She brought forth her firstborn son, and she wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a feeding trough, because there was no room for them in the inn.
A little tyrant, Herod, in a show of independent spirit, offends the greater tyrant, Augustus. Augustus informs him that he will no longer treat him as a friend, but as a slave; and although Herod makes the most humiliating submission, and his friends at the Roman court intercede for him, yet Augustus, to show his displeasure, orders a census to be taken of all the Jewish people, in order to make preparations for a contemplated taxation, which was not carried out till some ten years later. Even the winds and the waves are not more fickled than a tyrant's will; but the Ruler of the wind and the waves knows how to rule the perverse spirits of princes. The Lord our God has a bridle for the wildest war horse, and a hook for the most terrible sea monster. 