In Israel’s case man had been tried on the ground of obedience to God, and had not been able to possess the blessing that should have resulted from it. Then God abandoned this direct government of the world (while still the sovereign Lord above), and casting off the elect people with the nations round them and His own throne there, subjected the world to one head, proving under this new trial whether man will own the God who gave him power to make those happy who are subjected to him when he can do what he will in the world. This began with Nebuchadnezzar, the head of the image—the system of imperial power. We know that man failed here too. But the Lord Christ will re-unite the two things in His person. He will be the one man to whom the whole dominion is given, and Israel, as well as the various nations with their kings, shall be re-established, each in his own land and his own heritage, as before the time of Nebuchadnezzar, with the exception of Edom, Damascus, Hazor, and Babylon herself (that is to say, those nations which occupy Israel’s territory; and Babylon which had absorbed and taken the place of all the others, and which must disappear by the judgment of God, to give them their place again).