Chebar
DR. JOHN KITTO.—This is doubtless the same river that still bears the name of Khabur—being the same Oriental name, differently represented in European orthography. It is the only stream of note that enters the Euphrates, which it does from Mesopotamia.—Pict. Bib., In loco.
Inscribed Tiles
Ezek. 4:11Thou also, son of man, take thee a tile, and lay it before thee, and pourtray upon it the city, even Jerusalem: (Ezekiel 4:1).—Thou also, son of man, take thee a tile, and lay it before thee, and portray upon it the city, even Jerusalem.
DR. JOHN KITTO.—This is a striking reference to the Chaldean usage of writing and portraying by indented figures upon broad and thin bricks (or tiles). Great numbers of such bricks charged with inscriptions in the arrow-headed characters, and with figures of animals and other objects, are found among the ruins of Babylon, and other ancient sites in Chaldea. The bricks applied to this use are of fine clay, much hardened in the fire (after the inscriptions had been formed). They are of different sizes, but very commonly a foot square, by three inches in thickness.-Pict. Bib., in loco; See also Layard's Nineveh and Babylon, passim.
PLINY. —Epigenes, a writer of very great authority, informs us that the Babylonians have a series of observations on the stars for a period of 720,000 years, inscribed on baked bricks.—Hist. Nat., lib. vii., c. 57.
Battering Ram
PLINY.—The battering horse, which is at present styled "The Ram," was invented by Epeus, at Troy.—Hist. Nat., lib. vii., c. 57.
Haunts of Idolatry
PLINY.—The robur is selected by the Druids to form whole groves; and they perform none of their religious rites without employing branches of it. It is probable the priests themselves receive their name from the Greek name of that tree. —Hist. Nat., lib. xvi., 95.
Idolatrous Figures
DR. JOHN KITTO.—Here begins the description of the idolatries which the Hebrews borrowed from their neighbors. This first was unquestionably taken From the Egyptians. How exactly it describes the inner chambers and sanctuaries of the Egyptian temples, the tombs, and mystic cells, must be obvious to anyone who has read the various descriptions, and seen the representations which modern travelers have supplied. The walls were covered with representations, sculptured or painted in vivid colors, of sacred animals, and of gods represented in human forms, and under various circumstances, or in various monstrous combinations of the animal and human forms.—Pict. Bib., In loco.
Zedekiah
DR. JOHN KITTO.—The prophet Jeremiah foretold of Zedekiah that his eyes should behold the eyes of the king of Babylon; and here Ezekiel predicts that, he should not see Babylon though he should die there. We are informed by Josephus, that the king, thinking these prophecies contradicted each other, gave no credit to either. But both proved true; for, being taken captive and carried to Riblah, he there saw Nebuchadnezzar, and then his eyes were put out, and he was sent to Babylon, where he remained for the rest of his life; so that he saw not that city, though he died in it.—Pict. Bib., In loco.
All Souls God ' S
PLATO.—The gods take care of us, and we men are one of their possessions. It is God who takes care of us, and we are his property.—Phœd., c. 6, 7.
Smiting the Thigh
HOMER.—With shame repulsed, with grief and fury driven, He smote his thigh, and thus upbraided heaven.—Il., XII., 162.
XENOPHON.—Cyrus, on learning of the death of Abradatus, smote himself upon his thigh.—Cyrop., VII., 3.
PLUTARCH.—When Fabius Maximus saw the army of the Minucius surrounded and broken by Hannibal, he smote upon his thigh.—Fab. Max., c. 12.
Divination
DR. JOHN KITTO.—Belomancy, or divination by arrows, was a practice widely diffused among the ancients.—Pict. Bib.
D'HERBELOT.—On all occasions the Arabs consulted futurity by arrows.—See under the word Acdah.
REV. F. W. FARRAR, M. A.—Wooden images were consulted as Idols, from which the excited worshippers fancied that they received oracular responses.—Smith's Dict. of Bible, p. 608.
LIVY.—The Roman consuls before they led out their forces to the field, performed sacrifices. We are told that the haruspex showed to Decius that the head of the liver was wounded on the side which respected himself; in other respects the victim was acceptable to the gods.—Liv., lib. viii., c. 9.
DIODORUS SICULUS.—Among the Gauls there are prophets who foretell future events by viewing the entrails of the sacrifices; and of these soothsayers all the people generally are very observant. —Diod. Sic., V., 2.
Metallurgy
Ezek. 22:2020As they gather silver, and brass, and iron, and lead, and tin, into the midst of the furnace, to blow the fire upon it, to melt it; so will I gather you in mine anger and in my fury, and I will leave you there, and melt you. (Ezekiel 22:20).—As they gather silver, and brass, and iron, and lead, and tin, into the midst of the furnace, to blow the fire upon it, to melt it; so will I gather you in mine anger and in my fury, and I will leave you there, and melt you.
WILLIAM ALDIS WRIGHT, M. A.—In modern metallurgy lead is employed for the purpose of purifying silver from other mineral products. The alloy is mixed with lead, exposed to fusion upon an, earthen vessel, and submitted to a blast of air. By this means the dross is consuMed. This process is called the cupelling operation, with which the description in Ezekiel (22:20) accurately coincides. —Smith' s Dict. of Bible, p. 1619.
Wall Pictures
DIODORUS SICULUS.—Semiramis built two palaces on the Euphrates. One of these was surrounded by three walls, on the innermost of which were represented the shapes of all sorts of living creatures, drawn with great art, in various colors. —Diod. Sic., II., 1.
VIRGIL.—Great Pan arrived, and we behold him too, His cheeks and temples of vermilion hue.—Ecl., X., 26.
PLINY.—It was the custom upon festivals to color the face of the statue of Jupiter with red lead, as well as the bodies of triumphant generals. It was in this guise that Camillus celebrated his triumph.—Hist. Nat., XXXIII., 36.
PAUSANIAS.—Of the images of Bacchus, at Corinth, the faces were colored with red paint.— Corinth, p. 115.
War Chariots
Ezek. 23:23, 2423The Babylonians, and all the Chaldeans, Pekod, and Shoa, and Koa, and all the Assyrians with them: all of them desirable young men, captains and rulers, great lords and renowned, all of them riding upon horses. 24And they shall come against thee with chariots, wagons, and wheels, and with an assembly of people, which shall set against thee buckler and shield and helmet round about: and I will set judgment before them, and they shall judge thee according to their judgments. (Ezekiel 23:23‑24).—The Babylonians and all the Chaldeans, Pekod, and Shoa and Koa, and all the Assyrians with them,... shall come against thee with chariots, wagons, and wheels, and with an assembly of people.
HON. AUSTEN H. LAYARD, M. P.—The Elamites, we find from the bas-reliefs, used even in war, besides chariots, a kind of cart drawn by mules, and consisting of a flat stage raised upon lofty wheels, which had as many as twelve, and even sixteen spokes. The largest of these cars could hold five or six persons, and were adorned with a fringed or embroidered cloth. The smallest, it would appear, contained only two, the warrior and the charioteer, who sat on a kind of raised seat. Such carts are probably alluded to by the prophet Ezekiel, when he speaks of “the chariots, wagons, and wheels," belonging to “the Babylonians and all the Chaldeans, Pekod, and Shoa, and Koa, and all the Assyrians," who should come up against Jerusalem.—Nineveh and Babylon, p. 383.
Cutting off the Nose
DR. ADAM CLARKE.—The cutting off of the nose was a frequent punishment among the Persians and Chaldeans, as ancient authors tell. Adulteries were punished in this way, and to this Martial refers,—" Who has counseled thee, to cut off the adulterer's nose." Women were thus treated in Egypt.— Note, In loco.
STRABO.—Rhinocolura is so called from the colonists whose noses had been mutilated. Some Ethiopians invaded Egypt, and instead of putting the malefactors to death, having cut off their noses, they settled them at Rhinocolura, supposing that they would not venture to return to their own country, on account of the disgraceful state of their faces.—Strab., XVI., 2.
Sacrificing Children
PLATO.—With us (Athenians) it is not lawful to sacrifice human beings, for it is an unholy act; but the Carthaginians sacrifice them, as being a holy and lawful thing with them; so that some of them sacrifice even their own sons to Kronos.—Min., c. 5.
LUCIAN—Some of the Galli sacrifice their children.—De Dea Syr., c. 58.
SILIUS ITALICUS.—It was the custom in that state which Dido founded to propitiate the gods, and, dreadful to be told, to sacrifice their little children upon the fiery altars.—Sil. Ital., IV., 767.
Ammon
Ezek. 25:4, 54Behold, therefore I will deliver thee to the men of the east for a possession, and they shall set their palaces in thee, and make their dwellings in thee: they shall eat thy fruit, and they shall drink thy milk. 5And I will make Rabbah a stable for camels, and the Ammonites a couchingplace for flocks: and ye shall know that I am the Lord. (Ezekiel 25:4‑5).—Behold, therefore, I will deliver thee to the men of the east for a possession, and they shall set their palaces in thee, and make their dwellings in thee: they shall eat thy fruit, and they shall drink thy milk. And I will make Rabbah a stable for camels, and the Ammonites a couching place for flocks.
BUCKINGHAM.—Among the ruins of Ammon, we came to an open square court, with arched recesses on each side, the sides nearly facing the cardinal points. The recesses in the northern and southern walls were originally open passages, and had arched door-ways facing each other; but the first of these was found wholly closed up, and the last was partially filled up, leaving only a narrow passage, just sufficient for the entrance of one man, and of the goats, which the Arab keepers drive in here occasionally for shelter during the night.... Close by the ruins of Ammon, I laid me down among flocks of sheep and goats, but was prevented nearly the whole night from sleeping by the bleating of flocks.—Travels Among the Arab Tribes, p. 72, 73.
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM, LL. D., F. R. S.—As at Heshban, so at Amman, the ruins, magnificent and extensive though they be, reveal, if we except the walls of the citadel, nothing of Rabbah. It is only the Roman Philadelphia that has left its story in its stones, and nowhere else have I seen any sculpture more elaborate or delicate. “Rabbah of the Ammonites shall be a desolate heap." It has been "delivered into the hands of brutish men, and skilful to destroy." At this season the flocks and herds were all on the surrounding wolds, and the spring was too far advanced to drive them to seek shelter at night. When I looked out about midnight, the gaunt ruins were dimly reflected by the glimmering watch-fires which flickered round three sides of the camp, and the starlight just revealed the sleeping forms, grouped under their spears by their picketed horses, or crouching like little heaps of clothing round the embers. All was silent, save the occasional snorting of a horse, the tinkling of the mule-bells, and the ripple of the stream. “I will deliver thee to the men of the East for a possession, and they shall set their palaces in thee, and make their dwellings in thee: they shall eat thy fruit, and they shall drink thy milk. And I will make Rabbah a stable for camels, and the Ammonites a couching place for flocks." What pen, unguided by the foreknowledge of Omniscience, indicted that? I asked myself, as I closed the book and extinguished the light.—The Land of Israel, p. 555.
DR. ALEXANDER KEITH.—While the Jews, who were long their hereditary enemies, continue as distinct a people as ever, though dispersed among all nations, no trace of the Ammonites remains; none are now designated by their name, nor do any claim descent from them. “They are not remembered among the nations.”—Evid: from Froth., p. 124.
Tyre
BISHOP NEWTON.—Palæ-Tyrus, or Old Tyre, was seated on the continent; New Tyre was built in an island almost over against it (half a mile distant). It is commonly said, that when Old Tyre was closely besieged, and was near falling into the hands of the Chaldeans, then the Tyrians fled from thence, and built New Tyre in the island; but the learned Vitringa hath proved at large from good authorities that New Tyre was founded several ages before, and was the station for ships, and considered as part of Old Tyre. The prophecies, therefore, appertain to both, some expressions being applicable only to the former, and others only to the latter.—XIth. Dissert. on Proph.
Ezek. 26:44And they shall destroy the walls of Tyrus, and break down her towers: I will also scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock. (Ezekiel 26:4).—And they shall destroy the walls of Tyrus, and break down her towers. ARRIAN.-The wall of Tyre was nearly one hundred and fifty feet high, and of breadth proportionate; it was built with vast stones strongly cemented together.—Exped. Alex., lib. ii., c. 21.
Ezek. 26:77For thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I will bring upon Tyrus Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, a king of kings, from the north, with horses, and with chariots, and with horsemen, and companies, and much people. (Ezekiel 26:7).—Behold I will bring upon Tyrus Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, a king of kings.
JOSEPHUS.—On the seventh year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar he began to besiege Tyre.—Cont. Ap., lib. i., c. 21.
PHŒNICIAN RECORDS.—Nebuchodonosor besieged Tyre for thirteen years, in the days of Ithobal, their king.—Ibid.
PROF. GEORGE RAWLINSON, M. A.—Soon after his departure from Syria, Judæa rebelled, and Phœnicia appears about the same time to have thrown off the yoke. Nebuchadnezzar, having called in the aid of Cyaxares, king of Media, led in person the vast army—which, according to Polyhistor, consisted of 10,000 chariots, 120,000 cavalry, and 180,000 infantry—to chastise the rebels. He immediately invested Tyre, the chief of the Phœnician cities. Rawlinson's Herod., Vol. I., p. 414
DIODORUS SICULUS.—Alexander, seeing that it would be a difficult thing to carry on the siege of Tyre, because the city was separated from the continent by an arm of the sea, and was well furnished with provisions, and protected by a powerful navy, demolished Old Tyre, as it was then called, and with the stones and fragments of the buildings formed a mole 200 feet in breadth, extending from the main land to the peninsula.—Diod. Sic., XVII., 4.
ARRIAN.—Alexander laying siege to Tyre, endeavored to connect the city with the continent by a huge bank or rampart. The sea is there shallow near the shore, but as you draw nigh the city it is nearly three fathoms deep. But as there was abundance of stone not far off, and a sufficient quantity of timber and rubbish to fill up the vacant spaces, they found no difficulty in laying the foundations of their rampart.—Exped. Alex., II., 18.
BISHOP NEWTON.—The ruins of Old Tyre contributed much to the taking of the New City; for with the stones and timber and rubbish of the old city Alexander built a bank or causeway front the continent to the island, thereby literally fulfilling the words of the prophet Ezekiel,—" they shall lay thy stones, and thy timber, and thy dust, in the midst of the water."—XIth. Dissert. on Proph.
MAUNDRELL.—This city (Tyre) standing in the sea upon a peninsula, promises at a distance something very magnificent. But when you come to it, you find no similitude of that glory, for which it was so renowned in ancient times, and which the prophet Ezekiel describes. On the north side it has an old Turkish un-garrisoned castle; besides which you see nothing here, but a mere Babel of broken walls, pillars, vaults, etc., there being not so much as one entire house left: its present inhabitants are only a few poor wretches harboring themselves in the vaults, and subsisting chiefly upon fishing, who seem to be preserved in this place by Divine Providence, as a visible argument how God has fulfilled his word concerning Tyre, viz., that "it should be as the top of a rock, a place for fishers to dry their nets on."—Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem, p. 82.
VOLNEY.—Instead of that ancient commerce, so active and so extensive, Tyre is reduced to a miserable village. They live obscurely on the produce of their little ground and a trifling fishery.— Travels, II., 212, 225.
PROF. H. B. 'TRISTRAM, LL. D., F. R. S.—In the burden of Tyre, by Ezekiel, it is said, "I will make thee like the top of a rock; thou shalt be a place to spread nets upon "—a prediction which, in the present ruined and degraded condition of Tyre, has been fulfilled to the very letter. The inhabitants of the wretched village subsist principally b' fishing; their boats are the only craft in the harbor of her whose merchants were princes; and the old wharves and the columns-strewn promontory, whence all the palaces have been long since swept away, are covered with nets, spread out to dry over the ruins.—Nat. Hist. of Bible, p. 288.
DR. ADAM CLARKE. —This is literally true: there is not the smallest vestige of the Ancient Tyre, that which was erected on the main land. Even the ground seems to have been washed away.—Note, In loco.
PROF. J. LESLIE PORTER, A. M.—I have pitched my tent on the site of Ancient Tyre, and searched, but searched in vain, for a single trace of its ruins. Then, but not till then, did I realize the full force and truth of the prophetic denunciation upon it: “Thou shalt be sought for, yet shalt thou never be found again."—Giant Cities of Bashan, p. 19.
DIODORUS SICULUS.—In the meantime the rams battered down a great part of the wall in another place; and now the Macedonians entered through the breach on one side, and Alexander, with his party, passed over the wall on the other; so that the city was now taken. Yet the Tyrians behaved valiantly; and encouraging one another, guarded and blocked up all the narrow passes, and fought with desperation; insomuch that above 7,000 of them were cut to pieces on the spot. The king made all the women and children slaves, and hanged all the young men who survived the battle, to the number of 2,000. So great was the number of captives, that though the greatest part of the inhabitants were transported to Carthage, no less than 13,000 remained behind.—Into so great miseries fell the Tyrians, after they had, with more obstinacy than prudence, endured a siege of seven months.—Diod. Sic., lib. xvii., c. 4.
ARRIAN. —The rest of the survivors, to the number of 30,000, including strangers, were sold as slaves. —Exped. Alex., 1. ii., c. 24.
QUINTUS CURTIUS. —Alexander, when he besieged Tyre, ordered the city to be burnt.—Q. Curt., lib. iv., c. 4.
Egypt
Ezek. 29:33Speak, and say, Thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I am against thee, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great dragon that lieth in the midst of his rivers, which hath said, My river is mine own, and I have made it for myself. (Ezekiel 29:3).—Thus saith the Lord God, Behold I am against thee, Pharaoh, king of Egypt, the great dragon that lieth in the midst of his rivers, which hath said, My river is mine own, and I have made it for myself.
HERODOTUS. —Of the permanence of his authority Apries (Pharaoh-Hophni) is said to have entertained so high an opinion, that he conceived it not to be in the power even of a deity to dethrone him.—Euterpe, c. 169.
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM. —The sucking-fish (Echeneis remora) attaches itself to sharks and other large fish; and the powers of adhesion of which are so great that it is sometimes employed, when secured by a ring, for the purpose of taking turtles, to which it attaches itself, in its endeavors to escape, when both are hauled in together.—Nat. Hist. of Bible, p. 292.
DR. ADAM CLARKE. —The country from Migdol, or Magdolan, which was on the isthmus between the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, was so completely ruined that it might well be called desert; and it is probable that this desolation continued during the whole of the reign of Amasis, which was just forty years.—(See Herod., lib. iii., c. 10.)—Note, In loco.
DR. ADAM CLARKE. —" It shall be a base kingdom,"—that is, it shall continue to be tributary. It is upwards of two thousand years since this prophecy was delivered, and it has been uninterruptedly fulfilling to the present hour. 1. Egypt became tributary to the Babylonians under Amasis. 2. After the ruin of the Babylonish Empire it became subject to the Persians. 3. After the Persians it came into the hands of the Macedonians. 4. After the Macedonians it fell into the hands of the Rom. 5. After the division of the Roman Empire it was subdued by the Saracens. 6. About A. D. 1250, it came into the hands of the Mameluke slaves. 7. Selim, the ninth emperor of the Turks, conquered the Mamelukes, A. D. 1517, and annexed Egypt to the Othman Empire, of which it still continues to be a province, governed by a pacha and twenty-four beys, who are always advanced from servitude to the administration of public affairs. So true is it that Egypt, once so glorious, is “the basest of kingdoms."—Note, In loco.
VOLNEY. —In Egypt the system of oppression is methodical. Everything the traveler sees or hears reminds him he is in the country of slavery and tyranny.... There is no middle class, neither nobility, clergy, merchants, landholders. A universal air of misery, manifest in all the traveler meets, points out to him the rapacity of oppression, and the distrust attendant upon slavery. The profound ignorance of the inhabitants equally prevents them from perceiving the causes of their evils, or applying the necessary remedies. Ignorance, diffused through every class, extends its effects to every species of moral and physical knowledge. Nothing is talked of but intestine troubles, the public misery, pecuniary extortions, bastinadoes and murders. Justice herself puts to death without formality. ("It shall be the basest of kingdoms. ")—Travels, Vol. I., 190-198.
Ezek. 29:1818Son of man, Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon caused his army to serve a great service against Tyrus: every head was made bald, and every shoulder was peeled: yet had he no wages, nor his army, for Tyrus, for the service that he had served against it: (Ezekiel 29:18).—Son of man, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, caused his army to serve a great service against Tyrus; every head was made bald, and every shoulder was peeled: yet had he no wages, nor his army, for Tyrus, for the service that he had served against it.
DR. ADAM CLARKE.—Nebuchadnezzar was thirteen years employed in the siege. (Joseph. Ant., X., ii.) In this siege his soldiers endured great hardships. Being continually on duty, their heads became " bald " by wearing their helmets; and their shoulders bruised and " peeled " by carrying baskets of earth to the fortifications, wood to build towers, etc. " Yet had he no wages, nor his army." The Tyrians, finding it at last impossible to defend the city, put all their wealth aboard their vessels, sailed out of the port, and escaped for Carthage: and thus Nebuchadnezzar lost all the spoil of one of the richest cities in the world.—Note, In loco.
ST. JEROME.—We have read in the histories of the Assyrians, that when the Tyrians saw that the works for carrying on the siege were perfected, and the foundations of the walls were shaken by the battering rams, whatsoever precious things in gold, silver, clothes, and various kinds of furniture the nobility had, they put them on board their ships, and carried to the islands; so that" the city being taken, Nebuchadnezzar found nothing worthy of his labor.—Hieron. in Ezk., c. 29.
DR. JOHN KITTO.—When the siege of Tyre had terminated in such an unprofitable result, Nebuchadnezzar marched his army into Egypt, which was then in a state of such deplorable disorder as promised him an easy conquest, and an ample indemnity for his recent disappointment. What opposition he met with, or what arrangement he made on withdrawing finally from the country, is not certainly known. But it is certain that he ravaged the country from one end to the other, committing much devastation, and slaying great numbers of the people, and that he finally returned with an immense booty, which probably formed no small part of the treasure he expended in his magnificent improvements and great undertakings at Babylon.—(See Univ. Hist., II., 88; Hale' s Anal., II., 454.)—Note in Jerm., c. 43
HERODOTUS.—About the time when Cambyses arrived at Memphis (which is Noph), Apis appeared to the Egyptians. He bade the priests go and fetch the god to him. When the priests returned, bringing Apis with them, Cambyses, like the hare-brained person that he was, drew his dagger and aimed at the belly of the animal, but missed his mark, and stabbed him in the thigh. Then he laughed, and said to the priests: “Oh! blockheads, and think ye that gods become like this, of flesh and blood, and sensible to steel? A fit god indeed for Egyptians, such an one! "... Apis, thus wounded, lay some time pining in the temple. At last he died of his wound, and the priests buried him secretly without the knowledge of Cambyses.
While he still stayed at Memphis, Cambyses, among other wild outrages, opened the ancient sepulchers, and examined the bodies that were buried in them. He likewise went into the temple of Vulcan, and made great sport of the image—for it is a figure resembling that of a pigmy. He went also into the temple of the Cabiri, which it is unlawful for anyone to enter except the priests, and not only made sport of the images, but even burnt them.—Tkalia, c. 29 and 37.
DIODORUS SICULUS.—Ochus (another Persian king), having subdued the Egyptians again after they had revolted, plundered their temples, and caused Apis to be slain, and served up in a banquet to him and his friends.—Diod. Sic., XVI., 51; see also Plut. de Isid. et Osir., § 31.
GIBBON.—A more unjust and absurd constitution cannot be devised than that which condemns the natives of a country to perpetual servitude, under the arbitrary dominion of strangers and slaves. Yet such has been the state of Egypt above five hundred years. The most illustrious sultans of the Baharite and Borgite dynasties were themselves promoted from the Tartar and Circassian bands; and the four-and-twenty beys, or military chiefs, have ever been succeeded, not by their sons, but by their servants. ("And there shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt.")—Decline and Fall of the R. E., Chap. LIX.
VOLNEY.—The Mamelukes, purchased as slaves, and introduced as soldiers, soon usurped the power and elected a leader. If their first establishment was a singular event, their continuance is not less extraordinary. They are replaced by slaves brought from their original country.—Travels, Vol. I., 103-110.
Careless Hearers
SENECA.—The misfortune is, some come only to hear, not to learn; as they attend the theater for pleasure's sake, to delight the ear with some speech, or a sweet tone of voice, or a diverting story exhibited in comedy. Such you will find great part of an audience, who make the philosophical school but a place of idle resort. They come not thither in order to dispossess themselves of any vice, or to receive any law for the better regulation of manners or better conduct of life; 'but to please the ear with the twang of eloquence.—Epist., 108.
Spoils of the Syrians
Ezek. 39:9, 109And they that dwell in the cities of Israel shall go forth, and shall set on fire and burn the weapons, both the shields and the bucklers, the bows and the arrows, and the handstaves, and the spears, and they shall burn them with fire seven years: 10So that they shall take no wood out of the field, neither cut down any out of the forests; for they shall burn the weapons with fire: and they shall spoil those that spoiled them, and rob those that robbed them, saith the Lord God. (Ezekiel 39:9‑10).—And they that dwell in the cities of Israel shall go forth, and shall set on fire and burn the weapons, both the shields and the bucklers, the bows, and the arrows, and the handstaves, and the spears; and they shall burn them with fire for seven years: so that they shall take no wood out of the field, neither cut down any out of the forest.
MARIANA. —The Spaniards, after they had given that signal overthrow to the Saracens, A. D. 1212, found such a vast quantity of lances, javelins, and such like, that they served them for four years for fuel.—History of Spain, lib. xi., c. 24.