Page:Studies in the Scriptures - Series I - The Plan of the Ages (1909).djvu/321

 on their wages for daily bread, and to fill the world with tramps and persons whose necessities will defy all law, Then it will be as described by the prophet (Ezek. 7 : 10- 19), when the buyer need not rejoice, nor the seller mourn ; for trouble will be upon the entire multitude and there will be no security of property. Then all hands will be feeble and helpless to turn aside the trouble. They will cast their silver in the streets, and their gold will be removed. Their silver and their gold will not be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord's wrath.

It should not be forgotten that though the last forty years of the existence of Israel as a nation was a day of trouble, a "day of vengeance' 1 upon that people, ending in the complete overthrow of their nation, yet their day of wrath was but a shadow or type of a still greater and more exten- sive trouble upon nominal Christendom, even as their past history as a people during their age of favor was typical of the Gospel age, as will be conclusively shown hereafter. All then will see why these prophecies concerning the Day of the Lord should be, and are, addressed to Israel and Jerusalem more or less directly, though the connections show clearly that all mankind is included in the complete fulfilments.

Take another prophetic testimony (Zeph. i : 7-9, 14-18), "The Lord hath prepared a slaughter, he hath bid his guests. [Compare Rev. 19 : 17.] And it shall come to pass in the day of the Lord's slaughter that I will punish the princes and the king's children, and all such as are clothed in imported clothing. And I will inflict punishment [also] on all those [marauders] who leap over the threshold on that day, who fill their masters* houses with violence and deceit. [This shows not only that there will be a great overthrow of wealth and power in this time of trouble, but that those who will for the time be the instruments of heaven in break-

�� �