unenlightened by the light of revelation, he was unprepared to put a true estimate upon earthly wealth and glory, and to look upon earthly governments in their true light. Hence the striking harmony between the estimate which he put upon these things, and the object by which they were symbolized before him. To him they were presented under the form of a great image, an object in his eyes of respect and admiration. With Daniel, the case was far different; and to him these same earthly kingdoms were afterward shown under the form of cruel and ravenous wild beasts.

But how admirably adapted was this representation to convey a great and needful truth to the mind. of Nebuchadnezzar. Besides delineating the progress of events through the whole course of time, for the benefit of his people, God would show Nebuchadnezzar the utter emptiness and worthlessness of earthly pomp and glory; and how could this be more impressively done than by an image commencing with the most precious of metals, and continually descending to the baser, till we finally have the coarsest and crudest of metals, iron, mingled with the miry clay; the whole then dashed to pieces, and made like the empty chaff, no good thing in it, but altogether lighter than vanity, and finally blown away where no place could be found for it, after which something durable and of heavenly worth occupies its place. So would God show to the children of men, that earthly kingdoms were to pass away, and earthly greatness and glory, like a gaudy bubble,

would break and vanish; and the kingdom of God, in the place so long usurped by these, should be set up to have no end, and all who had an interest therein, should rest under the shadow of its peaceful wings forever and ever. But this is anticipating.

VERSE 36. This is the dream; and we will tell the interpretation thereof before the king. 37. Thou, O King, art a king of kings; for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory. 38. And wheresoever the children of men dwell, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath he given into thine hand, and hath made thee ruler over them all. Thou art this head of gold.

Now opens one of the sublimest chapters of human history. Eight short verses of the inspired record tell the whole story; yet that story embraces the history of this world's pomp and power. A few moments will suffice to commit it to memory, yet the period which it covers, dating from twenty-four centuries in the past, reaches on down past the rise and fall of kingdoms, past the setting up and overthrow of empires, past cycles and ages, past our own day, over into the eternal state. It is so comprehensive that it embraces all this; yet it is so minute that it gives us all the great outlines of earthly kingdoms from that time to this. Human wisdom never devised so brief a record which embraced so much. Human language never set forth, in fewer words, a greater volume of historical truth. The finger of God is here. Let us heed the lesson well.

With what interest, as well as astonishment, must

the king have listened to the words of the prophet, as he informed him that he, or rather his kingdom, the king being here put for his kingdom (see the following verse), was the golden head of the magnificent image which he had seen. Ancient kings were grateful for success; and in cases of prosperity, the tutelar deity to whom they attributed their success, was to them the adorable object upon which they would lavish their richest treasures, and bestow their best devo-. tions. Daniel indirectly informs the king that in his case all these are due to the God of Heaven, since he is the one who has given him his kingdom, and made him ruler over all. This would restrain him from the pride of thinking that he had attained his position by his own power and wisdom, and would enlist the gratitude of his heart toward the true God.

The Babylonish Empire, this head of gold, was founded by Belesis, called also Nabonassar, and in the Scriptures called Baladan, B. c. 747. Arising from the ancient Assyrian Empire, founded by Nimrod, Gen. 109, 10, which had governed Asia for about thirteen hundred years, it reached the summit of its glory under Nebuchadnezzar, who added to his original dominions the provinces of Asia Minor, Phoenicia, Egypt, Syria, and Palestine. These, with the empire of Babylon proper, embraced all the then known world of any national influence or power. See "Prideaux's Connexion."

We do not take it to be necessary that Babylon, to be called a universal kingdom, should have had every class of people and every country in the world

absolutely under its sway; for this was not in a strict sense the fact with any one of the kingdoms which are called in history universal kingdoms. Babylon never conquered Grecia nor Rome; but Rome was founded before Babylon had risen to the climax of its power. Rome's position and influence, however, were then altogether prospective; and it is nothing against the prophecy that God begins to prepare his agents long years before they enter upon the prominent part they are to perform in the fulfillment of prophecy. We must place ourselves with the prophet, and view these kingdoms from the same stand-point. We shall then, as is right, consider his statements in the light of the location he occupied, the time in which he wrote, and the circumstances by which he was surrounded. It is a manifest rule of interpretation that nations are not particularly noticed in prophecy until they become so far connected with the people of God that mention of them becomes necessary to make the records of sacred history complete. When this was the case with Babylon, it was the great and overtowering object in the political world. In the prophet's eye, it necessarily eclipsed all else; and he would naturally speak of it as a kingdom having rule over all the earth. So far as we know, all provinces or countries against which Babylon did move in the height of its power were subdued by its arms. In this sense, all were in its power. And this will explain the somewhat hyperbolical language of Verse 38. That there were some portions of territory and considerable numbers of people unknown to his

tory and without the pale of civilization as it then existed, which were neither discovered nor subdued, is not a fact of sufficient strength or importance to condemn the expression of the prophet, or to falsify the prophecy.

In 677, B. C., Babylon became connected with the people of God by the capture of Manasseh, king of Judah, and is at this point introduced into prophecy.

The character of this empire is indicated by the nature of the material in that portion of the image by which it was symbolized-the head of gold. It was the golden kingdom of a golden age. Babylon, its metropolis, towered far above all its later rivals. Situated in the garden of the East, laid out in a perfect square sixty miles in circumference, fifteen miles on each side, surrounded by a wall three hundred and fifty feet high, and eighty-seven feet thick, with a moat, or ditch, around this, of equal cubic capacity with the wall, divided into six hundred and seventysix squares, each two and a quarter miles in circumference, by its fifty streets, each one hundred and fifty feet in width, crossing each other at right angles, twenty-five each way, every one straight and level, and fifteen miles in length; its two hundred and twenty-five square miles of inclosed surface, divided as just described, and laid out in luxuriant pleasure-grounds and gardens, interspersed with magnificent dwellings-this city, with its sixty miles of moat, its sixty miles of outer wall, its thirty miles of river wall through its center, its hundred and fifty gates of solid brass, its hanging gardens, rising ter