Babylon Hanging Garden
The SecretThe Hanging Gardens of Babylon are invoked in The Secret as the architectural emblem of ancient Babylonian prosperity. Their decisive significance is not developed through a physical description or a narrated visit, but through their status as a celebrated wonder that supports the book’s claim that prosperity follows from understanding and applying universal laws.
Definition and Setting
The Hanging Gardens are identified as one of the Seven Wonders of the World associated with the ancient Babylonians. The book places them within a broader account of Babylonian wealth and achievement, presenting ancient Babylon as a civilization whose material success was sufficiently remarkable to be preserved in historical memory.
The gardens function as a remembered historical site rather than a contemporary setting. No detailed account is given of their construction, appearance, location within Babylon, or survival; instead, the reference compresses their significance into the combination of ancient civilization, extraordinary accomplishment, and enduring fame.
Babylonian Prosperity
Bob Proctor states that the ancient Babylonians and their great prosperity have been well documented by scholars. The gardens therefore appear not as an isolated marvel but as visible evidence within an argument about the civilization’s exceptional wealth. Their wonder-status lends grandeur and historical weight to the claim that Babylonian success was more than accidental.
The book attributes that prosperity to the Babylonians’ understanding and application of the laws of the Universe. In this framework, the gardens become a consequence of knowledge put into practice: a monumental achievement that illustrates how an underlying law, once understood, can produce abundance and influence on a civilizational scale.
Place in the Book’s Historical Argument
The reference to the Hanging Gardens belongs to the book’s larger effort to trace the law of attraction through history. The Secret is described as knowledge known by great teachers across centuries, preserved in writings, teachings, religious traditions, and ancient civilizations. Ancient Babylon is included in that genealogy as one of the early cultures said to have understood the universal laws.
This historical framing gives the gardens a double role. They are both a cultural landmark and an argumentative exhibit. By linking a famous wonder to Babylonian prosperity, the book turns historical greatness into corroboration for its spiritual and motivational thesis, even though it does not provide a separate historical analysis of the gardens themselves.
Narrative and Thematic Significance
The gardens embody the book’s recurring contrast between hidden knowledge and visible results. The laws of the Universe are treated as principles that may remain unknown or unrecognized to most people, while wealth, achievement, and abundance appear as their outward effects. The gardens supply the memorable image of that movement from unseen understanding to public accomplishment.
Their inclusion also extends the book’s network of authority beyond its modern teachers. The ancient Babylonians stand beside philosophers, artists, scientists, religious traditions, and contemporary practitioners as part of a long historical chain. In that chain, the Hanging Gardens provide the clearest material symbol: a wonder remembered across centuries and used to suggest that prosperity can be read as the architectural trace of universal principles understood and applied.