As this half-insane work was dedicated to Manasseh, he was obliged to answer it, which he did with great prudence (February 1, 1655), gladly welcoming the pages favorable to Jews, and passing over the rest in silence. The good news concerning the near future was the more welcome to his heart, he said, as he himself, in spite of the afflictions of many centuries, did not cease ardently to hope for better times. "How gladly would I believe you, that the time is near when God, who has so long been angry with us, will again comfort His people, and deliver it from more than Babylonian captivity, and more than Egyptian bondage! Your sign of the commencement of the Messianic age, the announcement of the exaltation of Israel throughout the whole world, appears to me not only probable, but plain and clear. A not inconsiderable number of these announcements (on the Christian side) for the consolation of Zion have been sent to me from Frankenberg and Mochinger, from France and Hungary. And from England alone how many voices! They are like that small cloud in the time of the prophet Elijah, which suddenly extended so that it covered the whole of the heavens." Manasseh ben Israel had the courage to express without ambiguity Jewish expectations in opposition to the opinions held by Christian enthusiasts. They, for the most part, imagined the fifth monarchy, which they alleged was about to commence, as the millennium, when Jesus would again appear and hand over the sovereign power to the saints. The Jews would have a share in it; they would assemble from the ends of the earth, return to their ancestral home, and again build Jerusalem and the Temple. But this would be only an intermediate state, the means to enable the whole Twelve Tribes to acknowledge Jesus as Messiah, so that there be but one flock under one shepherd. Against this Manasseh ben Israel composed a treatise, ended April 25, 1655, on the fifth kingdom of the prophecy of Daniel, interpreting it to mean the independence of Israel. In this work, called "The Glorious Stone, or the Image of Nebuchadnezzar," and dedicated to Isaac Vossius, then in the service of the queen of Sweden, he put forth all his learning to show that the visions of the "four beasts," or great kingdoms, had been verified in the successive sway of the Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans, and therefore the coming of the fifth kingdom also was certain. This was shown in Daniel plainly enough to be the kingdom of Israel, the people of God. In this Messianic kingdom all nations of the earth will have part, and they will be treated with kindness, but the authority will ever rest with Israel. Manasseh disfigured this simple thought by Kabbalistic triviality and sophistry. It is singular that not only did a learned Christian accept the dedication of this essentially Jewish work, but the celebrated painter Rembrandt supplied four artistic