could devise no method for escaping from the cruelty of his own law, and Daniel was thrown headlong to the lions. And a stone was brought and laid upon the mouth of the den, which the king sealed with his own ring, and with the ring of his nobles, that nothing should be done against Daniel. And the king went away to his house, and laid himself down without taking supper and meat was not set before him, and even sleep departed from him. Then the king rising very early in the morning, went in haste to the lion's den. And coming near to the den, cried with a lamentable voice to Daniel, and said to him: Daniel, servant of the living God, hath thy God, whom thou servest always, been able to deliver thee from the lions? And Daniel answering the king, said: O king, live for ever. My God hath sent His angel, and hath shut up the mouths of the lions, and they have not hurt me: forasmuch as before Him justice hath been found in me: yea and before thee, O king, I have done no offence. Then the king was exceedingly glad for him; and he commanded that Daniel should be taken out of the den: and Daniel was taken out of the den, and no hurt was found in him, because he believed in his God. And by the king's commandment, those men were brought that had accused Daniel : and they were cast into the lions' den, they and their children, and their wives; and they did not reach the bottom of the den, before the lions caught them, and broke all their bones in pieces.

This was the second time that Daniel was thus protected from the fury of the wild beasts, for already, after he had destroyed the idols of the people, he had been thrown to the lions, and miraculously protected by the God whom he served.

One other incident in the life of Daniel is related in the Bible. A wealthy Babylonian, by name Joakim, had married Susanna, a pious Jewess, of great beauty and modesty. Two of the judges of the Chaldeans, men held in esteem for their age and their office, beheld her in her husband's house, and formed criminal designs upon her virtue. One day, when bathing in the garden, they

suddenly came upon her, and tempted her to sin; and when Susanna vehemently repulsed them, their passion was turned into hatred, and they falsely accused her of an unlawful attachment to a young man of the place. Susanna was accordingly brought to trial; and her denial not being accounted of any weight when contradicted by the solemn declarations of two venerated men, she was condemned to death. As she was led to execution, Daniel, who saw her pass, cried aloud, I am clear from the blood of this woman. Struck with his exclamation, the people crowded round him, and he reproached them with their rash condemnation of an innocent person, and bade them try her again. They yielded to his command, and he proceeded to examine the two elders separately, asking each of them under what kind of tree they had found Susanna and her supposed lover in the garden. Not being prepared with an answer, each one replied with a guess; and their answers disagreeing, the people were convinced of their deceit, and putting them to death, set Susanna free.

CHAP. VII. Daniel's Visions.

To none of the prophets of old was the time of the coming of the future Saviour revealed so distinctly as to the prophet Daniel. During his captivity in Babylon many mysterious visions were vouchsafed him by God, and the same divine Power interpreted them to him. His visions also comprehended the destiny of the Church of Christ itself until the end of the world. In one he beheld four beasts rising from the stormy ocean, the first a lioness, the second a bear, the third a leopard, and the fourth a mysterious creature which trod under foot the rest. From his head sprung ten horns, and another little horn, which one had eyes, and the voice of a man, uttering terrible words. Then the prophet beheld a vision of the Almighty God, and he saw the Son of man presented before the throne of the Ancient of Days, and receive power over all flesh. And an angel

told him that the four beasts were four kingdoms, and the ten horns ten other kingdoms, and the little horn yet another, which should persecute the saints, until the kingdom of the saints commenced, never to end. The four kingdoms are believed to be those of the Assyrians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans, and that of the little horn the kingdom of Antichrist. In another vision he saw what was to befall the Persian monarchy and its conqueror, Alexander the Great and his suc

cessors.

Again, while he was fasting and praying for his people, he was favoured with a distinct declaration of the exact dates when the captivity of the Jews should cease, and when Christ the Prince should appear, and the Jewish sacrifices cease, and the temple be defiled and utterly destroyed. The predictions in which the prophet has recorded all these announcements from Almighty God are so clear, beyond the ordinary character of divine prophecies, that unbelievers, in after times, could find no excuse for denying the divine mission of Him whose coming had been thus miraculously foretold, except by asserting that the whole work was a forgery, written by an impostor after the life and death of Jesus Christ. Daniel also is remarkable among the Hebrew prophets for having passed his days amidst the luxuries and temptations of a royal court, while the rest lived almost the lives of hermits. And yet more, so extraordinary was his sanctity, that it was revealed to him by God, that he was one of those who would be saved at the great day of judgment. Thus, of the two prophets whose eternal blessedness is especially declared in holy Scripture, the one, Elias, was the especial forerunner of those who serve God in the austerities of monastic solitude; the other, Daniel, of those who preserve their faith and piety amidst all the blandishments and cares of the world.

CHAP. VIII. The Return from the Captivity.

THE seventy years' captivity of the Jews was now ended, and their restoration was at hand. The chastisement, so repeatedly threatened by Divine justice, and so long delayed by Divine mercy, had been inflicted, and had wrought its effect upon the wayward heart of the chosen people. Seventy years' abject slavery had taught them that, in truth, there was but one God, and that the gods of the heathen were but idols, powerless to save those who blindly trusted in them. When the appointed time was come, Almighty God controlled the will and thoughts of Cyrus, who then ruled over Persia, and in the fear of God he prepared to restore the captive Jews to the land of their birth. And it is to be remarked that, incurable as had been the obstinacy with which they had fallen into idolatry, notwithstanding incessant punishments, before the seventy years' captivity, after that one severest visitation, the people frequently displayed a constancy in adhering to the worship of the Almighty alone, which yielded not to the heaviest trials. Their zeal for the law of Moses, when it was finally perverted, became little more than an attachment to every form and ceremony which formed a portion of that law, and to an innumerable number of mere human traditions, many of which were absurd and trifling, and many in reality subversive of the spirit of the law of Moses itself.

The whole body of the people (that is, of the tribes of Juda and Benjamin, together with the Levites,) did not immediately return to Judæa, though the edict by which Cyrus proclaimed their freedom gave equal permission to all. Above 40,000 left the land of their captivity under the command of Zerobabel, the grandson of King Joachin. They carried with them the sacred vessels which had been brought by their conquerors, from the temple, and immediately on their arrival at Jerusalem commenced the rebuilding of the temple, amidst the mingled shoutings and weepings, which testified the joy of the young and the sadness of the aged,

at the remembrance of the still greater glories of the temple now long ago levelled with the ground.

The mixed race of people who now dwelt in Samaria sought to aid in the new work, claiming a title to do so because they worshipped, or pretended to worship, the God of the Jews. Permission being refused, on the ground of their being aliens to the chosen people, the Samaritans commenced a series of intrigues at the Persian court, with a view to put an end to the new prosperity of the Jews. As long as Cyrus lived, their malice was unsuccessful; but Cambyses, his successor, was induced to put a stop to the building at Jerusalem. Darius Hystaspes, who succeeded Cambyses, in the second year of his reign, permitted the works to be resumed; and in his sixth year the new temple was completed, and solemnly dedicated to the worship of Almighty God.

To Darius succeeded Xerxes on the throne of Persia, and to Xerxes Artaxerxes, in whose reign Esdras, or Ezra, a priest who had remained with many of his fellowcountrymen in Persia, led an additional number of the Jews to Jerusalem. He brought splendid gifts for the temple from the Persian monarch; and what was a far greater gift to his people, a learned, courageous, and devout heart, fixed on the reformation of the abuses which had sprung up among the Jews already settled in Jerusalem.

CHAP. IX. Queen Esther.

DURING the reign of Assuerus, who is supposed to be the same either as Xerxes or as Darius Hystaspes, the Jews who still remained in the country of their captivity passed through the narrowest possible escape from extermination. Aman, the chief minister of Assuerus, was roused to plot their destruction, in revenge for the firmness with which one of their number, Mardochai, refused to pay him the same slavish veneration which he received from the rest of the king's subjects. He