The duties of these angels are manifold. Those placed at the entrances of palaces or temples are to guard those entrances. The peculiar relations of angels to men are suggested, for example, by {183} a letter of a Babylonian officer to the queen mother. He writes: "Mother of the king, my lady, be comforted. Bel's and Nabu's angel of mercy attends on the king of the land, my lord." A letter addressed to Esarhaddon contains these words: "May the great gods send a guardian of salvation and life to stand by the king my lord." And Nabopolassar, the founder of the Chaldean empire, and father of Nebuchadrezzar, writes: "To lordship over land and people, Marduk called me. He sent a cherub of mercy to attend on me, and everything I undertook he aided." Alongside of these guardian angels there appear evil spirits and demons. "These demons were everywhere: they lurked in every corner, watching for their prey. The city streets knew their malevolent presence, the rivers, the seas, the tops of the mountains. They appeared sometimes as serpents gliding noiselessly upon their victims; as birds, horrid of mien, flying resistlessly to destroy or afflict; as beings in human form, grotesque, malformed, awe-inspiring through their hideousness. To these demons all sorts of misfortunes were ascribed: toothache, headache, broken bones, raging fever, outbursts of anger, of jealousy. Did a man lie wasting of disease and torn of pain, a demon was thought to be within him, the disease being but a manifestation of his malevolence. There could be no return of the precious boon of {184} good health until the demon was exorcised, and it was to the exorcising of demons that so large, so disproportionate a part of the religious literature of Babylon and Nineveh was devoted."[24] Sometimes demons are referred to in a manner which shows that the conception in Job 1. 6ff., Zech. 3. 1ff., of the Adversary, or the Satan, is closely related to the Babylonian conception of a demon as accuser, persecutor, or oppressor. The vision of the Old Testament is largely confined to this world. There is little hope for a man after he passes away from this earth. Indeed, there are some passages which would seem to imply the thought that with death existence came entirely to an end. Compare, for example, Psa. 39.13: Oh, spare me, that I may recover strength Before I go hence, and be no more; or Job 14. 7-12: