“Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image.  This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee:  and the form thereof was terrible.  This image’s head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay.  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” (Dan. 2:31-35).

The interpretation of this dream, as given by the prophet, particularly concerns and interests us.  Said Daniel:  “This is the dream; and we will tell the interpretation thereof before the king.”  “Thou, O king, art a king of kings:  for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory.  And wheresoever the children of men dwell, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath he given into thine hand, and hath made thee ruler over them all.  Thou art this head of gold” (verses 36-38).

At the time of this vision the Chaldean monarchy was in the height of her power and glory.  Babylon, the capital city, was the chief “pride of the Chaldees’ excellency,” containing those magnificent hanging gardens, one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world.  Nebuchadnezzar was pointed out particularly as the head of gold in the image, but we should bear in mind that in the general language of prophecy, “kings” signify not merely individual monarchs but monarchies under a succession of princes of the same nation.  That the real significance of the head of gold is the Babylonian Kingdom or Monarchy is shown by the fact that in the description of the other three divisions of the same image they are referred to directly as kingdoms.  The Babylonian Kingdom came to an end with the death of Belshazzar, and the overthrow of his father Nabonadius in 538 B.C.

“And after thee shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee” (verse 39).  This is the explanation given of that part of the image represented by the breast and arms of silver.  This refers to the Medo-Persian empire, which, under Cyrus the Great, captured Babylon 538 B.C. and terminated the Chaldean empire.  The Persian kingdom was in certain respects inferior to the Chaldean, just as silver is inferior to gold.  It was neither as wealthy nor as prosperous, and was particularly inferior in the character of its kings, for from the death of Cyrus they are said to have been “as vile a set of men as ever disgraced human nature.”