Babylon became almost deserted after his death; the
swamps grew worse, till no one could live there, and at last, the only
use of the great walls was to serve as an enclosure for a hunting
ground, where the wild beasts had their home, and kept court for ever.
LESSON XVI.
THE GREEK KINGS OF EGYPT.
"Why hast Thou then broken down her hedge, that all they that go by
pluck off her grapes?"--_Ps_. lxxx. 12.
The leopard of Daniel's vision had four heads--the great horn of the
rough goat gave place to four horns; so when Alexander was taken away so
suddenly from the midst of his conquests, leaving no one in his room,
his great officers divided them between themselves; and after much
violence and bloodshed, four Greek kingdoms were formed out of the
fragments of his conquests, Thrace, Macedon, Egypt, and Syria. It is
only the two last of which we have to speak. The angel who spake to
Daniel called their princes the Kings of the North and South. The north,
or second kingdom of Syria, was very large, and went from Asia Minor to
the borders of India, and it had two great capital cities, Antioch in
Syria, and Seleucia upon the Tigris, where the Babylonians went to live
when their city became deserted and uninhabitable.
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