98 They must have known, also, that there were many persons watching them, anxious to find occasion to injure them with their Master; for the power, and wealth, and honours, which Nebuchad nezzar had bestowed upon these Hebrew strangers, had excited the envy of many of the Babylonians. The worship of the golden image was over, and the people were about to separate, when several Chaldeans approached king Nebuchadnezzar, and addressed him in the customary language, saying, “O king, live for ever !” They had watched the conduct of the young Jews before the idols, to see whether they obeyed the law of their God, or the commands of the king. They saw with joy that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abéd-nego chose even to be singular among this great and to expose themselves to a most dreadful death, rather than to sin against God. They now eagerly went to the king with their complaints : “Thou, Q king, hast made a decree, that every man that shall hear the sound of the cornet, fluge, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer, and all kinds of music, shall fall down
