THE story of Babylon and of Chaldea presents a strong resemblance to that of Nineveh and Assyria, but it is marked with much more distinctness of outline, and minuteness of detail.

Chaldea was the most fertile country in the east, and probably the most fertile in the whole world. The district surrounding Babylon, called Babylonia, was one vast plain, delightfully watered by the Euphrates and the Tigris, from which rivers numberless streams were distributed over the whole country. And, the soil being rich

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most extraordinary degree, and the climate warm and ripening, the result was a fertility of so wonderful a kind, that the best writers of antiquity confess their fear, that the facts they state would be deemed too marvellous to be true. Herodotus, Strabo, and Pliny, unite in declaring that Babylonia was of all countries the most fertile in corn; not producing less, according to the first of these writers, than two hundred fold; and even reaching, according to the second, to three hundred fold; the grain, also, being of prodigious size.

Such was the country over which the great city Babylon, as a queen, reigned and ruled. And her own magnificence agreed with the riches of the territory in the midst of which she was placed. The concurrent testimony of many ancient writers establishes the fact, of the vastness, strength, and splendour of this magnificent city. The measurement of its walls, as given by Strabo, Diodorus Siculus, and Quintus Curtius, was about 360 or 380 stadia, or about thirty-four miles. The height and thickness of these e walls has been variously stated. By, Herodotus they are

described as 300 feet high, and 75 feet thick. But it is agreed on all hands that Darius Hystaspes, after quelling a rebellion, reduced the walls considerably, in order to make the city less defensible. And later historians give the height as⠀ 75 feet, and the breadth as 32. The magnificence comprised within these walls must appear all but incredible to the pigmy mortals of modern days, who live, not in the times of the "head of gold," but in the days of the "feet, part of iron and part of clay.' The temple of Belus was half a mile in circumference, and a furlong, or 660 feet in height. The hanging gardens were piled, terrace after terrace, one above another, to the height of 300 feet. And the gates, of solid brass, were a hundred in number. These par

ticulars we gather too, not from the prophets of Israel, but from various heathen writers who never dreamt of illustrating the statements and predictions of holy writ.

Nevertheless, these descriptions accord in the most exact manner with the language of the Jewish prophets. Babylon is described by Isaiah, as "the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the excellency of the Chaldees;"-as" the golden city." It is apostrophized by him as Lucifer, son of the morning! who said, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God." "I shall be a lady for ever; "the lady of kingdoms." Jeremiah says, Babylon hath been a golden cup, that made all the earth drunken." He addresses

her, as, "O thou most proud! O thou that dwellest in many waters, abundant in treasures," though thou shouldst mount

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up to heaven, and though thou shouldst fortify the height of thy strength, yet from me shall spoilers come unto thee, saith the Lord."

But Daniel's language is most expressive. Nebuchadnezzar had seen in a vision a great image, the head whereof was of fine gold; his breast and his arms of silver; his belly and his thighs of brass; his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay. The interpretation or meaning of which is given by the prophet in the following terms, "Thou, O king, art a king of kings: for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory. 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.'

And

Now, as we observed in our last essay, except we attribute some degree of colouring or exaggeration to the prophet,--which supposition, under the circumstances, would savor of infidel profaneness,―we must take this language to convey a true idea of the relative glory of these four kingdoms. And in this case, the splendour of Babylon, and its power, was, when compared with all the empires which have arisen since, as gold, in comparison with silver, or brass, or iron, or clay. The difference is immense. surely all the details of Herodotus and others, must be admitted to be collaterally confirmed.

Then

And the very points which seem to stagger credibility, in the descriptions of the heathen historians, are those which are most distinctly corroborated by the inspired prophets. Walls of three hundred feet in height, and so thick that six chariots could pass on their top, and of the circumference of thirty-four miles; and a temple half a mile in circuit, and nearly seven hundred feet in height, may seem beyond

the power of belief; but how precisely does the language of the prophets coincide with these facts. "Thou hast said, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars. Though thou should mount up to heaven, and fortify the height of thy strength." On the whole, we feel well convinced that the most faithful of heathen historians, Herodotus, was as correct in his statements, as to the splendour and strength of Babylon, as in any other of his narrations.

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But now, having settled in our minds some clear idea of the splendour and strength of great Babylon,' let us proceed to examine into the nature and extent of the prophecies of holy writ concerning her. And since the exact coincidence of the predictions and the events is so striking, that some determined infidels have been unable to account for it in any other way than by supposing that the predictions themselves were really written after the events which they appear to foretell, it may be adviseable to point out in the first instance the impossibility of such assumed imposture.

For instance, Isaiah states himself, in the beginning of his book, to have lived and prophesied in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. We have as much certainty of the truth of this fact, namely, that he lived and wrote in those years, as we have of the existence of Homer, or Xenophon, or Cæsar, at the particular times in which they are believed to have flourished. That such persons as the three last named did live, and produced the works which go by their names, is a fact, the disbelief of which would excite, among scholars and men of science, nothing but derision and contempt. Yet the being and the works of Isaiah are just as certain, merely speaking now of these works as historical documents. That prophet lived, then, and

wrote the book which goes by his name, between the years 760 and 706 before Christ.

Now Isaiah in this book prophesies, in the most distinct and decided language, the overthrow of Babylon, then one of the most powerful and prosperous empires upon earth, He distinctly describes it as taking place by the instrumentality of the Medes, a people, at the date of his writing, of no importance, forming only a province of Assyria. And he also, in another place, even names the individual commander, Cyrus, before whom Babylon should fall, though above a hundred years had then to elapse, ere, in a far distant land, that same Cyrus should be born.

But all this is so perfectly wonderful, so clearly beyond all human wisdom, or knowledge, or foresight, that foolish men, refusing to credit what is so clearly beyond nature, say at once, in their sceptical pride, Oh! the cheat is plain, nothing can be clearer than that these writings, speaking as they do distinctly of Cyrus and his conquest of Babylon, must have been written after that event; and all assertions that they were composed nearly two centuries before, can be nothing but falsehoods and attempts at imposition.'

But scepticism here, as in all other cases, flies from one difficulty into another still greater. The reasoner cannot conceive of such a thing as a man's being so inspired by the Spirit of God, as to be enabled to declare beforehand the things that shall come to pass; although any one who acknowledges a deity at all, must grant him the attribute of prescience, and must also admit the possibility of his displaying this foreknowledge by means of human agents and instruments. He therefore solves the difficulty by what seems to him an easier method of accounting for the wonder, namely, that the assumed date must be an

imposition, and that the supposed prophecy was framed after the event which it professes to foretell.

The Atheist, because he will not admit the being of God, declares that the world itself was formed by a concourse of atoms.' It has been well observed, that it would be less irrational to suppose that Milton's Paradise Lost was formed by a concourse of atoms! A like folly is committed in the case we are now considering. The sceptic asserts that the Scripture Prophecies are forgeries and impostures, and he thinks that he has thus settled the question. Instead of which, he has merely changed the difficulty. He has got away from a supposition which included what was above or beyond, but not opposed to, the ordinary course of nature, and has taken up with one which is altogether contrary to nature, and which is refuted by all experience.

His assertion is, in the present case, that the Prophecies of Isaiah, which profess to have been written between the years 760 and 706, B. C. and which predict the conquest of Babylon by Cyrus, must in fact have been written after that event, that is, two centuries later than their apparent date; this apparent, but false date, having been affixed to them in order to give them the character of predictions.

Now, such sciolists may fairly be asked, first, whether they can adduce any instances, in the history of the world, of impostures of this kind having been successfully carried on, during a series of twenty centuries; and, secondly, whether the imposition itself, which they assume to have taken place, is within the limits of possibility.

On the first of these points, the voice of history is full and decided against them. Literary and religious forgeries and frauds have, it is true, been frequently attempted; but they have also uniformly been detected. All the experience of

the human race, from the first dawn of letters to the present time, proclaims the extreme improbability of the success of such a cheat.

But when we consider the subject more closely, the reason of this being the case becomes apparent, in the obvious impossibility of carrying on such an imposition with the least chance of success. These people tell us with all possible flippancy, that these supposed predictions were written after the event, and then ante-dated in order to pass for prophecies. Would they like to try the experiment of concocting such a prediction themselves, in order to show how easily it might be made to pass current. No! they will not! But it is not the elevation of their moral feelings that holds them back;-it is rather the certainty of the contempt and derision which would follow their audacity. It is easy enough It is easy enough to talk about such a scheme, but to carry it into successful practice is quite the reverse. Had Isaiah's prophecy been thus framed it would either have instantly fallen into deserved oblivion; or, if remembered at all in story, would only have been named as an instance of detected imposition.

A book, to acquire character and credit in succeeding ages, must make good its claim on its birth and first appearance. Then it is that it is scrupulously examined, and the verdict of mankind pronounced. If produced in after ages, as one born out of due time, then a double degree of suspicion is excited, and a double strength of evidence is demanded. Spenser's Fairy Queen, one of the finest productions in English literature, remains, as is well known, imperfect; six books having been lost, it is supposed by shipwreck. Let those six books now for the first time make their appearance in print, and claim to be received as the missing portion. What a weight and completeness of evidence would

be demanded before their authenticity would be admitted? What a multitude of points and queries would have to be satisfactorily answered, before men would allow their claims? Where had they been hidden? How came their existence to be unknown? Had their depository been in safe and reputable hands, unlikely to commit a fraud? Was the handwriting clearly and distinctly agreeing with the other specimens of the author's penmanship extant? Was the paper on which they were written of the texture of that age? And, above all, did the work itself exhibit internal evidence of its alleged author's mind. All these, and a hundred other questions, would have to be answered, and if in a single instance the reply was not full, explicit, and satisfactory, there would be little chance of their reception to any thing beyond an apocryphal place in our standard literature.

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But this is stating the faintly. Let us rather suppose it to be said, that some writing of Joseph Mede's had just been discovered, in which he broadly foretold, not by way of inference from scripture, but as an independent and isolated prediction, that in the year 1815, the Emperor of France should be dethroned by the combined forces of all the other European sovereigns; and that in the year 1835, Turkey would be wholly conquered by, and absorbed into, the Russian empire.

Most interesting would such a document be; both with respect to the past fulfilment of the first prediction, and the apparent approach of the other,—but let any one imagine to himself for a moment the piercing scrutiny to which such a writing would be subjected, before it would be admitted to be really the production of a man who died more than a century ago. All the points to which we have just adverted, of origin, hand