Jerome : Verse 22. "'My God sent His angel and shut up the lions' mouths, and they did me no harm...'" The fierceness of the lions was not altered, but their gaping jaws were closed by the angel, and also their voracious hunger, and that too for the reason that the prophet's good works had gone before him. And so his deliverance was not so much a matter of grace as of reward for his unrightness. And these words might be uttered by every saint, for he has been snatched from the mouths of lions unseen and from the infernal pit, because he has trusted in his God. — St. Jerome, Commentary on Daniel, CHAPTER SIX