The life and work of St. Paul

138 THE LIFE AND WORK OF ST. PAUL.
not prevent him from protecting the Jews as far as he could in their own
and when Yitellius, the Legate of Syria, had decided that there was
country ;
primd facie cause for the complaints which had been raised against the
Procurator in all three divisions of his district, it is probable that Pilate, who
was sent to Borne to answer for his misdemeanours, would have received
strict justice from the aged Emperor. But before Pilate arrived Tiberius
had ended his long life of disappointment, crime, and gloom.
The accession of Gaius was hailed by the whole Roman world with a burst
of rapture, 1 and there were none to whom it seemed more likely to introduce a
golden era of prosperity than to the Jews. For if the young Emperor had
any living friend, it was Herod Agrippa. That prince, if he could command
but little affection as a grandson of Herod the Great, had yet a claim to
Jewish loyalty as a son of the murdered Aristobulus, a grandson of the
murdered Mariamne, and therefore a direct lineal descendant of that great
line of Asmonsean princes whose names recalled the last glories of Jewish
independence. Accordingly, when the news reached Jerusalem that Tiberius
at last was dead, the Jews heaved a sigh of relief, and not only took with
perfect readiness the oath of allegiance to Gaius, which was administered by
Vitellius to the myriads who had thronged to the Feast of Pentecost, but
offered speedy and willing holocausts for the prosperity of that reign which
was to bring them a deeper misery, and a more absolute humiliation, than any
which had been inflicted on them during the previous dominion of Rome. 2
Gaius lost no time in publicly displaying his regard for the Herodian
prince, who, with remarkable insight, had courted his friendship, not only
before his accession was certain, but even in spite of the distinct recommendation
of the former Emperor. 3
One day, while riding in the same carriage as Gaius, Agrippa was im-
prudent enough to express his wish for the time when Tiberius would bequeath
the Empire to a worthier successor. Such a remark might easily be construed
into a crime of high treason, or laesa majestas. In a court which abounded
with spies, and in which few dared to express above a whisper their real
thoughts, it was natural that the obsequious
slave who drove the chariot
should seek an audience from Tiberius to communicate what he had heard;
and when by the influence of Agrippa himself he had gained this opportunity,
his report made the old Emperor so indignant, that he ordered the Jewish
1 Suet. Calig. 13, 14.
2 Compare for this entire narrative Suet. Caligula ; Philo, Leg. ad Gfaium, and in
Flaccwn ; Jos. Antt. xviii. 68; I>. J. ii. 10, 1; Dion Cass. lix. 8, seq. ; Griitz, iii.
270277 ; Jahn, Hebr. Commonwealth, 174.
* The adventures of Herod Agrippa I. form one of the numerous romances which
give us so clear a glimpse of the state of society during the early Empire. Sent to Borne
by his grandfather, he had breathed from early youth the perfumed and intoxicating
atmosphere of the Imperial Court as a companion of Drusus, the son of Tiberius. On
the death of Drusus he was excluded from Court, and was brought to the verge of
suicide by the indigence which followed a course of extravagance. Saved from his
purpose by his wife Cypros, he went through a series of debts, disgraces, and escapades.
*ntu he was once more admitted to favour by Tiberius at Caprese,