Behold, Reader! on what a slender thread the happiness of man hangs, when in a moment the appearance on a wall can snap it asunder! What was it so alarmed the reveling prince, and his drunken lords? Simply the view of a man's hand, writing on the wall! But what did he write! In truth, none of the company could tell, for none of them could read it. But what none of them could do, conscience did for them. Belshazzar felt the whole of the evil before it was explained; and more than anticipated all. I beg the Reader to remark with me, the beautiful correspondence between the prediction of this event, and the accomplishment. Isaiah had been commissioned to tell of this two hundred years at least before. Cyrus was named by the Lord as his servant, to the ruin of Babylon, to open the two-leaved gates, and that the Lord would loose, it was said, the loins of kings. And here we learn, that Belshazzar, (and no doubt his princes also), literally had this prophecy accomplished in his own person. See Isaiah 45:1-4. Historians relate, that Cyrus found out a passage to enter Babylon through the river Euphrates, where there was two-leaved gates. What a wonderful coincidence of providences there must have been, to bring about such events! Reader! never forget that the Lord cannot need instruments for the accomplishment of his will, whenever that will is about to be manifested to his creatures!
Daniel 5:5-9
5 In the same hour came forth fingers of a man's hand, and wrote over against the candlestick upon the plaister of the wall of the king's palace: and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote.
6 Then the king's countenanceb was changed, and his thoughts troubled him, so that the joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one against another.
7 The king cried aloudc to bring in the astrologers, the Chaldeans, and the soothsayers. And the king spake, and said to the wise men of Babylon, Whosoever shall read this writing, and shew me the interpretation thereof, shall be clothed with scarlet, and have a chain of gold about his neck, and shall be the third ruler in the kingdom.
8 Then came in all the king's wise men: but they could not read the writing, nor make known to the king the interpretation thereof.
9 Then was king Belshazzar greatly troubled, and his countenanced was changed in him, and his lords were astonied.