which, at the supper of the King Belzhazzar miraculously appeared upon the wall, to the astonishment of all, were written in this mode; and hence think this artificial transposition of letters originated with God. But these things are to be passed by as {52} uncertain. If this last be true, the handwriting on the wall would have appeared thus: [Hebrew: YT`T YT`T 'RB PWGCHMT`][53] But according to the first system referred to, the following would have been the appearance.[54] [Illustration] (See Conf. Jan. Hercvles de Svnde in Steganologia, lib. v., num. 4., p. 148. seqq.) If the society of Kabbalistae originated among the Israelites as early as the time of Moses, their secret writings must having been only known to him and few besides, with their successors. Solomon, to whom Almighty God declared "wisdom and knowledge is granted unto thee,"[55] must have learned them; or, if it originated with him, Daniel and Ezra, who lived in a succeeding age; after the great temple had been destroyed, during the captivity, and at the rebuilding of the second temple, both inspired servants of God, equally knew them; and when the inscriptions on the wall, or on the ark, or in the sacred rolls, were lost and unknown to the people, they were easily deciphered by means of the knowledge of the Kabbalistic character, no matter what its form. Thus when Daniel saw the handwriting on {53} the wall he read it at once, possessed as he may have been of the knowledge how to read that cipher, while it can readily be seen why the Magi of Chaldea, and of Media and Persia, were at fault. It was a secret writing of the Hebrews, known only to the select few. Ezra, in the reign of Artaxerxes, king of Persia, "was chief-priest. This Ezra went up from Babylon, and he was a ready scribe in the law of Moses, which the Lord God of Israel had given."[56] This was, then, no new matter to him. The book of the law had been lost during the captivity. Yet, at the rebuilding of the temple, Ezra was a ready scribe in that lost writing. As such he went up from Babylon to Jerusalem.