Esther 1:4

Verse Esther 1:4. The riches of his glorious kingdom] Luxury was the characteristic of the Eastern monarchs, and particularly of the Persians. In their feasts, which were superb and of long continuance, they made a general exhibition of their wealth, grandeur, c., and received the highest encomiums from their poets and flatterers. Their ostentation on such occasions passed into a proverb: hence Horace: -

Persicos odi, puer, apparatus:

Displicent nexae philyra coronae

Mitte sectari, rosa quo locorum

Sera moretur.

I tell thee, boy, that I detest

The grandeur of a Persian feast;

Nor for me the linden's rind

Shall the flowery chaplet bind.

Then search not where the curious rose

Beyond his season loitering grows.

FRANCIS.