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1. But still the affairs of Herod's family were no better, but
perpetually more troublesome. Now this accident happened, which
arose from no decent occasion, but proceeded so far as to bring
great difficulties upon him. There were certain eunuchs which the
king had, and on account of their beauty was very fond of them;
and the care of bringing him drink was intrusted to one of them;
of bringing him his supper, to another; and of putting him to
bed, to the third, who also managed the principal affairs of the
government; and there was one told the king that these eunuchs
were corrupted by Alexander the king's son with great sums of
money. And when they were asked whether Alexander had had
criminal conversation with them, they confessed it, but said they
knew of no further mischief of his against his father; but when
they were more severely tortured, and were in the utmost
extremity, and the tormentors, out of compliance with Antipater,
stretched the rack to the very utmost, they said that Alexander
bare great ill-will and innate hatred to his father; and that he
told them that Herod despaired to live much longer; and that, in
order to cover his great age, he colored his hair black, and
endeavored to conceal what would discover how old he was; but
that if he would apply himself to him, when he should attain the
kingdom, which, in spite of his father, could come to no one
else, he should quickly have the first place in that kingdom
under him, for that he was now ready to take the kingdom, not
only as his birth-right, but by the preparations he had made for
obtaining it, because a great many of the rulers, and a great
many of his friends, were of his side, and those no ill men
neither, ready both to do and to suffer whatsoever should come on
that account.
2. When Herod heard this confession, he was all over anger and
fear, some parts seeming to him reproachful, and some made him
suspicious of dangers that attended him, insomuch that on both
accounts he was provoked, and bitterly afraid lest some more
heavy plot was laid against him than he should be then able to
escape from; whereupon he did not now make an open search, but
sent about spies to watch such as he suspected, for he was now
overrun with suspicion and hatred against all about him; and
indulging abundance of those suspicions, in order to his
preservation, he continued to suspect those that were guiltless;
nor did he set any bounds to himself, but supposing that those
who staid with him had the most power to hurt him, they were to
him very frightful; and for those that did not use to come to
him, it seemed enough to name them [to make them suspected], and
he thought himself safer when they were destroyed. And at last
his domestics were come to that pass, that being no way secure of
escaping themselves, they fell to accusing one another, and
imagining that he who first accused another was most likely to
save himself; yet when any had overthrown others, they were
hated; and they were thought to suffer justly who unjustly
accused others, and they only thereby prevented their own
accusation; nay, they now executed their own private enmities by
this means, and when they were caught, they were punished in the
same way. Thus these men contrived to make use of this
opportunity as an instrument and a snare against their enemies;
yet when they tried it, were themselves caught also in the same
snare which they laid for others: and the king soon repented of
what he had done, because he had no clear evidence of the guilt
of those whom he had slain; and yet what was still more severe in
him, he did not make use of his repentance, in order to leave off
doing the like again, but in order to inflict the same punishment
upon their accusers.
3. And in this state of disorder were the affairs of the palace;
and he had already told many of his friends directly that they
ought not to appear before him, her come into the palace; and the
reason of this injunction was, that [when they were there], he
had less freedom of acting, or a greater restraint on himself on
their account; for at this time it was that he expelled
Andromachus and Gamellus, men who had of old been his friends,
and been very useful to him in the affairs of his kingdom, and
been of advantage to his family, by their embassages and
counsels; and had been tutors to his sons, and had in a manner
the first degree of freedom with him. He expelled Andromachus,
because his son Demetrius was a companion to Alexander; and
Gamellus, because he knew that he wished him well, which arose
from his having been with him in his youth, when he was at
school, and absent at Rome. These he expelled out of his palace,
and was willing enough to have done worse by them; but that he
might not seem to take such liberty against men of so great
reputation, he contented himself with depriving them of their
dignity, and of their power to hinder his wicked proceedings.
4. Now it was Antipater who was the cause of all this; who when
he knew what a mad and licentious way of acting his father was
in, and had been a great while one of his counselors, he hurried
him on, and then thought he should bring him to do somewhat to
purpose, when every one that could oppose him was taken away.
When therefore Andromachus and his friends were driven away, and
had no discourse nor freedom with the king any longer, the king,
in the first place, examined by torture all whom he thought to be
faithful to Alexander, Whether they knew of any of his attempts
against him; but these died without having any thing to say to
that matter, which made the king more zealous [after
discoveries], when he could not find out what evil proceedings he
suspected them of. As for Antipater, he was very sagacious to
raise a calumny against those that were really innocent, as if
their denial was only their constancy and fidelity [to
Alexander], and thereupon provoked Herod to discover by the
torture of great numbers what attempts were still concealed. Now
there was a certain person among the many that were tortured, who
said that he knew that the young man had often said, that when he
was commended as a tall man in his body, and a skillful marksman,
and that in his other commendable exercises he exceeded all men,
these qualifications given him by nature, though good in
themselves, were not advantageous to him, because his father was
grieved at them, and envied him for them; and that when he walked
along with his father, he endeavored to depress and shorten
himself, that he might not appear too tall; and that when he shot
at any thing as he was hunting, when his father was by, he missed
his mark on purpose, for he knew how ambitious his father was of
being superior in such exercises. So when the man was tormented
about this saying, and had ease given his body after it, he
added, that he had his brother Aristobulus for his assistance,
and contrived to lie in wait for their father, as they were
hunting, and kill him; and when they had done so to fly to Rome,
and desire to have the kingdom given them. There were also
letters of the young man found, written to his brother, wherein
he complained that his father did not act justly in giving
Antipater a country, whose [yearly] revenues amounted to two
hundred talents. Upon these confessions Herod presently thought
he had somewhat to depend on, in his own opinion, as to his
suspicion about his sons; so he took up Alexander and bound him:
yet did he still continue to be uneasy, and was not quite
satisfied of the truth of what he had heard; and when he came to
recollect himself, he found that they had only made juvenile
complaints and contentions, and that it was an incredible thing,
that when his son should have slain him, he should openly go to
Rome [to beg the kingdom]; so he was desirous to have some surer
mark of his son's wickedness, and was very solicitous about it,
that he might not appear to have condemned him to be put in
prison too rashly; so he tortured the principal of Alexander's
friends, and put not a few of them to death, without getting any
of the things out of them which he suspected. And while Herod was
very busy about this matter, and the palace was full of terror
and trouble, one of the younger sort, when he was in the utmost
agony, confessed that Alexander had sent to his friends at Rome,
and desired that he might be quickly invited thither by Caesar,
and that he could discover a plot against him; that Mithridates,
the king of Parthia, was joined in friendship with his father
against the Romans, and that he had a poisonous potion ready
prepared at Askelori.
5. To these accusations Herod gave credit, and enjoyed hereby, in
his miserable case, some sort of consolation, in excuse of his
rashness, as fiattering himself with finding things in so bad a
condition; but as for the poisonous potion, which he labored to
find, he could find none. As for Alexander, he was very desirous
to aggravate the vast misfortunes he was under, so he pretended
not to deny the accusations, but punished the rashness of his
father with a greater crime of his own; and perhaps he was
willing to make his father ashamed of his easy belief of such
calumnies: he aimed especially, if he could gain belief to his
story, to plague him and his whole kingdom; for he wrote four
letters, and sent them to him, that he did not need to torture
any more persons, for he had plotted against him; and that he had
for his partners Pheroras and the most faithful of his friends;
and that Salome came in to him by night, and that she lay with
him whether he would or not; and that all men were come to be of
one mind, to make away with him as soon as they could, and so get
clear of the continual fear they were in from him. Among these
were accused Ptolemy and Sapinnius, who were the most faithful
friends to the king. And what more can be said, but that those
who before were the most intimate friends, were become wild
beasts to one another, as if a certain madness had fallen upon
them, while there was no room for defense or refutation, in order
to the discovery of the truth, but all were at random doomed to
destruction; so that some lamented those that were in prison,
some those that were put to death, and others lamented that they
were in expectation of the same miseries; and a melancholy
solitude rendered the kingdom deformed, and quite the reverse to
that happy state it was formerly in. Herod's own life also was
entirely disturbed; and because he could trust nobody, he was
sorely punished by the expectation of further misery; for he
often fancied in his imagination that his son had fallen upon
him, or stood by him with a sword in his hand; and thus was his
mind night and day intent upon this thing, and revolved it over
and over, no otherwise than if he were under a distraction. And
this was the sad condition Herod was now in.
6. But when Archelaus, king of Cappadocia, heard of the state
that Herod was in, and being in great distress about his
daughter, and the young man [her husband], and grieving with
Herod, as with a man that was his friend, on account of so great
a disturbance as he was under, he came [to Jerusalem] on purpose
to compose their differences; and when he found Herod in such a
temper, he thought it wholly unseasonable to reprove him, or to
pretend that he had done any thing rashly, for that he should
thereby naturally bring him to dispute the point with him, and by
still more and more apologizing for himself to be the more
irritated: he went, therefore, another way to work, in order to
correct the former misfortunes, and appeared angry at the young
man, and said that Herod had been so very mild a man, that he had
not acted a rash part at all. He also said he would dissolve his
daughter's marriage with Alexander, nor could in justice spare
his own daughter, if she were conscious of any thing, and did not
inform Herod of it. When Archelaus appeared to be of this temper,
and otherwise than Herod expected or imagined, and, for the main,
took Herod's part, and was angry on his account, the king abated
of his harshness, and took occasion from his appearing to have
acted justly hitherto, to come by degrees to put on the affection
of a father, and was on both sides to be pitied; for when some
persons refuted the calumnies that were laid on the young man, he
was thrown into a passion; but when Archclaus joined in the
accusation, he was dissolved into tears and sorrow after an
affectionate manner. Accordingly, he desired that he would not
dissolve his son's marriage, and became not so angry as before
for his offenses. So when Archclaus had brought him to a more
moderate temper, he transferred the calumnies upon his friends;
and said it must be owing to them that so young a man, and one
unacquainted with malice, was corrupted; and he supposed that
there was more reason to suspect the brother than the soft. Upon
which Herod was very much displeased at Pheroras, who indeed now
had no one that could make a reconciliation between him and his
brother. So when he saw that Archclaus had the greatest power
with Herod, he betook himself to him in the habit of a mourner,
and like one that had all the signs upon him of an undone man.
Upon this Archclaus did not overlook the intercession he made to
him, nor yet did he undertake to change the king's disposition
towards him immediately; and he said that it was better for him
to come himself to the king, and confess himself the occasion of
all; that this would make the king's anger not to be extravagant
towards him, and that then he would be present to assist him.
When he had persuaded him to this, he gained his point with both
of them; and the calumnies raised against the young man were,
beyond all expectation, wiped off. And Archclaus, as soon as he
had made the reconciliation, went then away to Cappadocia, having
proved at this juncture of time the most acceptable person to
Herod in the world; on which account he gave him the richest
presents, as tokens of his respects to him; and being on other
occasions magnanimous, he esteemed him one of his dearest
friends. He also made an agreement with him that he would go to
Rome, because he had written to Caesar about these affairs; so
they went together as far as Antioch, and there Herod made a
reconciliation between Archclaus and Titus, the president of
Syria, who had been greatly at variance, and so returned back to
Judea.
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