Instead of being a protector of men, Babylon became a proud and cruel oppressor. The words of Inspiration picturing the cruelty and greed of rulers in Israel reveal the secret of Babylon’s fall and of the fall of many another kingdom since the world began: “Ye eat the fat, and ye clothe you with the wool, ye kill them that are fed: but ye feed not the flock. The diseased have ye not strengthened, neither have ye healed that which was sick, neither have ye bound up that which was broken, neither have ye brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that which was lost; but with force and with cruelty have ye ruled them.”Ezekiel 34:3, 4.
(Ed 176.1)
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To the ruler of Babylon came the sentence of the divine Watcher: O king, “to thee it is spoken; The kingdom is departed from thee.”Daniel 4:31.
(Ed 176.2)
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“Come down, and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon, Sit on the ground: there is no throne.... Sit thou silent, And get thee into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans; For thou shalt no more be called, The lady of kingdoms.”Isaiah 47:1-5.
(Ed 176.3)
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“O thou that dwellest upon many waters, abundant in treasures, Thine end is come, and the measure of thy covetousness,”Jeremiah 51:13.
(Ed 176.4)
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“Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, The beauty of the Chaldees’ excellency, Shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.”Isaiah 13:19.
(Ed 176.5)
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Every nation that has come upon the stage of action has been permitted to occupy its place on the earth, that it might be seen whether it would fulfill the purpose of “the Watcher and the Holy One.”Daniel 4:13. Prophecy has traced the rise and fall of the world’s great empires—Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. With each of these, as with nations of less power, history repeated itself. Each had its period of test, each failed, its glory faded, its power departed, and its place was occupied by another.
(Ed 176.7)
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