewes vntill Herod who was made by the Senators of Rome with the consent of Augustus Caesar and Mar. Antonius both Emperours of Rome vnder whom Iudah was a Prouince Yet one false Alexander a Iew most subtilly adopted himselfe being very like to Herod to be of the stock and family of Herod and brother to Aristobulus and thereby claimed to bee king of Iudah saying that he was Herods sonne as false Philip faigned himselfe in Macedonia to be Persius sonne king Philips brother and as the common people there reuerenced false Philippe in Macedonia so likewise in all parts of Iurie was this false Alexander carried in coach from Cittie to Cittie with all the reuerence and honour that
losse of many countries prouinces and cities so the Turkes marched vpon the Romanes as the Romanes marched vpon others Cyrus the great king of Persia hauing an hundred and seuen and twentie prouinces after his conquest of many kingdomes and nations marched with two hundred thousand Persians to be slaine in Scythia and that by a woman so Cyrus lost Persia seeking to winne Scythia and lost his life to get more landes Zerxes marching into Greece with such an innumerable armie that they dranke and dried vp many riuers as Scamander in Thessalia the riuer Simois in Phrygia Clidorus in Beotia Lysus in Samothracia the riuer Menalia by Hellespont yet he came from Greece home to be murthered by Mardonius his seruant in his owne kingdom Alexander the great hauing subdued the most parts of the world he also for want of men marched to India to fight with Elephants and returned from India to Babilon where he was poysoned by his owne seruants Many such crooked marchings were as well among the Iewes as among the Gentiles Saul the first king of Israel marched not as he ought to haue done against Agag king of the Amalekites and therefore was he slaine with his three sonnes in the battell at mount Gilboa by the Philistines Ieroboam marched not rightly to the battel in mount Zemaraim against Abiah king of Iudah and therfore fiue hundred thousand Israelites were slaine of his soldiers The most part of the kings of Israel because I need not to name as Acha◅ Manasses Zedechiah the rest many of the kings of Iudah for that they marched not in the path of the Lord but followed Ieroboā which made Israel to sinne and therefore marched with Ieroboa◅ to their destruction These marched not with Moses who said to the God of Israel We will not goe hence if thou goe not before vs. Nor with king Dauid who would take no warre in hand before he had consulted with the Lord. Nor with Gedeon who would not goe to any battell vnlesse the Lord had giuen him a signe before he went so the captaines of the Lorde marched no where attempted no warre or battell without consulting with the Lorde by Vrim Thummim or with some Prophet of the Lord. The Gentiles likewise would take no warre in hand without consulting with their Oracles as the Romains besought the gods of Carthage promising them Temples Altars sacrifices feasts if they would forsake Carthage and come to Rome and therfore the Gentiles were so superstitious and blinde that in many countries they would binde the Images of Hercules and Mars lest they should forsake them and goe to other nations their enemies for no doubt it should seeme that either they read or heard of Moses bookes how the Lord forsooke the Israelites and gaue them ouer to the Canaanites Philistines and other nations about them and how the Arke was taken frō them by the Philistines Here hence grew the blindnesse of the Gentiles that the Arke being taken away from Israel they feared also lest their gods should be either allured by faire promises or taken away by strength of victories CHAP. VI. Of the maner and forme of vowes as well of the Iewes as of the Gentiles for their victories in warres A Bigail Nabals wife vsed a policie to please Dauid fearing least Dauid would be reuenged vpon her husband for his churlish deniall of reliefe to him and to his company went after Dauid with victualls gifts and rewards and pleased him with faire words as Iacob pleased his brother Esau who vsed the like stratagem to win his brother Esau to send him gifts and rewards to please his brother whom he much feared for Esau promised to kill his brother Iacob when his father should die For Iacob the Patriarke made a vow when he went to Mesopotamia after his vision in Luz which thē Iacob named Bethel and said If God be with me and helpe me this iourney and will giue me bread to eate and cloaths to put on he vowed of all things that the Lord would giue him that he would giue the tenth vnto the Lord. Iacobs vow is farre more godly then Absolons vow for Iacob sought but bread to eate and cloaths to put on and safe reture againe from Mesopotamia ouer Iorden but rebellious Absolon sought the kingdome of Israel from his father Dauid by a dissembling vowe saying I will goe and performe my vowes which I vowed vnto the Lorde in Hebron which vowe he made his father the king beleeue that hee vowed in Ieshur in Syria that if the Lord would bring him to Ierusalem he would performe his vowes in Hebron this is a rebellious vow like to the wicked vowes of the Iewes which vowed before they would either eate or drinke to kill Paul The Israelites after they were ouerthrowne in a great battell by Arad king of the Canaanites they vowed vnto the Lorde that if the Lorde would giue Arad and the Canaanites into theyr handes that they would truely ferue the Lorde and destroy the Canaanites theyr landes and theyr cities They bound the Lord to so many conditions that if they should obtaine victories they promised him true seruice and to fight manfully against the Cananites And againe for another victory that the Lord gaue them against the Canaanites they vowed the tenth and performed their vowe the Hebrewes wanted no victories vpon their obedience dutiful seruice to the Lord. Iephtha in his war◅es against the Ammonites vowed vnto the Lord if he should haue victory ouer the Ammonites that whatsoeuer first met him at his returne from his victory comming out of his house should be a sacrifice vnto the Lord. Asa king of Iudah vowed vnto the Lord as Abiah his father did when Shesac king of Egipt came with an infinite number Asa and all Iudah made a couenant to seeke the Lord promised sware that they that sought ◅ot the Lord small or great man or woman should die this with an oath he vowed that Iudah reioyced for the victory they had ouer Zerah king of Aethiope with all his army of tenne hundred thousand Ionas a Prophet of the Lord when he fled from Niniuie to Tharsis being in danger of shipwracke he tolde the Marriners that he was the cause of the perillous tempest and willed the Marriners to throwe him into the sea confessing the lot fell iustly vpon him saying I will performe the vow which I promised vnto the Lord. So Anna vowed vnto the Lord and said that if the Lord would bestowe a man childe vpon her she would giue him vnto the Lord and she vowed that neither razor or sheares should come vpon his head and so performed her vow and brought Samuel her sonne before the Lord. There was nothing so common among the Gentiles also as vows as you heard of the Hebrues of their vows to the gods of Israel so likewise among the Greekes and
Phrygians called their kings the greatest kings which the Romane Consulls could endure no great names but themselues as Sylla Lucullus and Pompey tooke the best hand either going riding or sitting of any king in Asia Augustus Caesar also reuenged on the Parthians Crassus death and brought againe to Rome all the Romaine Ensignes and all that Crassus lost in Parthia sauing Crassus himselfe his sonne and the Romans that died there The Greekes in like sort as the Romanes after they had giuen diuers ouerthrowes and gotten many great victories ouer the Persians as at the battell at Artemisium at the battell of Salamina and at the battell of Marathon where the Athenians wonne a famous victorie ouer the Persians who were ledde vnder Pisistratus a banished man out of Athens not like Themistocles who refused to fight but like himselfe a tirants sonne though a Greeke borne yet hee presented himselfe to Darius Hisdaspis king of Persia to lead his army into Greece his countrey where he was slaine and two hundred thousand Persians at the battell at Marathon by the Athenians for his welcome home who were conducted vnder Milciades and Callimachus two noble Captaines In this warre flourished Themistocles a young man and was as much commended by the Athenians for his prowesse and courage beeing so young as Alexander the great was in the battell at Cheronea or Scypio Affrican at the battell at Ticinum This young Themistocles was wont to say in his youth that he could not sleepe in his bed for the sound and report of Milciades triumphes The Greekes hauing so many victories and such good successe in theyr owne countreys ouer the Persians and others were as greedie as the Romanes were to win other countries the Greekes had the like lucke with the Syracusans as Mar. Crassus had with the Parthians who in both the battels at Syracusa the one by land the other by sea were ouerthrowne by the Syracusans by the rashnesse of Demosthenes who was Generall with Niceas in this voyage beeing maliciously counselled by Alcibiades to commence warre against the Syracusans but after these victories which the Syracusans hadde ouer the Athenians at the Riuer Asinanius where was the most cruell slaughter of the poore wretches the Athenians euen as they were a drinking vntill Niceas fell downe flat at Gilippus feete and yeelded himselfe Demosthenes beeing taken prisoner before not Demosthenes the Orator but an other Captaine in Athens of that name and hauing taken the residue of the Captaines vnslaine brought them together in troupes first vnarmed thē taking their weapons frō thē hung thē vp as tropheys vpō the goodliest young trees that grew by the Riuers side in token of triumph then they put on triumphing garlands on theyr heads hauing trimmed the horses in triumphant manner leading all the horses of the enemies shauen with some of the best captaines in chaines entered into the Citie of Syracusa with great pompe and after they had put all the Athenian captaines to death and had imprisoned the best and solde the slaues and poore wretches as bondmen and burned them in the forehead with the print of a horse The Syracusans decreed a feast for euer to bee celebrated in memorie of the Athenians in Syracusa called Asinarus after the name of the Riuer where the victorie was gotten by the counsell of Euricles the Orator with sacrifice to their goddes Niceas and Demosthenes both Generalls of the Athenians killed themselues by a word sent to them by Hermocrates to auoyd the furious crueltie of the Syracusans Yet the Syracusans did not so much annoy the Athenians as the Lacedemonians did theyr neighbours and countrey men in the great battell at the Riuer of Gotes where the Athenians were so ouerthrowne and the citie of Athens it selfe was destroyed vnto the verie ground by Lysander After Lysander had destroyed Athens Antipater king of Macedonia at the battell at Cranon which was the vtter destruction of the Greekes the rather for that Philip king of Macedonia before had giuen a great ouerthrowe to the Greekes in the battell at Cheronea by the meanes of Demosthenes who would neuer haue the Greekes to yeeld neither to Philip nor to his sonne Alexander the great and though Alexander after his father thought to haue made a full conquest of all Greece and began with Thaebes tooke the citie and rased it to the ground slew sixe thousand Thaebans solde thirtie thousand slaues and spared none but such as were friends and kinsmen to Pindarus the Poet whom Alexander loued no lesse then Augustus loued Arius the Philosopher for whose sake he spared the whole streete in Alexandria where Arius dwelt The miserie of the Thaebans by Alexander brought downe made the Phoceans the Plataeans the Athenians and all Greece to quake for feare of Alexander hee spared Priests and religious people and such as were kin to any of the Macedonian Lords and this did Alexander onely to terrifie Greece and to bring them in subiection without further warre so that the victory of Antipater at the battell of Cranon after that Philip and his sonne Alexander had brought Greece so lowe brake quite the backe of Greece for Antipater so tirannized ouer the Grecians that he spared none especially the Orators by whose meanes onely he knew Greece so long resisted kings Yet neither Philip king of Macedonia with his battell at Cheronea nor Alexander the great with his victory ouer Thaebes neither Antipaters victory at Cranon harmed Greece so much as their ciuill warres which is the ouerthrowe of all Common-wealths and the decay of all states whereof the example you may read Octauius Augustus after he had vanquished Mar. Antonius in their ciuill warres in a battell by sea at Actium from whence Antonius fled into Egipt after Cleopatra where Antonius and Cleopatra ryoting in Alexandria feasting and dauncing for fewe dayes vntill Antonius hearing that Augustus followed him as hee followed Cleopatra dispairing to haue any longer peace with Octauius slew himselfe whom Cleopatra buried and after in short time slew her selfe ouer whom triumphed Ostauius carrying her picture from Egipt in his triumph into Rome as Iu. Caesar his vncle in his ciuil warres betweene him and Pompey carried the pictures of Cato Petronius and others in his triumphes from Affrike vnto Rome at what time the greatest and most famous library of the world was burned which Pio. Philadelphus had prepared and gathered together in Alexandria in Egipt to the number of foure hundred thousand volumes at what time Philadelphus sent to Ierusalem to the high Priest Eleazarus for the Hebrew Bible and for seuentie two learned men to translate it out of the Hebrew into the Greeke tongue which were all burned and destroyed as well in the ciuill warres betweene Iulius Caesar Pampey as in the ciuill warres betweene Mar. Antonius and Augustus Caesar. The like library of Pisistratus in Athens was destroyed by Sylla
the Athenians were for Agesilaus tooke another course thē Themistocles did when he wanted money he went to the confines of Persia to spoile and to plague the Persians for the Persians euer feared the greatnesse of Agesilaus and yet was he but a litle lame man of stature that hee was satisfied with golde and siluer to returne to his countrey that Agesilaus would often iest and say that thirtie thousand Archers did driue him out of Asia which was the Persian coine that was stampt with the print of an Archer with these Archers the Persians caused oftentimes Agesilaus to returne frō Persia into Greece againe The like iest did Gilippus seruant he told the Ephories of Sparta that his maister Gilippus had vnder the roofe of his house more Owles then all Athens for the coine of Athens was stampt with the print of an Owle as the Persians was with the print of an Archer for Gilippus had taken from his maister Lysander much money and hidden them vnder the shield of his house and so by his seruant was in a iest betraied Thus leauing Agesilaus with his Archers and Gilippus seruant with his Owles I will returne to Themistocles to whom Marcellus shall be compared in celeritie of whom Hannibal said that Marcellus could not be quiet neither with good fortune nor bad neither victor nor conuicted Scypio Affrican with such celeritie after he had conquered Hannibal at the battell at Zama soone subdued Carthage Pau. Aemilius with great celeritie subuerted the whole Empire of Macedonia and brought their king Persius and Gentius king of the Illyrians both prisoners vnto Rome in his tryumphe Pompey the great vsed such celeritie that within fortie daies he vanquished all the Pyrates who had a thousand ships on the seas and taken aboue foure hundred townes they robd and spoyld all marchant venturers rifled and destroyed all the Ilands and townes vpon the sea coast and destroyed many Temples they feared no force neither weighed for kings nor subiects and grew so strong that they ruled both land sea without lawe But Pompey had such victory ouer them that after the great slaughter in the battell at the citie Coracesium he tooke twentie thousand persons prisoners and thus in lesse then three moneths Pompey ended and quite vanquished the Pyrates Caesar in all his warres excelled all men in expedition and celeritie in the which he had such wonderfull good successe against Pompey in Pharsalia against his sonne in Affrica against Affranius in Hispaine against Cato in Vtica with such expedition that he became as you read being one that was denied to be Consul to be Perpetuus Dictator and the first Emperour of Rome Clau. Nero the Consul considering that Italy was plagued by Hannibal in Lucania and by Asdrubal his brother in Vmbria made such secret great hast that before Hannibal knew he went out of his campe in Lucania he was in Vmbria and before Asdrubal knew he was in Vmbria he was with his fellow Consul at the battell of Metaurus where Asdrubal was slaine his armie ouerthrowne and his head sent to his brother Hanibal in Lucania so that by one Romane stratagem the two great Romane enemies Hanibal and Asdrubal were ouerthrowne the one slaine at the Riuer Metaurus and the other driuen from Italy into Affrike Celeritie vpon deliberation is most necessarie at all times therefore the chiefe guard about Romulus person were called Celeres for their quicknesse and celeritie in executing Romulus commaundement Dauid king of Iudah had such resolute men called Cerethites about his person readie with such celeritie to effect any thing the king would commaund them that when they heard the king longing for some water out of the well of Bethelem they presently ventured theyr liues through the campe of the enemies and brought water to the king from Bethelem before the king missed them but Dauid sacrificed the water vnto the Lord and would not drinke of it because his men offered theyr liues for it Caleb vsed such expedition after he had viewed and trauelled all the land of Canaan that he returned within fortie dayes to the Hebrew campe with a full resolution perswading Ioshua to take the warres in hand Ehud one of the Iudges of Israel who was wont to say to his souldiers follow mee went fully resolued to Eglon king of Moab an enemie of the Lord and therefore slew him in his chamber Many souldiers of the Lord are resolued through faith to effect many things with celeritie and zeale so Phineas slew Zimri the Israelite Cosbi a Lords daughter of the Madianites for that they offended the Lord in the campe and therfore Phineas thrust them through both with his speare Iehu though a wicked man yet much commended for his resolute zeale for that he ouerthrew Achabs house slew Baals prophets and destroyed Baals temple and his aultars The great kings of the world are resolued to hazard theyr liues to winne fame and glory eyther by parasites or flatterers moued therevnto or by oracles of theyr Idols or by visions and dreames especially as Astiages king of the Meades dreamed that his daughter Mandanes which was Cyrus mother made water that ouerflowed all Asia Astiages dreamed the second time that a vine grew out of his daughters wombe whose braunches couered all Asia therefore hee called all his wise men and soothsayers of his kingdome together to interpret him these two dreames who tolde him that his daughter should haue a sonne that should bee such a king that hee should rule ouer all Asia which made Cyrus so ambitious and proud that he could not be content with all the kingdomes of Asia but must goe to be slaine in Scythia The like dreame sawe Xerxes before his voyage in to Greece that in his dreame hee thought hee sawe an Oliue tree crowned whose boughes and braunches couered the whole earth and withall suddenly vanished away The same Author writeth that Iulius Caesar dreamed that he lay with his mother and by these meanes he was flattered by his soothsayers that hee should subdue the whole earth Euen so Hamilcar Generall of the Carthagineans thought hee heard in his sleepe a voyce that hee should the next night suppe in Syracusa but he was so glad of his speech that he was deceiued of his hope and yet he supt in Syracusa not as a conqueror but as a prisoner but was deceiued as Xerxes was by the hope of his crowned Oliue or as Caesar was by his mother Hannibal after the taking of Saguntum dreamed that Iupiter should call him into councell with the goddes where hee was commaunded to take warres in hand against the Romanes there hee seemed that Iupiter had giuen him a captaine to goe before him euen from the councell house one of the company of the gods and looking behinde him hee thought he sawe a terrible monstrous Serpent which Hannibal in his sleepe asked Iupiter what monster that was
which was answered and said to be Vastitatem Italicae the spoile and destruction of Italy Homer and Virgil both faigned that all kinde of dreams passe through two sundry gates the true dream through the hornie gate the false dreame through the Iuorie gate Yet we reade in the sacred scripture that Ioseph was exalted by expounding Pharaos dreame in Egipt and so was Daniel by expounding Nabuchodonozers dreame in Persia. But Ioseph while yet he was amongst his brethren a young boy dreamed and tolde his bretheren saying we were making sheaues in the field and loe my sheffe arose and stood vpright and your sheaues stood round about and made obeysance to my sheffe Then saide his brethren shalt thou be our king or shalt thou raigne ouer vs They hated him before for that his father loued him more thē they and for his dreame they hated him the more And Ioseph told his father and his brethren a second dreame saying I sawe the Sunne the Moone and the eleuen starres make obeysance to me and his father rebuked him saying shall I thy mother and thy bretheren come and fall before thee but yet his father noted his dreame but his brethren tooke such indignation against him that they solde Ioseph to an Arabian marchant who solde him againe into Egipt where he came by expounding of Pharaos dreame of the seuen leane kine that did eate the seuen fatte kine and yet were but leane to be the second person and the onely ruler of Egipt vnder Pharao Thither came his brethren constrained by a dearth in Canaan to buy corne in Egipt and after Ioseph being knowne his father Iacob and all his houshold came These were the Sunne the Moone and eleuen Starres heere his bretheren performed the dreame honouring Ioseph vpon their knees as all Egipt did In like manner Daniel being a captiue of Nabuchodonozers by expounding his dreame and his sonne Balthazers after him was commaunded to bee cloathed with purple and to put a chaine of golde about his necke and by proclamation made ruler ouer the third part of the kingdome of Persia and to be one of the three Princes that ruled the kingdome of Persia of a hundred seuen and twentie Prouinces vnder King Darius No doubt Ioseph was instructed by an Angell to expound the dreame of Pharao and Daniel to expound the dreame of Nabuchodonozer Angels did instruct men minister vnto men rebuke sinners Angels comforted the afflicted and foretold things an Angell appeared to Zachary who told him that his wife should bring forth a sonne and his name should be Iohn So an Angell appeared to the virgin Mary and said shee should haue a sonne and his name shal be Iesus Abraham in the feast which he made to the Angels vnder the oake of Mambre was promised hee should haue a sonne by Sarah and was named by the Angels Isaac laughing for that his mother laughed hearing she should haue a childe in her olde age being foure score and tenne So was also Ismael Solomon and Iosias named long before they were borne The olde Hebrewes tooke example for that the name of Abram was chaunged by the Lord and named Abraham which signified the father of many nations Iacob likewise was named of the Angell with whom hee wrestled Israel the prince of God So the Hebrewes gaue such significant names of things to come vpon their children that when they remembred the names of theyr children they should also remember the thing signified by the name as Solomon was named Iedidia beloued of God Iosias an oblation to the Lord and so Ismael the son of Abraham by Agar Absolon the sonne of Dauid and others more named of the Hebrewes in like manner Women onely gaue names to their children among the Hebrewes as Leah and Rachel Iacobs wiues named the twelue sonnes of Iacob So Sampson was named of his mother and so also was Samuel named by his mother for the Hebrew women gaue such names to their children as should containe something signified by the name not following the fathers name but one onely name which the Hebrew women gaue to their children The Romanes had three or foure names commonly contrary to the Hebrewes and besides three or foure names which were proper vnto them they would purchase as many names as they could get as Pub. Cornel. Scypio had the fourth name Affricanuss for his conquest ouer Affricke and his brother Lu. Scypio was surnamed Asiaticus for the fourth name because hee subdued Asia Lu. Q. Metellus surnamed Numidicus by his victories in Numidia Mummius for his victories in Achaia surnamed Achaicus So the Romanes being glorious people full of their victories would possesse as many names as they could haue and being not contented with so many names they would haue the moneths of the yeare to be named after their names So Iu. Caesar called the moneth Quintilis after his owne name Iuly Augustus the second Emperour called the moneth Sextilis after his name August So other Emperours imitating them as Nero would haue the moneth of Aprill after his name Neronius and Domitianus would haue October named Domitianus Likewise Claudius wold haue May called after his name Claudius and Germanicus would haue September named Germanicus after his name So the Grecians began to honor Demetrius in like sort in so much they decreed that the month Manichion which is Ianuary shal be called Dēmetrion and their feast Dionisia which was dedicated to Bacchus should be called Demetria after Demetrius name and that Demetrius and his father king Antigonus should haue their pictures set vp carried in the sacred banner of Peplon where none but the picture of Iupiter and Minerua were set and placed Clearchus the tyrant would be called sonne vnto Iupiter as well as Alexander the great so king Antigonus because hee might be called Bacchus hee resembled him outward in his habite ware a Diademe on his head made of Iuie like Bacchus and for his scepter bare in his hand Thyrsus The Greekes also most commonly had but one name vnlesse he had a name added vnto it either by some vertue or vice noted in him as Pericles for his eloquence and sweete perswasion was surnamed Olympius Aristides for his integritie surnamed the iust Antigonus for his liberalitie was surnamed Doson and yet reported in Plutarch that hee promised any thing and performed nothing So likewise the Greekes named those that had any blemish on their bodies as Antiochus surnamed Griphos for his great belly Another Antigonus surnamed Gonatos for that hee had great knees Demetrius surnamed Polycrates for his inuention and skill of warlike engines as Elepolis thereby as famous welnigh as Archimedes otherwise the Grecians vsed but one name And although Agesilaus was a great souldier for skil and knowledge in warre so famous that hee was sent from Egipt vnto Greece for to be their Generall and also among the Persians so feared and among the Grecians so esteemed and yet
hee was called but Agesilaus without any surname of addition among the Grecians neither other great captaines of Greece as Milciades Themistocles Cymon and others had no such surnames by their victories as the Romanes had The Hebrues also had but proper names some had their fathers name added vnto it so our Sauiour in the Gospell named Peter Simon the sonne of Ionas so was it oftentimes spoken to Esay the Prophet Esay thou sonne of Amos so all the Iewish Rabines were named after their fathers names as Iuda the sonne of Dama Simeon the sonne of Gamaliel Ismael the sonne of Elizei but among the old Hebrewes as you heard they were so named as pleased the mothers The Egiptians vsed also Greeke additions to their names as Pto. surnamed Euergetes for his good deeds and benefites to his countrey Pto. surnamed Ceraunos that is to say lightning for his quicke dispatch Pto. surnamed Aetos an Eagle for his swiftnesse and celeritie and so Philadelphus and other kings and great men of Egipt added to their own proper names Greek surnames The surnames of the last kings of Egipt began from a souldiers name who grew so great among the Egiptians that he strengthened and established the countrey being subdued and ouerthrowne before by the Persians that the Alexandrians so hououred him after his death that all his successors the kings of Egipt were called after his name Ptholomei for as all the first kings of Egipt were called Pharaones so were the last kings of Egipt called Ptolomei So Arsaces a poore Scythian borne a great souldier with a great armie of poore banished men of the Parthians ouerthrew king Zaleucus and restored the Parthians to their libertie for the which benefites he was made king and all the kings his successors were named Arsaces after his name These men seeke name and fame on earth where they haue no citie nor place permanent but houses made of clay and forget to builde immortalitie and eternitie in heauen they make sumptuous and durable tombes for their bodies like the Egiptians which make pyramides for their dead bodies to dwel for euer Some againe like the Agrigentines which build them such strōg houses as though they shuld liue alwaies and yet eate drinke as though they should die the next day But we leaue these builders that build towers in the aire with Nimrod and Iuorie houses with Achab and would lose immortalitie with Vlisses for Ithaca his country and come to Paul who would be losed from the bodie and be with Christ and with Ioshua to fixe our triumphes and tropheys in Heauen with the euerlasting Ioshua Christ Iesus the sonne of God who purchased vnto vs eternall habitations and went in bodie before vs to prepare for vs a dwelling place to him therefore with the father and the holy Ghost be all honor glory and praise for euer FINIS A Table containing a briefe summe of the whole Booke Matters contained in the first Booke THirtie nine kings ouerthrown by Moses Ioshua page 2 Of diuers combats pa. 3 Of the vow of Cherim pa. Ead. Adam rescued by the seed of the woman pa. 5 Elizeus leadeth the army of Benhadad blinde pa. 6 They that mourned in Ierusalem were marked with the letter Tau Ead. Of diuers and seuerall markes pa. 7 The time that barbours were first seene in Rome pa. 9. Abraham the first man marked pa. Ead. Abrahaham feared Abimelech and Pharao for his wife pa. 10 Abraham read Astronomie in Egipt pa. Ead. Abraham rescued the fiue kings and Lot his nephewe pa. 11 The victory and stratagem of Gedeon ouer the Madianites pa 12 Dauids victory at Bezor in rescuing his two wiues pa. Ead. Three Angels feasted at Mambre with Abraham pa. 13. Foure named before they were borne pa. Ead. The Ismaelites would not bee called Agareni of Agar but Sarazeni of Sarah pa. 14. The Tower of Babell builded by Nimrod pa. 15 Ninus the first Monarch pa. ead Alexanders voyage to India pa. Ead. Zoroastes laughed at his birth pa. 16. The first Idolatry by Ninus pa. ead Baall the first Idoll pa. 17 The male children of the Hebrews throwne to Nilus pa. 18 The tyrannie of Pharao pa. Ead. A comparison betweene the Egiptians and the Romanes pa. 19 The armies of the Lord in Egipt vnder Moses pa. Ead. The first plague of Egipt pa. 20 The comparison of the first plague with the first persecution vnder Nero pa. 21 Nero slew himselfe pa. 22. The second miracle and triumph of Moses in Egipt pa 23 The blasphemy of Nicanor punished pa. Ead. Domitianus Image set vp in the Temple at Ierusalem pa. 24 Domitianus slain in his owne house by his seruants pa. 25 Iamnes and Iambres Phoraos soothsayers pa. ead The third persecution vnder Traiane pa. 26 Philo was not heard of Nero. pa. ead The fourth army of the Lord in Egipt was swarmes of flyes pa. 27 The fighting of the Iewes with wild beasts pa. 28 The yeelding of tyrants pa. 29 Pharao and Esau compared pa. 30 Septimus and Antiochus murthered pa. 31 The tyrannie of Antiochus against the Iewes pa. ead Antiochus cōfessed the great wrong he did to the Iewes at Ierusalem pa. 32 The fable of Manetho and others concerning Moses whom he named Osarphis pa. 33 The persecution of the seuen bretheren pa. 34 The seuenth plague of Egipt 35 The comparison of the seuenth persecution vnder Decius with the seuenth plague pa. 36 Great plagues and sicknesses vpon the Romanes pa. 37 Hipocrisie of Pharao pa. ead Pericles made a lawe in Athens against straungers pa. 38 The eight persecution vnder Valerianus pa. ead Valerianus the Emperor of Rome vsed as a blocke by Sapor king of Persia pa. 39 The ninth plague of Egipt pa. 40 The dissimulation of Pharao pa. ead The ninth persecution vnder Aurelianus pa. ead Christ denied among the Romanes pa. 41 A golden target sent by the Senators pa ead The euill end of cruell Emperors pa. ead The tenth plague of Egipt pa. 42 The tenth persecution vnder Dioclesian pa. ead When persecution ended heresie began pa. 43 Arius with diuers crewes of heretiques pa. ead The foure generall Councels pa. 44 The marching of Pharao after the Hebrewes pa. 45 The drowning of Pharao in the red sea pa. ead Appians impudent lies against Moses pa. 46 The education of Moses in Egipt pa. 47 Moses chosen captaine for Pharao pa. ead Moses death sought by the Priests of Egipt pa. ead The victories of Moses in Aethiopia pa. 48 The marriage of Moses to Tharbis the king of Aethiope his daughter pa. ead Appians lyes pa. 49 Philo his speech of the Hebrewes pa. 50 The law of Armes set downe by the Lord to Moses pa. 51 The stratagems of Archidamus Epaminondas and Pericles pa. 52 Of the lawe of Armes pa. 53 Of the Priests Mantes in Athens c. pa. 54 The remoouing of the Arke pa. ead The numbring and mustering of the Hebrew army by Moses pa. 55 The Hebrewes
Tarentum against Pirrhus vsed the like stratagem shewing a bloudy sword in his hand saying to his souldiers that it was the bloud of Pirrhus whom he slew with his owne hand thereby to moue the souldiers to greater courage to fight more manfully Souldiers ought not to be terrified with the multitude of enemies with slaughters of their Armies wherby Cities Townes and Countries reuolt to the enemies as at the battell at Canne the report of Varro the Consul of the ouerthrow of the Romanes caused all the citie of Capua to reuolt to Haniball Againe the report in Praeneste of the ouerthrowe of Sylla by Telesinus at the battell of Antemna and of the marching of Telesinus towards Rome with all his whole Army it so affrighted Offella one of Syllas Colonels that he at that time besieging Praeneste thought to raise his siege hearing such hard newes of Sylla the Generall Skilfull Generalls and wise Captaines vsed euer to couer and conceale the multitude of enemies as Milciades Themistocles and other Greeke captaines kept the innumerable multitude of the Persian Armies secret from the souldiers So did Mardonius conceale from Xerxes the great slaughter of the Persians in Greece The Romanes being besieged by the Gaules many of the chiefe Romanes to the number of a thousand fled into their Capitoll The Gaules hauing possessed the Cittie of Rome for seuen moneths expecting the yeelding of the Capitoll the Romanes also within the Capitoll hauing welnigh consumed their victuals vsed this stratagem to throwe loaues of bread in euery place out of the Capitoll in such abundance though at that time they wanted prouision of bread that the Gaules were amazed suspecting they had prouision inough to hold out that they presently fell to composition with the Romanes The Thracians beeing besieged on such a straight hill where their enemies could haue no accesse to come vnto them and readie to die for famine vsed this stratagem to feed certaine beasts with wheate and cheese and to let the beasts goe downe towards their enemies Camp which being takē of the enemies and killed they found wheate and cheese in the bowels of the beastes thinking thereby that the Thracians had bin well victualled and prouided remoued their siege Clearchus the Lacedemonian vnderstanding that the Thracians had caried sufficient prouision of victuals for themselues vp to the mountaines to their Campe the Thracians sent their Embassadors still expecting when Clearchus for want of victuals would remoue his siege Clearchus knowing that the Thracian Embassadors were comming vsed this stratagem commaunded one of the captiues to bee slaine to bee deuided in peeces and to be distributed betweene him and other tenne of his captains in his pauiliō in the very sight of the Thracian Embassadors the sight whereof made the Thracians so astonished and thereby to yeeld thinking that they that could feed on such foode might continue too long for the Thracians to endure it But the Sonne of God gaue himselfe to be slaine for his souldiers to bee their spirituall foode to feed them both in body and soule to wearie Satan which still continueth his siege against Ierusalem I shall haue occasion to write of more stratagems hereafter and therefore I returne to the battels of the Hebrewes against the Canaanites CHAP. XIII Of the great victorie had ouer fiue Kings in the plaine of Moab by Ioshua Of their vnthankfulnesse afterward disobedience and of their marshall punishment therefore A Great battell was fought in the plaine of Moab commaunded by the Lord vnto Moses where fiue Kings of the Madianites were slaine their names you may read in the margeant all their villages and citties burnt with fire all their people slaine with the sword the Hebrewes tooke all the spoile and all the pray both of men and beasts and Moses was angry with the Captains of the host for sparing the women as Samuel was with king Saul for sparing Agag king of the Amalekites and Elizeus with Achab for sparing Benhadad and caused all women that had knowne men carnally to be slaine with the sword and to saue those that were virgins that knew no man which were two and thirtie thousand whereby it appeared that innumerable was the slaughter of men women and children in this battell where two and thirtie thousand virgins were found and reserued to liue whereby also the spoyle and pray was very rich in this battell to the Hebrewes In this battell was not one slaine of Ioshuas souldiers All the Captains and Colonels of the Army came before Moses saying thy seruants haue taken the number of all the men of warre which are vnder our authoritie and there lacketh not a man of vs. This was a stratagem of Ierusalem in the battels of the Lord that not one man died of the army in so great a victory The Lacedemonians reioyced much that Archidamus had obtained a great victorie got great spoile and slew many of his enemies without the loosing of one of his souldiers and therfore called it Bellumsine lachrimis Yet the Hebrewes for their three former victories at Riphidim at Horma and in the plaine of Moab were vnthankfull vnto the Lord and murmured and rebelled against Moses and Aaron and after against Ioshua Caleb as at Taberah where they so murmured against Moses their Generall that the Lord was so displeased with them that he executed martiall lawes vpon them for the fire of the lande burnt them and consumed the vtmost part of theyr Army because of their disobedience Moses sister Myria for that she spake against the Generall and began to rebel in the campe martiall laws were executed vpon her she was not spared for that she was Moses sister nor Moses himselfe when he had offended the Lord at the water of Meribah shee was made leaprous and shut out of the host seuen dayes vntill shee had due punishment for her seditious mutinie and prayers made by Moses before she was receiued into the host Againe Coreh Dathan and Abiron conspired and rebelled against their Generall with two hundred and fiftie souldiers that were famous in the Congregation and men of renowme but the lawe of armes was most terribly executed the ground claue asunder vnderneath them and opened her mouth and swalowed them aliue with all their treasures and wealth and all their families Againe they murmured against Ioshua and Caleb that the whole multitude would haue stoned Ioshua Caleb so seuere was the Lord against his owne people the Hebrewes for their disobedience and murmuring that he vsed martiall lawes vpon them that all they that came out of Egipt sixe hundred thousand for their disobedience against the Lorde and rebellious mutinies from time to time from place to place at Horeb at Taberah at Massa at Riphidim at Meribah died in the wildernesse for the Lord accepteth obedience more then sacrifice And therefore Noah for that he obeyed the Lord in