glorious of the sky;” and that “_Israel should dwell alone_: the fountain of Jacob should be in a land of corn and wine; and his heaven should drop down dew.” In the contemplation of such a glorious prospect, he might be led to say with the great lawgiver himself: “Happy art thou, O Israel: who is like unto thee, O people, saved by the Jehovah, who is the shield of thy help, and the sword of thy excellency!” Deut. xxxiii. 5, 13, 26. Truly as the poet said “the Eternal (Κρονος, _Time without end_) now reigns their King.” The sudden transition of the Poet from the description of the _Fourth age_, to that of the _Fifth_, with his rapid glance at the _Sixth_, which extends from v. 174 to v. 201, shows that his mind must have been wrought up to a great pitch of feeling and sublimity, in reflecting on the glorious deeds of the past age, and the splendid anticipations of the future. With the description of the _Fifth_ or _Iron age_ in which he himself lived, we cannot but deeply sympathise, feeling as we do that it has returned in our own days, and that its features are precisely the same as those which now characterize this _age of Bronze_.[64] “Oh! how I wish,” says he, “that I had not lived in the _Fifth age_ (πέμπτοισι ἀνδράσιν), but had either died before it, or lived after it; for, now indeed is the _Iron age_; and they will rest neither day nor night from labour and misery, corrupting each other; but the gods shall give them unutterable sorrows; still even to these shall good and evil be intermingled; but Jupiter shall destroy the men of this age, for they shall become grey-headed soon after their birth; because the father will not live in unity with his children, nor the children with the father; the guest with his host, nor the friend with his companion; and the brother will be no longer affectionate, as in former ages; and soon shall they dishonour their parents growing old; then also shall the wicked attack them, speaking cruel words, and not fearing the wrath of the gods; nor shall the lawless then yield to their aged parents the rewards of their education; but one shall destroy the city of another; and no favour shall be shown to the pious, or the just, or the good; but they will rather honour the evildoer, and encourage injustice; nor shall there be any justice or modesty in their hands; and the wicked man shall injure the good, addressing him with hard speeches, and even be guilty of perjury; and croaking envy of hateful countenance, rejoicing in evil, shall pursue the whole race of miserable mortals; and then shall blushing Modesty and indignant Virtue, clothed in their white robes, having forsaken mankind, pass from the spacious earth to Olympus, to mingle with the immortal gods; then shall they leave direful woes to mortal men; and there shall be no help for the evil.” In this description, the Poet, who, according to the best authorities, lived about the end of the first century of the _Iron age_, seems to have