Page 71 - 02 The Great Image
P. 71
DANIEL AND THE REVELATION-Uriah Smith
~The Response of History to the Voice of Prophecy~
Chapter 2-The Great Image
Grecian fable, Bacchus and Hercules, two
sons of Jupiter, whose son he also claimed to
be, had done the same. With contemptible
arrogance, he claimed for himself divine
honors. He gave up conquered cities, freely
and unprovoked, to the absolute mercy of his
blood-thirsty and licentious soldiery. He
himself often murdered his own friends and
favorites in his drunken frenzies. He sought
out the vilest persons for the gratification of
his lust. At the instigation of a dissolute and
drunken woman, he with a company of his
courtiers, all in a state of frenzied intoxication,
sallied out, torch in hand, and fired the city
and palace of Persepolis, one of the then finest
palaces in the world. He encouraged such
excessive drinking among his followers that
on one occasion twenty of them together died
as the result of their carousal. At length,