arriage; the prophecy said it would be so; but "they shall not
cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay." So we see
it. No statesman, no master of legions, has been able to join these
nations together again in one great empire. Charles V had the thought in
mind, some think. Napoleon dreamed of doing it. But it was not to be.
Nevermore was there to be one universal monarchy.

We may know that as surely as the course of world empire has followed
the exact outline of the prophecy put on the inspired record in the days
of Babylon of old, just so surely the specifications of the closing
portion of the outline will be fulfilled.

The fourth great kingdom was to be divided. Rome was the fourth empire:
it was divided. The kingdoms of the divided empire are acting their part
before our eyes today.

The Next Great Event

And what next? That is the question for us. Now the prophetic outline
that began with ancient Babylon touches the things of our own day. The
word spoken before Nebuchadnezzar so long ago is now spoken especially
to us:

"In the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom,
which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to
other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these
kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.

"Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain
without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the
clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the
king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and
the interpretation thereof sure."

"In the days of these kings,"--these kingdoms of our own time,--the next
great world-changing event is to be the coming of Christ to begin the
setting up of his everlasting kingdom. That is the grand climax toward
which all the course of history has been tending. At last the end is to
come.

"Down in the feet of iron and of clay,
Weak and divided, soon to pass away;
What will the next great, glorious drama be?--
Christ and His coming, and eternity."

As the stone, cut out of the mountain "without hands," smote the image,
so that all its parts, representative of earthly dominion, were ground
to dust and blown away, so Christ's coming kingdom, set up "without
hands," by no human power, but by the power of the eternal God, will end
all earthly dominion and bring the utter destruction of sin and sinners
out of