Page:Mahometanism in its relation to prophecy - or, an inquiry into the prophecies concerning antichrist, with some reference to their bearing on the events of the present day (IA mahometanisminit00philrich).pdf/36

 they said unto it: Arise, devour much flesh; ' that may refer to the period of Assuerus, whom the Septuagint names Artaxerxes, when Aman exhorted him in one day to slay all the Jews. We must observe the prophet does not say, that the beast devoured much flesh, but that they said unto it, ' Arise and devour much flesh;' signifying that the thing would be planned, but not executed." And here we may add to the exposition of St. Jerome, that these words may also refer to the unsuccessful expeditions of Darius, and subsequently of Xerxes, against Greece, when the wonderful bravery of the Greeks overthrew the almost countless hosts of the Persians in the memorable battles of Marathon, Thermopylae, Artemisium, and Salamis. But St. Jerome continues: " 'After this I beheld, and lo ! another beast, like unto a leopard.' The third kingdom, of which it is said, in the corresponding vision of Nabuchodonosor's statue,  'his belly and his thighs of brass.'  This kingdom is that of the Macedonian Greeks, and it is compared to a leopard, one of the swiftest of beasts, and : to signify its headlong course of conquest. And it had four wings; signifying the wonderful rapidity with which Alexander the Great won victory after victory, from the Illyrian and Adriatic Sea even to the Indian Ocean and the Ganges; so