No. 4.
MY DEAR CHILDREN. — I promised you that this letter should contain an account of Babylon, about which so much is said in Scripture, and so much written in profane history. There can be no reasonable doubt that it was the site of the empire of Nimrod the mighty hunter (Genesis 10:1010And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. (Genesis 10:10)), and the very place where man, in his pride, built the tower of Babel, to make himself a name, and to escape that scattering which eventually became a motel necessity by the judgment of God in the confusion of tongues (Gen. 11:1-91And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. 2And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. 3And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them throughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for mortar. 4And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth. 5And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. 6And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. 7Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. 8So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city. 9Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth. (Genesis 11:1‑9)). We hear afterward of Amraphel, king of Shinar (Babylon), attacking Sodom, and of “a goodly Babylonish garment” (Joshua 7:2121When I saw among the spoils a goodly Babylonish garment, and two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold of fifty shekels weight, then I coveted them, and took them; and, behold, they are hid in the earth in the midst of my tent, and the silver under it. (Joshua 7:21)), by which passages we learn that it must have been still a kingdom, otherwise it is lost sight of until after the time of Solomon, and then, when he Assyrian monarchs― whose metropolis was Nineveh― began to make inroads upon Palestine Chaldea, with its capital, was clearly a province If the Assyrian empire. But as these attacks certainly did not begin sooner than 900 years before Christ, we have a gap from Genesis of more than a thousand years to fill up. But the scanty fragments of profane history agree in giving 2234 years before Christ as the date of the original Chaldean kingdom, of which Amraphel, king of Shinar (about 1918 B.C.), was one of the monarchs. This monarchy fell before the Assyrian, which rose into supremacy within the limits of the 13th century before Christ. From this time, until the rise of Nebuchadnezzar’s father, Babylon was ruled by the Assyrians as a province of the empire, although with oft-repeated and sometimes successful attempts at independence, until, at the fall of Nineveh by the Median revolt, Babylon about 606 B.C., or rather sooner, became the seat of empire in the East. You should recollect that the Hebrew Bible gives for the flood 2348 years before Christ, but the Septuagint, or Greek translation carries it back to 3155 B.C. We have now done with dates for the present, and I must tell you about the city itself.
First, ―Scripture repeatedly hints as to its immense size, as in Jeremiah 51:3131One post shall run to meet another, and one messenger to meet another, to show the king of Babylon that his city is taken at one end, (Jeremiah 51:31), and all history agrees. Beginning with its outside dimensions, every ancient writer considers it was a perfect square, whilst they differ as to the length of its tides. Herodotus, the most ancient historian, and who appears to have been there, makes the sides fifteen miles each way, whilst by others they are reduced down to eleven. Their height, according to Herodotus, was 373ft. 4in., or 13ft. 4in. higher than St. Paul’s cathedral, and their width somewhere about 80 feet. Supposing we consider the area to be 120 square miles, what a vast extent! Six hundred and forty acres is a square mile, and this makes two good-sized farms in England. These walls were built out of the excavations of a broad and deep moat which surrounded them, to which moat the river Euphrates, which runs in a north and south direction through the extent of the city, supplied the water, and would be, as to their size, absolutely fabulous, if we had western Europe only before our thoughts. But we have to consider, not only the genius of the East, which, from the time of the tower of Babel, has delighted in vast structures, but also, first, that the bricks were made and dried at the very spot, requiring no great art in their manufacture, and that there was a water communication for bringing the bitumen, or fluid pitch, which served for mortar, from the place where it came. Secondly, there was an unlimited amount of labor in the captives, whose lives otherwise were of no value to their conquerors, and who, most likely, had no wages, but only food. We are told, in the annals of the great Sennacherib, found at Nineveh, that when he undertook the repairs of that city, he collected his prisoners into four bodies, assigning 360,000 men for the repair of the great palace, and employing women almost to the same amount in restoring the other buildings. Thirdly, the Scripture is very explicit about these eastern cities, that they were “great, and walled up to heaven.” It is said in Jeremiah 51:5353Though Babylon should mount up to heaven, and though she should fortify the height of her strength, yet from me shall spoilers come unto her, saith the Lord. (Jeremiah 51:53), “Though Babylon should mount up to heaven, and though she should fortify the height of her strength;” and again, “The broad wall of Babylon shall be utterly broken, and her high gates shall be burned with fire.” In the apocryphal book of Judith useful for its historical details, Ecbatana, the Median capital, is described as having walls 70 cubits high, and 50 broad, with towers upon the gates 100 cubits high, and the breadth of the foundation 60 cubits, the gates themselves being 70 cubits. A cubit is about 18 inches. Of course, then, Babylon being “the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldees’ excellency,” “the golden city,” the size of her walls need not be rejected, though they contained nearly twice the cubic extent of the great wall of China, or more materials, as has been affirmed, than in all the buildings of the British empire. These walls had on each of the four sides twenty-five brazen gates, for which, very likely, the brazen vessels of the temple of Jerusalem were employed (Jeremiah 52:17-2317Also the pillars of brass that were in the house of the Lord, and the bases, and the brazen sea that was in the house of the Lord, the Chaldeans brake, and carried all the brass of them to Babylon. 18The caldrons also, and the shovels, and the snuffers, and the bowls, and the spoons, and all the vessels of brass wherewith they ministered, took they away. 19And the basons, and the firepans, and the bowls, and the caldrons, and the candlesticks, and the spoons, and the cups; that which was of gold in gold, and that which was of silver in silver, took the captain of the guard away. 20The two pillars, one sea, and twelve brazen bulls that were under the bases, which king Solomon had made in the house of the Lord: the brass of all these vessels was without weight. 21And concerning the pillars, the height of one pillar was eighteen cubits; and a fillet of twelve cubits did compass it; and the thickness thereof was four fingers: it was hollow. 22And a chapiter of brass was upon it; and the height of one chapiter was five cubits, with network and pomegranates upon the chapiters round about, all of brass. The second pillar also and the pomegranates were like unto these. 23And there were ninety and six pomegranates on a side; and all the pomegranates upon the network were an hundred round about. (Jeremiah 52:17‑23)), and were surmounted at intervals by high towers. When these walls met the bank of the river, which flowed through the city, and which were scarped and bricked, they were continued along them at a lower height and interrupted only by the stairs for the streets which led down to the water side. These streets opening to the river had also brazen gates, which were closed at night. It was the omission to dose these river-side gates which enabled the soldiers of Cyrus to climb up into the city, whet: they had marched into the drained river’s bed. The streets of the city were all laid out in parallel lines, terminating at each of the twenty-five wall gates, and therefore crossing one another at right angles.
Besides the boat traffic between the two banks of the Euphrates, they were connected by a bridge in the center of the city. For the foundation of the piers, and for the general security of the banks, a former queen had formed a vast reservoir, or lake, into which she had drained the river. So much for the great framework, as it were, of this vast capital. The walls, which, according to Herodotus, were wide enough to drive two four-horse chariots abreast, and in parts to turn them, were probably the great promenades, where crowds took the air every day. Looked at from a distance, the whole appearance might have been like Windsor Castle, indefinitely magnified. But we must go on to the interior. Herodotus, the Greek historian, from whom this description has principally been given, says the houses were three and four stories high, lying in squares, and beautifully garnished; but we are not to imagine this whole vast space to have been inhabited. There were orchards and parks, large squares and farms; so that, in case of a siege, provisions might not be wanting. Everything that ministered to the pomp of the king himself, and to the worship of the gods, was finished with elaborate care, and attended to at a vast expense whilst, owing to the climate, the people would live much in the open air. Thus we are not to suppose them packed together, as in London or Paris. Besides the great outer wall, there was an inner fortification, comprising an area of about five miles, and embracing within it the great public buildings on either side of the river, of which the bridge formed the connection. Those on the west side of the river consisted of the temple of Bel, and an old palace; those on the east, a huge fortress, and the new palace of Nebuchadnezzar. It was begun and completed by him in fifteen days. It had―so says the recently-discovered tablets ― “many chambers and lofty towers,” and was called “the wonder of mankind.” Compare Jeremiah 51:4141How is Sheshach taken! and how is the praise of the whole earth surprised! how is Babylon become an astonishment among the nations! (Jeremiah 51:41): “How is the praise of the whole earth surprised!” Nebuchadnezzar says, “Silver and gold and precious stones, whose names were almost unknown, I stored up inside, and placed there the treasure-house of my kingdom.” Again, “With pillars and beams, plated with copper and strengthened with iron, I built up its gates.” Close to the palace were what have been universally called the hanging gardens. They were, apparently, terraces raised one above the other, with earth laid on them deep enough to encourage the growth of the largest trees. This was done to please his queen, who, being from Media, which is a hilly country, and Babylon being quite flat, had thus the scenery of her native land recalled to her mind. The king appears to have surrounded the buildings on the east side with water, and to have taken great pains with the reservoirs of the city, and to preserve the river Euphrates, ever liable to overflow its banks, in its proper coarse.
As I am writing to you about the four empires and the head of gold of the statue, you must bear in memory that, whilst the walls, and some of the palaces and of the temples and reservoirs, had been before existing, yet Nebuchadnezzar’s master mind and ready hand repaired, embellished, improved, or added to them all this is attested by every brick being marked by his name; whilst his own palace and the hanging gardens, with their enclosures, were the creations of his own genius: “Is not this great Babylon which I have built?” Sir Henry Rawlinson, the great authority in the interpretation of the recently-discovered cuneiform inscriptions, does not doubt that one of the tablets alludes in a delicate way to his seven, years’ madness, as if he had been separated from his subjects on account of illness for a certain time, and restored again.
I do not know? that I need write anything more of the city at present, as I shall have to return to it when we get into the history of the second empire―that, of Persia. There is always danger of being too minute in description, where, in reality, everything is told us but in outline. If history is found sufficiently to agree with Scripture, as to the grandeur and luxury of Babylon, we shall find, when we come to see what it says of her downfall, that facts, and not writings, demonstrate the exact accomplishment of her destiny.
I hope, if I am spared in life, to write to you next about the breast and arms of silver, or the Medo-Persian empire.
I remain, your affectionate father,