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the world, which had been chosen by God, as that where in to place the first family of mankind, but which the despotism and oppression of ages has reduced for many centuries almost to a desert waste. Herodotus and Strabo speak of its fertile soil producing two, and even three hundred fold of corn; and even after repeated conquests and desolations, the vast plains, enriched by the Euphrates and Tigris, and their tributary streams, and irrigated by numerous artifical canals, the traces of which may yet be seen, continued to furnish such abundant supplies as the natives of northern and less favoured climes can hardly conceive of. Wealth abounded, luxury and sensual enjoyments were pursued as objects worthy of the highest ambition of man. Gold, silver, precious jewels, spices, silks, and every costly means of pleasure or adornment were accumulated, and the rulers of Babylon added kingdom to kingdom, until their vast dominions, extended from the Helespont to the Indian Archipelago, and embraced nearly the whole of the Asiatic continent under one sovereign ruler. Human ambition seemed to have achieved its utmost desires, and to be established beyond the reach of fate. But all was hollow within. Under this splendid despotism vice and misery prevailed. The grossest forms of idolatry associated impure and horrible rites with the worship of their deities; and the great mass of the people toiled in hopeless slavery to contribute to the unbounded desires of the few who trampled on their rights. But the doom of their mighty empire was pronounced. It was "weighed in the balance and found wanting," while yet the sunshine of prosperity seemed to rest upon it, and now it lies amid the crumbled ruins of its palaces and temples, a byeword and a mockery to the nations.

CHAPTER III.

THE DOOM OF BABYLON.

Struck by a thousand lightnings still 'tis there,
As proud in ruin, haughty in despair.

Oh! oldest fabric reared by hands of man!

Built ere Art's dawn on Europe's shores began!

Rome's mouldering shrines, and Tadmor's columns gray,
Beside yon mass, seem things of yesterday!
In breathless awe, in musing reverence, bow,
'Tis hoary Babel looms before you now!

MICHELL

NUMEROUS as are the records of ancient historians as to the magnificence of the Babylonish capital, and the extent of its empire, nothing more effectually exhibits its greatness among the elder empires of the world than the large space which it occupies in the terrible denouncements of ancient prophecy. No portion of the prophecies recorded by the inspired authors of the Old Testament Scriptures, has more frequently supplied evidence and argument for their divine authority, than the remarkable and literal words in which they foretold the doom of Babylon. The prophet Isaiah delivered his remarkable denouncements fully one hundred and sixty years before the taking of Babylon, and upwards of two hundred and fifty years before Herodotus recorded the history of these events, altogether unconscious that he too was guided not only as a recorder of incidents of common history, but of evidence that should avail to remote ages in proof of the divine origin of the first of books. When Isaiah recorded, "the burden of Babylon," which, says the prophet, "Isaiah the son of Amos

did see," a century and a half had to pass, and genera

tions to be gathered to the in vision should be fulfiled. that is being accomplished: "The noise of a multitude in the mountains, like as of a great people; a tumultuous noise of the kingdoms of nations gathered together; the Lord of hosts mustereth the host of the battle. They come from a far country from the end of heaven, even the Lord, and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land. Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate; and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it. It shall be as the chased roe, and as a sheep that no man taketh up; they shall every man turn to his own people, and flee every man unto his own land. Every one that is found shall be thrust through, and every one that is joined unto them shall fall by the sword. Behold I will stir up the Medes against them, which shall not regard silver, and as for gold they shall not delight in it. Their bows also shall dash the young men to pieces; and they shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb; their eye shall not spare children. And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldees' excellency, shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. It shall never be inhabited, neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation; neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there; neither shall the shepherds make their fold there; but wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures; and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there. And the wild beasts of the islands shall cry in their desolate houses, and dragons in their pleasant palaces."

dust, ere what he witnessed Yet he said, as of a thing

Ere these words could be accomplished God had destined Babylon to be made his servant and tool, for the punishment of others. The chosen people to whom

Isaiah prophesied, were themselves to be subjected to his anger, and were to be sent away captives into Babylon. The gorgeous temple of Solomon was to be spoiled. The city of David was to be desolate, and in ruins; and Babylon was to triumph for a time over the people whose prophets had foretold her coming fate. But the words of God are sure. The faithful among the captives of Judah, who hung their harps on the willows of Babylon, and wept when they remembered Zion, believed no less certainly in the promises to their fathers, than in the threats and denouncements to their captors, and anticipated with longing hearts, the time when God would remember Zion, and build up her ruined walls.

It seems not improbable that an important class of the inscriptions brought to light by Dr. Layard while exploring the palaces of Nimroud, will be proved to be contemporaneous with the period of the later grandeur of Babylon, when, while she rejoiced in her haughty power and luxury, the Hebrew prophet was recording her coming doom, and foretelling the fate which the Christian believer can now read for himself amid her desolate and ruined heaps. At a meeting of the Syro-Egyptian Society of London, on the 12th of February 1850, Mr. Sharpe laid before the meeting a communication regarding Major Rawlinson's reading of the inscriptions from Nimroud, which he characterized as one of the greatest triumphs of ingenuity, and as the result of a rare union of learning, patience, sagacity, and that wise caution which is so specially needed, while the true value and force of many of the letters is still doubtful. Mr Sharpe, however, challenges some of the most important of Major Rawlinson's historical conclusions, while attaching full reliance to his elucidation of cuneiform inscriptions. Major Rawlinson produces the names of seven or eight kings; some of these make Tyre, Sidon, and Egypt pay tribute, and carry on a long war against Ashdod. Even the name of Jerusalem, it is

thought possible, may be traced among the conquered cities. These eight kings may occupy about two centuries; and Mr. Sharpe exhibited tables of chronology for Egypt, Palestine, and Assyria, from which he argued that these circumstances in history could be true of no other period of similar duration than the two centuries comprehending the era of the prophet Isaiah; and that these were the kings spoken of in the Bible, whose dynasty was put down by Nabopolassar, for there was no other time in which Egypt and the Phoenician cities could have paid tribute to Assyria. It is wise that we should not too hastily assume unauthenticated evidence which may seem to confirm the prophetic writings. They stand in need of no such confirmation, though we derive a most legitimate gratification from the discovery of such evidences, and may, therefore, look forward with no slight degree of interest to the results of such intelligent research among the vast ruins of Central Asia.

It is an interesting truth, proved by many concurrent evidences, that, while Providence has frequently employed heathen and idolatrous nations for the punishment of his own church and people, yet the Divine anger has always been, sooner or later, manifested against such unbelieving instruments of God's displeasure. To those who look forward to the restoration of the Jews to their own land in these latter days, it is a subject of serious consideration whether God will not also, in like manner, judge the Gentile nations among whom the weary wanderers of Israel have so long borne their sad exile. Such thoughts may well stimulate the generous zeal of those whose hearts are now yearning after the outcasts of Judah. Little did the proud Babylonians dream that it was in his wrath God had suffered them to triumph over the kingdom of Judah, and to spoil the gorgeous temple which Solomon dedicated to his worship in so noble a strain of inspired devotion, when, standing before the altar of the one true

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