The last curse on Babylon reminds us of the fatal looseness of a society that is built only upon the interests of trade; of the loneliness and uselessness that await, in the end, all lives, which keep themselves alive simply by trafficking with men. If we feed life only by the news of the markets, by the interest of traffic, by the excitement of competition, by the fever of speculation, by the passions of cupidity and pride, we may feel healthy and powerful for a time. But such a life, which is merely a being kept brisk by the sense of gaining something or overreaching some one, is the mere semblance of living; and when the inevitable end comes, when they that have trafficked with us from our youth depart, then each particle of strength with which they fed us shall be withdrawn, and we shall fall into decay. There never was a truer picture of the quick ruin of a merely commercial community, or of the ultimate loneliness of a mercenary and selfish life, than the headlong rush of traders, _each as he could find passage_, from the city that never had other attractions even for her own citizens than those of gain or of pleasure. FOOTNOTES: [108] _Cf._ Doughty, _Arabia Deserta_. [109] The Turanians, who occupied Mesopotamia before the Semitic invasion, were the first builders of cities. [110] Babylon, as far as we can learn, first rose to power about the time of that Amraphel who fought in the Mesopotamian league against the neighbours and friends of Abraham. Amraphel is supposed to have been the father of Hammurabis, who first made Babylon the capital of Chaldea. It scarcely ever again ceased to be such; but it was not till the fall of Assyria, about 625 B.C., and the rebuilding of Babylon by Nebuchadrezzar (604-561), that the city's second and greatest glory began. [111] See ch. iv., pp. 53-56. [112] Vol. i., pp. 409-315. [113] Vol. i., pp. 275, 286, 294. [114] See especially _Satires III._ and _VI._, and _cf._ Bagehot's _Physics and Politics_. [115] Rev. xvii., xviii. [116] Ch. xlv. CHAPTER XIII. _THE CALL TO GO FORTH._ ISAIAH xlviii. On the substance of ch. xlviii. we have already encroached, and now it is necessary only to summarise its argument, and to give some attention to the call to go forth from Babylon, with which it concludes. Chapter xlviii. is addressed, as its first verse declares, to the exiles from Judah[117]: _Hear this, Oh House of Jacob, that call yourselves by the name of Israel, and from the waters of Judah have come forth_: that is, you so-called Israelites, who spring from Judah. But their worship of Jehovah is only nominal and unreal: _They who swear by the name of Jehovah, and celebrate the God of Israel, not in truth and not in righteousness; although by the Holy City they name themselves, and upon the God of Israel they lean--Jehovah of Hosts is His Name!_