Classic Poem

The number of those that had bin slaine at the siege of Ierusalem, and the number of the Prisoners that Titus caried with him to Rome.

The perfect number of the people there,
The which with hunger & with sword was slaine
A leauen hundred thousand did appeare,
As bookes of records did declare it plaine:
Beside all such as did vnburied lye,
And diuers moe that did in fier dye.

And when to Rome the Conqueror went his way,
The number of his prisoners were full great,
Full sixteene thousand men that instant day,
Were carried captiue to the Romaine seat:
Among the rest the man that wrote this story,
Who by his wisedome purchast endless glory.

Thus Christs prophesie truely came to passe,
Which Forty yeares before he had expressed,
But with the Iewes of small account it was,
Till they did finde themselues so sore distressed:
He soght their life, his death they wrought with spite,
Wishing his blood on them and theirs to light.

The which according to their owne request,
The Lord in wrath did perfectly fulfil,
There channels ran with blood and did not rest,
Their blood was spilt, that Iesus blood did spill:
God grant we may our hatefull sins forsake,
And by the Iewes a Christian warning take.