Daniel 2:32-33

32, 33. The dreamer dreams through the ages though he knows it not. In that sleep a thousand years were but as a watch in the night. “In the Parsee tradition Zoroaster was shown four trees, one of gold, another of silver, another of steel, and the fourth of iron, and he was told that these four trees represented four ages of the world ( Bahman Yesht). Ovid sings of the ages of gold, silver, bronze, and iron ( Metamorphoses); and though Hesiod ( Works and Days) mentions five ages, he has for them only four metallic names gold, silver, brass, and iron” (Terry). Compare also Dante, Inferno, 14:94, and Goethe, Das Mahrchen.