Page:Studies in the Scriptures - Series I - The Plan of the Ages (1909).djvu/322

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Plan of the

ing down present systems will also be punished for their equally tinjust and unrighteous course; for the coming trouble will involve all classes* and bring distress upon all the multitude.]

Nigh is the great Day of the Lord : it is nigh. Nearer and louder comes the uproar of the Day of the Lord. There the mighty shall shriek bitterly I That day is a day of wrath, a day of distress and anxiety, a day of wasting and desolation, a day of darkness and obscurity (uncertainty and foreboding, as well as present distress], a day of clouds [trouble] and tempestuous gloom, a day of the trumpet [the seventh symbolic trumpet, which sounds throughout this day of trouble also called the trump of God, because conne&ed with the event* of this Day of the Lord] and shouting against the fenced cities and the high battlements [clamor- ous and conflicting denunciations of strong and well-in- trenched governments], And I will bring distress upon men, and they shall walk about as blind men [groping in uncertainty, not knowing what course to pursue], because they have sinned against Jehovah. Their blood shall be poured out as the dust, and their flesh shall be as dung. Neither theiur silver *ior then gold shall be able to deliver them in the day <;>* '-be Lord's wrath [though previously wealth could furnish sase and every luxury), but the whole land shall be devoured by the FIRE of his zeal} for destruc- tion,, yea, quite sudden, will he prepare for all them [the wealthy] tha* dwett in the land,'" This destruction will destroy marxy ,trf the wealthy in the sense that they will cease to be wealthy, though doubtless tf, will also involve th* loss of many bves nf *\l classes.

We shaU not attempt to follow the prophets in their de- tails, from various standpoints, of the trouble of that day, but shall follow briefly the thought last suggested by the

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