THE

BIBLE CHRISTIAN MAGAZINE.

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NEBUCHADNEZZAR'S IMAGE.*

"He answered and said, Lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt; and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God."DANIEL iii. 25.

T is a high day on the plains of Dura! The King of Babylon has had a new god constructed on a large and magnificent scale. It is true he has a great number of gods already, for Babylon abounded with them. They were dotted along the streets, they were fixed at all the prominent places of cross-way and square, and the temples were gorged with these monuments of the superstitious folly and perverted devotion of king, noble, and people. To show the vast amount of wealth displayed in these idols, it is said that when Xerxes retired from Greece, he took the golden images of Babylon, which alone brought him the fabulous sum of twenty millions sterling! Here, in Dura, Nebuchadnezzar rears a great image, and designates it a god.

From its materials and proportions it is evidently intended to surpass all ever before seen. It was made of gold, or, as some think, it was overlaid with gold, so that it had the appearance of being an image of gold. It was sixty cubits in height, which, reckoning eighteen inches to the cubit, is fifteen times taller than a man six feet high. The image was reared, and the day of inauguration appointed, and a proclamation is sent through all the land of Chaldea and the subject provinces demanding the presence of "princes, governors, captains, judges, treasurers, counsellors, * Published by request of Exeter District Meeting, 1880.

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sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces, to the dedication of the image which Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up."

In compliance with the royal mandate, these officials gathered together to grace the occasion, though it might be to disgrace themselves. It is a painful fact that officials of state are frequently more inclined to observe the will of the ruler in evil than they are to obey the voice of God. Let a state religion rear its haughty head, and the of knees the great of this world will bow, while they may stubbornly refuse a single flexion to the Supreme Majesty of the true God.

Behold! here, then, is this huge idol. Lacking goodness, it is made big, and wanting in inward worth, it is plated over with gold. A religion that has no piety seeks compensation in pompous display, parade, and empty services. The king's god is set up, and a vast concourse of people assemble; and at the sound of the instruments of music, they bend in one mass, acknowledging a thing of human device superior to the genius that devised it. But among the officers of Nebuchadnezzar there are three young men of the Hebrews, who rise above the empty servility and superstitious folly of people and king, and piously refuse to bend the knee to a thing of nought. Soon the king is made aware of what might have been deemed the temerity of these elevated captives, and they are commanded into his royal presence, (v. 13-18). After this Nebuchadnezzar caused the furnace to be heated seven times hotter than usual, for the purpose of signally punishing the disobedience of these youths. Now attention is turned from the king's idol to the executioner's furnace, which, like a volcano, is belching out fierce lurid flames. The Apocrypha says that "the flames ascended forty-nine cubits;" and so fierce were they, that the king's servants were consumed in the act of casting-in these young men. But the great point in this striking story is the fact that, while the executioners were devoured by the flames, the three Hebrews were not touched.

I. THE ORDEAL.

This is a day of severe trial to the godly of that land among the Jews. Before them was the huge gilded toy called a god, to which every one is commanded to bow in adoration. On the one side there were music and imposing ceremony, on the other a fiery furnace, whose large hot maw was waiting to devour every one who should defy the authority of the king. We cannot refrain from denouncing such a piece of wicked imperialism. Such a mode of administration would fain fetter the free spirit, suppress every noble feeling, clip the wings of desire and hope, and bring man into bondage to a system which is an insult to reason, a mockery to

the soul's deep cry for peace, a blank negation of all religious yearnings, and a blasphemous repudiation of the prerogatives of that Being to whose praise Nebuchadnezzar had made humble confession and fair promises. It seems scarcely possible for one who had felt the weight of God's hand, and had acknowledged the sovereignty of the Divine authority, so soon and so far to forget himself as to set up this image. But, alas! modern times furnish instances too much resembling this, of the deep depravity of the heart, the stubbornness of the will, and the irreligiousness of the passions of the natural man. Sin to-day has its idols, and these pseudo-gods are imperious in their demands, base in their composition, and false in their pretensions. Irreligion has raised up its showy forms of human philosophy, and high systems of bombastic disbelief. They (the advocates of irreligion) have dethroned God, and enthroned reason-of a sort. False religions have reared their images of Papal pretensions, priest-craft, and state-craft. The authorities of modern times have not made golden images,-perhaps their parsimony has forbidden that,—but they have made gods upon a cheaper scale, and have used the gold for other, and, it may be, for equally unrighteous purposes.

The images of these times are principles, enactments, creeds, formularies, and customs, which cast as dark a shadow upon the souls of men as ever Dura's idol did upon its desecrated soil. The whole Papacy is a huge idol, and the assumptions of the Pope are the crowning feature of its blasphemies. The Pope, sitting in the temple of God, has arrogated to himself qualities that can belong to God alone, receiving worship as God. The Pope is addressed as "the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the promised Saviour; who shall rule from sea to sea." On the election of a Pope, the following words are used by the conclave: "I tell you good tidings of great joy-a new Pope is elected!" Cardinal Bellarmine says: "The Pope is the father of fathers, the pontiff of Christians, the prince of priests, the vicar of Christ, the head of the body, the church, the foundation of the building, the universal bishop."" Again it is said: "The sight of thy divine majesty does not a little terrify me, for I am not ignorant that all power, both in heaven and in earth, is given unto you; that prophetic saying is fulfilled in you. All the kings of the earth shall worship him, and all the nations shall serve him.'"* Of Pope Alexander VI., known to be one of the filthiest men that ever lived, it is said, "Cæsar was a man, Alexander was a God." Say, did ever idolatry go to greater length, or sink to lower depths?

I regard the established ecclesiasticism of our country as a vain pre* Lord Anthony Pucci.