nsolidated reign, as king over Babylon and Assyria, he dreamed a dream
which gave him much anxiety of mind and troubled him very much. This
dream he could not remember nor explain, save that it had left a terrible
impression on his mind. The wise men were confounded, for they could
neither declare the vision or its meaning. The king, in his rage,
decreed them all to death. At this point appears Daniel, one of the
captives of Judah. Moved of God, he presents himself before the king and
makes known to him the vision and interpretation.

The king had seen a great metallic image, excellent in brightness and
terrible in form. It was a human figure of massive proportions, standing
erect with outstretched arms, and of a mixed and strange composition.
The head was of fine gold. The breast and arms were of silver. The
belly and thighs of brass. The legs of iron, the feet part of iron and
part of clay. While the king was gazing on this monstrous figure with
intense interest, his attention was arrested by the appearance of a small
stone--this stone was alone; there appeared no hands handling it or
moving it. It was cut out of the mountain without hands. In this stone
there appears to be a good deal of the supernatural. At once this little
stone assaults the image, beginning at the feet. The battle is surely
unequal; the battle continues, and during the struggle the stone actually
grows; the image falls to pieces--the feet, thigh, breast, and head--and
victory is with the stone. By the time the image is wholly destroyed the
stone has become a mountain; or, as Daniel said to Nebuchadnezzar, "Thou
sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image
upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces. Then
was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold broken to
pieces together, and became like the chaff of the Summer
threshing-floors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found
for them; and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain and
filled the whole earth."

In this vision and interpretation we have a line of history laid bare so
clearly that we need not err. The beginning is the time and kingdom of
Nebuchadnezzar. The image stands for four great earthly monarchies,
extending down through the centuries even to this time and day--and a
little further; for these monarchies are not yet wholly destroyed, and
the stone-kingdom does not yet fil