POET' tip fiptOktor Tip nor TOOTOTOY Kal rijS aroas iplOgarev 6 0e6s, rat vecuo crebew ert not ppaxbv xp6vov. eEKEA. o-a,ccalve• roimo o-rae7i6v. arliaas oho ecu Xg-yet rav xp6vos Tits (3aa-eXclas 6 0e6s, if577 KaracSepovnv SnXoi. Kat Tofiro xXdotza SnXo'l Kara 'EX1viSa laaTray. KidaeL roeyapotiv aou T7jv pao-EXefav, Kat M7)SOLS cal Ilipocus 6taveliel. ' He (Daniel) explained the writing thus : MASH. 'This,' said he, 'in the Greek language, may mean a number; thus God bath numbered so long a time for thy life and for thy government, and that there remains a short time for thee.' OEKEA. This signifies weight ; hence he says, God having weighed in a balance the time of thy kingdom, finds it already going down.' This also, according to the Greek language, denotes a frag ment ; hence e he will break in pieces thy kingdom, and divide it among the Medes and Persians" (Antiq. x. r r. 3). There is some doubt whether the reading gXeyev be genuine, but Josephus evi dently represents the whole passage as addressed by Daniel to the king, and makes him speak as if the inscription had been in Greek. Still Jose phus, for some cause or other, represents Daniel as speaking doubtfully (' may mean ') in the former part of the passage, and scarcely less so in the latter. It has been supposed by some, that e the wise men' were not so much at fault to read the inscription, as to explain its meaning, which, it is said, they might sufficiently understand to see its boding import to the monarch, and be unwilling to consider further—like the disciples in regard to the predictions of our Lord's death (Luke ix. 45),
where it is said, e this saying was hid from them, they perceived it not, and they feared to ask him of that saying.' And certainly it is said through out our narrative that the wise men could not read the writing, nor make known the interpreta tion of it,' phrases which would seem to mean one and the same thing ; since, if they mean different things, the order of ideas would be that they could not interpret nor even read it, and Wintle accord ingly translates, could not read so as to interpret it' (Improved Version of Daniel, Lond. ao7). At all events the meaning of the inscription by itself would be extremely enigmatical and obscure. To determine the application, and to give the full sense, of an isolated device which amounted to no more than he or it is numbered, he or it is num bered, he or it is weighed, they are divided' (and there is even a riddle or paranomasia on the last word Din ; comp. Susannah, ver. 54, 55 and 58, 59, Greek, and Jer. i. r r, 12, Hebrew ; which may either mean they divide,' or the Persians,' according as it is pronounced), must surely have required a supernatural endowment on the part of Daniel—a conclusion which is confirmed by the exact coincidence of the event with the prediction which he propounded with so much fortitude (ver. 30, 31).—J. F. D.