None of the magicians of Babylon could tell him. A
young Jew, named Daniel, told him the dream and its meaning, and
declared at the same time that he had found it out by no wisdom of
his own, but God had revealed it to him. Nebuchadnezzar learned his
lesson, and confessed Daniel's God to be a God of gods and a Lord of
kings, and a revealer of secrets, seeing that Daniel could reveal
that secret; and forthwith, like a wise prince, advanced Daniel and
his companions to places of the highest authority and trust.
But Nebuchadnezzar required another lesson. He had learned that the
God of the Jews was wiser than all the planets and heavenly lords and
gods whom the Babylonian magicians consulted; he had not learned that
that same God of the Jews was the Creator and Lord of heaven and
earth. He had learned that the God of heaven favoured him, and had
helped him toward his power and glory; but he thought that for that
very reason the power and glory were his own--that he had a right
over the souls and consciences of his subjects, and might make them
worship what he liked, and how he liked.
Three Jews, whom he had set over the affairs of Babylon, refused to
worship the golden image which he had set up, and were cast into a
fiery furnace, and forthwith miraculously delivered, and beheld by
Nebuchadnezzar walking unhurt and loose in the midst of the furnace,
and with them a fourth, whose form was like the form of the Son of
God.
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