In other cases, without this multiplication, we observe expressions which imply a similar identification of the actual god with the mere image.

Tiglath-Pileser I., boasts that he has set Anu and Vul (i.e., their images) up in their places.

He identifies repeatedly the images which he carries off from foreign countries with the gods of those countries.

In a similar spirit Sennacherib asks, by the mouth of Rabshakeh, "_Where are the gods_ of Hamath and of Arpad?
_Where are the gods_ of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivah ?"--and again unable to rise to the conception of a purely spiritual deity, supposes that, because Hezekiah has destroyed all the images throughout Judaea, he has left his people without any divine protection.

The carrying off of the idols from conquered countries, which we find universally practised, was not perhaps intended as a mere sign of the power of the conqueror, and of the superiority of his gods to those of his enemies; it was probably designed further to weaken those enemies by depriving them of their celestial protectors; and it may even have been viewed as strengthening of the conqueror by multiplying his divine guardians.