607.

180.

144.

147.

A.. At this time the kingdom of Babylon was invaded by A. R. Nabopolasser. That traitor, whom Chinaladan, otherwise Sarac, bad made general of his armies against Cyaxares king of the Medes, joined Astyages son of Cyaxares, took Chinaladanin Nineveh, destroyed that great city so long mistress of the east, and mounted his master's throne. Under this ambitious prince Babylon 624. swelled with pride. Judea, whose impiety increased beyond measure, had every thing to fear. Good king Josiah, by his profound humility, suspended for a little the punishment his people had deserved: but the 610. evil waxed greater under his children. Nebuchadnezzar II. more terrible than his father Nabopolassor, succeeded him. That prince bred up in pride and continually exercised in war, made prodigious conquests both in the east and west; and Babylon threatened the whole earth with slavery. Its threats soon took effect with regard to the people of God. Jerusalem was given up to the haughty conqueror, who took it three several times: first, in the beginning of his reign, and fourth year of the reign of Jehoiakim, from whence are daJexxy ted the seventy years of the Babylonish captivity men1112tioned by the prophet Jeremiah: the second time under Jechonias, or Jehoiachin, son of Jehoiakim ; 155. and the last time under Zedekiah, when the city was 598. razed to the ground, the temple reduced to ashes, and 15e. the king carried captive to Babylon, with Seraiah the high priest, and the greatest part of the people. The most eminent of those captives were the prophets Ezekiel and Daniel. Among them likewise are to be counted the three young men, whom Nebuchadnezzar could neither force to worship his image; nor had power to destroy by fire. Greece was now flourishing, 594. and the seven wise men were rendering themselves illustrious. Some time before the desolation of Jerusalem, Solon, one of those seven sages, gave laws to the Athenians, and established liberty upon the 578. foundation of justice: the Phocians of Iona carried 176.

10.

599.

160.

Abyd.

Euseb.

Ev.c.

4. C. their first colony to Marseilles. Tarquinius Priscus, A king of Rome, after having subjected part of Tuscany, and adorned the city with magnificent works, end566. ed his reign. In his time the Gauls, conducted by 188 Bellovesus, possessed themselves of all the countries of Italy adjacent to the Po, while Segovesus his brother led another body of the same nation a great way into Germany. Servius Tullius, Tarquin's successor, instituted the Census, or list of the citizens disposed into certain classes, whereby that great city was regulated as a private family. Nebuchadnezzar beautified Babylon, which had enriched itself by the spoils of Jerusalem and the East: but it did not long enjoy 562. them. That king, who had adorned it with so much 192. magnificence, saw upon his death-bed the approaching apud ruin of the haughty city. His son Evilmerodach, having rendered himself odious by his debaucheries, Prap. had not reigned long when he was slain by Neriglissor ult. his brother-in-law, who usurped the kingdom. Pisis560. tratus usurped also the sovereign authority in Athens, 19 which he found means to maintain for the space of thirty years, amidst a number of vicissitudes, and which he even left to his children. Neriglissor could not suffer the power of the Medes, who were growing great in the East, and therefore declared war against them. While Astyages, son of Cyaxares I. was preparing for a vigorous resistance, he died, and left the war to be carried on by Cyaxares II. his son, called by 559. Daniel Darius the Mede. This last nominates for 195 general of his army, Cyrus, the son of Mandane his sister, and of Cambyses king of Persia, which was subject to the empire of the Medes. The reputation of Cyrus, who had signalized himself in divers wars under Astyages his grandfather, united most of 549. the kings of the east under the standards of Cyaxa- 200. res. He took Cresus king of Lydia in his capital city, and made himself master of his immense rich543. es: he subdued the other allies of the kings of Baby- 211lon and extended his dominion not only over Syria,

C.

538.

but even a great way into the lesser Asia. At last he marched against Babylon, took it, and subjected it to Cyaxares his uncle: who, no less touched with his fidelity than his exploits, gave him his only daughter 537. and heir in marriage. In the reign of Cyaxares,

Daniel already honoured under the preceding reigns with several heavenly visions, wherein he saw in manifest figures so many kings and empires pass before him, learned by a new revelation those seventy famous weeks, in which the times of the CHRIST, and the destiny of the Jewish people are unfolded. It was weeks of years, so that they contained 490 and this way of reckoning was common among the Jews, who observed the seventh year, as well as 536, the seventh day, with a religious rest. Some time after this vision, Cyaxares died, as did also Cambyses the father of Cyrus; and that great man who succeeded them, joined the kingdom of Persia, till then but obscure, to the kingdom of the Medes, which he had so vastly enlarged by his conquests. Thus was he peaceable master of the whole east, and founded the greatest empire that had ever been in the world. But what is most material to the connexion of our epochs, is, that this great conqueror, in the first year of his reign, gave his decree for rebuilding the temple of God at Jerusalem, and re-establishing the Jews in Judea.

We must stop a little at this period, which is the most intricate of all ancient chronology, by reason of the difficulty of reconciling profane with sacred history. You have, doubtless, Sir, already observed, that what I relate of Cyrus, is very different from what you have read of him in Justin; that he does not speak a word of the second kingdom of the Assyrians, nor of those famous kings of Assyria and Babylon, so renowned in sacred story; and that, in short, my account agrees very little with what that author tells us of the three first monarchies, namely, that of the Assyrians finished in the person of Sardanapalus, that of the

A. &. .216.

217:

218.

AC. Medes ended in the person of Aystages, grandfather AR of Cyrus, and that of the Persians begun by Cyrus, and destroyed by Alexander.

Tim.

To Justin you may join Diodorus, with most of the Greek and Latin authors extant, who relate those pieces of history in a different manner from that which I have followed.

As to what regards Cyrus, profane authors are by no means agreed about his history: but I thought I ought rather to follow Xenophon with St. Jerom, than Ctesias a fabulous author, whom most of the Greeks have copied after, as Justin and the Latins have the Greeks, and even rather than Herodote himself, though be be a most judicious writer. What determined me to this choice was, that Xenophon's history, more coherent and more probable in itself, has this additional advantage, that it is more conformable to scripture, which by reason of its antiquity, and the connexion of the affairs of the Jewish nation, with those of the east, would merit to be preferred to all the Grecian histories, although we did not moreover know, that it was dictated by the holy spirit.

As to the three first monarchies, what most of the Greeks have written of them, has appeared doubtful Plat in to the wisest men of Greece. Plato shows in general, under the name of the priests of Egypt, that the Gre Arist. cians were profoundly ignorant of antiquity: and Aris10. totle has ranked amongst the fabulous authors, those who wrote the Assyrian affairs.

Polit.

The matter is, the Grecians were late in beginning to write, and being willing to entertain Greece, ever curious, with ancient histories, they composed them from confused memoirs, which they contented themselves with putting in an agreeable order, without much minding the truth.

And sure the manner in which the three first monarchies are generally ranged, is evidently fabulous. For after having overthrown the Assyrian empire under Sardanapalus, the Medes are brought upon the

a. C.

1. 1. C.

stage, and then the Persians; as if the Medes had suc- A. R. ceeded to the whole power of the Assyrians, and the Persians had established themselves on the ruin of the Medes.

But on the contrary, it is certain that, when Arbaces raised the Medes in revolt against Sardanapalus, he did but set them free, without subjecting to them Herod. the empire of Assyria. Herodote, followed in this by 26, 27. the ablest chronologers, makes their first king Dejoces appear fifty years after their revolt; and it is farther certain from the concurring testimony of that great Herod. historian, and of Xenophon, not to mention others, Xen. that during the time allotted to the empire of the vi. Medes, there were in Assyria some very powerful kings, who were formidable to the whole east, and whose empire Cyrus overthrew by the taking of Babylon.

1.

Cyrop.

&c.

If then most part of the Greeks, and of the Latins, who have followed them, say nothing of those Babylonish kings, if they allow no place to that great kingdom among the first monarchies, of which they relate the succession; in short, if we find little or nothing in their works concerning the famous kings Tiglath-pileser, Shalmaneser, Sennacherib, Nebuchadnezzar, and many others so renowned in scripture, and in the eastern histories; we must impute it, either to the ignorance of the Greeks, who were more eloquent in their narrations, than curious in their inquiries; or to our having lost what was most authentic and exact in their histories.

1. i. c.

And indeed Herodote had promised a particular Herod history of the Assyrians, which we have not got, whe- 28, 87. ther it has been lost, or he has not had time to write it; and we may believe that so judicious an historian would not have omitted the kings of the second emHerod pire of the Assyrians, since Sennacherib, who was one e. 91. of them, is still to be found named in the books we have extant of that great author, as king of the Assy. rians and Arabians.

lib. ii.