"WATCHMAN, WHAT OF THE NIGHT?"
By Editor
SUCH is the question which the sojourner in Seir asks of the prophet of God. In the Scriptures the long millenniums of this world of sin are likened to the night, in which the drunken, the reveler, the gay, find thoughtless, sensuous pleasure, but where the reflecting, the thoughtful, seeing the misery, the wo, the transgression, the death, long for the breaking of morning. "Watchman, what of the night?" Must its deeds of darkness forever go on? or are we nearing the morning? Is the day about to dawn? Thousands are asking such questions as these, and it is to answer them in part that this number of the SIGNS OF THE TIMES is issued. We should not ask the question lightly. We may not answer it carelessly. In this teeming earth and its outcome are involved the eternal fate of nations and empires and the eternal destiny of countless thousands. What of the night? It is dark to the great majority. The political, misanthropic pessimist sees only trouble and destruction and darkness of despair. The hopeful optimist, sitting by his abundant table, looking in the light of his own fire at the visions to which his wishes have given being, sees only a roseate future, and declares, "To-morrow shall be as this day, and much more abundant." Isa. 56:12. The careless, heedless pleasure-lover says mockingly, "Let us eat and drink; for to-morrow we shall die." Isa. 22:13. We may not judge the time from immediate events or present environments. Circumstances may have placed us for a time in a low valley where our vision is indeed limited by not distant mountains. It may be the valley of our household, where all is sunshine and prosperity; the dear ones are kind and well; there is plenty to eat, drink, and wear; the black shadow of evil or death has never entered our door, and our hearts do not wish a change, and we will not look beyond our limited horizon. Such a vision is intrinsically selfish. Sometimes our valley is that formed by a business river. It winds its way through the mountainous country, dashes impetuously down the narrow gorges, bursts out into broader valleys, rich in natural products, gathers strength and volume from tributaries and confluents, turns the wheel of many a mill, and we are content to bound our vision by its immediate limit, and see only prosperity. In some river valleys the reverse of all this is seen. Sometimes our point of outlook is that of the politician's knoll, looking only for what will give "our party" success and what will hinder our opponents, and viewing nothing with certainty "beyond the election." Sometimes we climb the hill a little higher. We look at earth's turmoil as a statesman, a patriot, a historian; we confess, as do earth's greatest to-day, that we know not what next, but we hope for the best. There is a better view of this earth's condition than any or all of these combined. The only true outlook of worldly things is from the watch-tower of God. The vision of the mortal is absorbed by the strong lights and shadows of the things which immediately concern him. He loses the outline of the important. His perspective is at fault. The nearer, smaller, insignificant objects of vision obscure or hide the great and essential. The little sluggish canal of his own digging seems greater than the mighty stream of time on which empires are floating to eternal wreck. A mere partisan measure of to-day shuts from our view the eternal moral principle. A name and deed of some high-lifted human hero hides the great God and our duty to Him. The worldly view is always a present view. It is the view of the sensuous, the covetous. It is the view of the mere brute. God calls all mankind—possible immortals—up into the mount with Him. He would have us see as He sees—"visions [seeings] of God." He would place us "upon a very high mountain," and in "visions of God," as recorded in His Word, He would reveal to us His own workings among the kingdoms of men despite the kings, even to the glorious consummation. He would say: "Son of man, behold with thine eyes, and hear with thine ears, and set thine heart upon all that I shall show thee; for to the intent that I might show them unto thee art thou brought hither." Eze. 40:2-4. "O thou that tellest good tidings to Zion, get thee up into the high mountain." Isa. 40:9, R.V. So only may we know "what of the night." In the prophetic Word, God has revealed to us the birth, the course, the end of earthly empire. All the great events of earthly rule, opposed tho they be to righteousness and truth, are under His guiding or restraining hand. "The wrath of man," says the psalmist, "shall praise Thee, and the remainder of wrath shalt Thou restrain." "Watchman, what of the night?" And the watchman replies: According to His unerring Word we are nearing the end of earthly rule. "The fulness of time" is nearly reached, when Christ shall take to Himself His great power and reign. Over the darkness of moral night the bright beams of the glorious Sun of Righteousness is about to arise. "The morning cometh."