Page:Laird of Cool's ghost (NLS104186838).pdf/22

22 and even the most inhuman minds are at last weary of their conquest, and cloyed with shedding blood. At every hour and moment it mows down whole nations and kindreds. The flesh of all animals that have lived and died during the space of more than six thousand years hath not been able to glut the ravenous hunger of this devouring monster.

The fortune of war is various, he that wins the victory to-day, to-morrow may be put to flight; and he that rides at present on a triumphal car, may be come the footstool of his enemy. But Death is always victorious, and insolently triumphs over all the kings and people of the earth. It never returns to its den without being loaded with spoils, and drenched with blood. The strong Sampsons, and the victorious Davids, who have torn in pieces lions and bears, and cut off the heads of Goliahs have, at last, been devoured and swallowed up by Death. The great Alexanders, and the triumphant Cesars, who made the world tremble before them and subdued most part of the habitable earth could never find any weapons to defend them against this last enemy. When magnificient statues, and stately trophies, were erected to their honour, Death laughed them to scorn, and mocked at their foolish vanity; the rich marbles, whereon so many proud titles were engraved, covering nothing but a little rotten flesh, and a few bones, which Death hath broken and reduced to ashes.

We read, in the Revelation of the prophet Daniel, that king Nebuchadnezzar saw in a dream, a great image, whose brightness was excellent, and the form thereof terrible, "its head was of fine gold, its breast and arms were of silver, its belly and thighs of brass, its legs of iron, and its feet partly of iron, and partly of clay."-Dan. ii. 32, 33. As this mighty Prince was beholding it with astonishment, a little stone, cut