All the elements are telling it; the sky is full of signs;
There's an ominous awakening foreboding God's designs.
E'en the timorous are telling what the mighty fear to speak,
And the powerful are cringing with the wicked and the weak.
It is God's expostulation with the wretched and the rich,
With the princes in their palaces, the drunkards in the ditch.
Christ is coming, Christ is coming, all the prophecies proclaim,
With the mighty hosts of heaven, in His chariot of flame.
He is coming, He is coming, it is written in the sky;
Earth is rip'ning for the harvest, and the harvest-time is nigh.
He has heard the cry of millions in the slavery of sin;
He has listened to the pleading of the ones He died to win;
He is gathering His armies for our liberation day;
And that great emancipation human hands can not delay.
He is whispering in the whirlwind, He is speaking in the flood,
In the perfume-laden zephyr, in the bursting of the bud.
All the stars are singing praises to the glory of His name,
While the reeling earth is groaning 'mid a load of sin and shame.
Vice parades her gaudy trappings 'mid the pleasure-seeking throng,
Tinging with enticing glamor every separate way of wrong.
Homes once happy are in ruins through the gay deceiver's wiles;
While the throng are singing praises to the drama that beguiles.
There's a luring fascination for the slinking libertine
In the comedy of passion, for a glimpse behind the scene.
Soon his blandishments are followed by the wrecking of a life,
And the bonds are snapped asunder 'tween a husband and a wife.
There's a plaintive cry ascending in a long, unceasing moan
From the law-made orphan children to the great Judge on His throne.
You may listen but a moment to the mutterings of wo
That are gathering all around you as the seasons come and go;
But the words you hear are laden with a draught of bitter dregs—
There's a great, gaunt army growing, and the ragged waif who begs
At the doorstep of your dwelling is a thorough-drilled recruit
In that massive, marching legion moving down destruction's route.
Justice heeds the cry but seldom of the innocent oppressed;
Where the glittering bribe is lacking, many a wrong is unredressed.
Wealth is marshaling its forces; labor's legions are astir;
Anarchy, the wild, red-handed, has in this its dowager.
All the nations are a-quiver with the threatenings of strife,
Pouring out a golden river for new means of taking life;
They are furrowing the ocean with a myriad ships of mail,
Ballasted like clouds of fury with a load of iron hail.
On the hill the beacon's lighted, every torch is trimmed anew,
And the ranks of moving millions gather where the harvest grew.
There's a force unseen impelling all earth's factions to the fray;
'Tis the warrior host of Satan, hastening Armageddon's day.
You have seen the stars of heaven failing as the King foretold;
Seen the moon with bloody visage; seen the sun his light withhold.
You have marked the march of knowledge with its swift increasing stride,
And the progress of invention, like an irrepressible tide.
You have seen the preparation of the armies of the world,
Waiting now the order only like swift meteors to be hurled
To the seething sea of turmoil, 'gainst the city and the plain,
Belching death in iron hailstorm, strewing all the land with slain.
God is holding still the bridle of the prancing warrior steed,
While there yet is hope in heaven and a Priest to intercede.
When redemption's work is finished in this sin-polluted land,
And the seal of God is given to His humble, faithful band,
Angel hands will stay no longer earth's impatient armed horde,
And the trodden plains will redden 'neath the threshing of the sword.
Sad will be the billows' burden where the flaming fleets go down,
With the bright-eyed sailor laddie, and the captain of renown.
Then the form of the Redeemer in the heavens will be seen,
Seated on a cloud of glory, in His hand a sickle keen.
By the hand that bled for sinners will the harvesting be done;
For salvation's work is finished, and the race of sin is run.