Tall Buildings in New York City.
NEW YORK is about to realize her dream of a fifty-story office building. The Singer Building, with a height of 612 feet from the sidewalk to the apex, has been holding the record. But the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company began the erection some time ago of a building to be forty-six stories, mounting to a height of 658 feet above the sidewalk. This building is now well under way, and the architect is not satisfied with the appearance of the top of the structure, and so four more stories are to be added, bringing it to the bewildering height of 700 feet from the sidewalk, and 726 feet from the foundations, there being two stories below the surface. This building, when completed, will be devoted to office purposes, and thousands of people will be contained during office hours in its many rooms. New York has also in contemplation an immense sight-seeing tower that will rise still higher, if built, than this insurance company's building. Surely men are projecting great things in these days, little thinking of what the word of God has said concerning His purposes in regard to the wicked cities of earth. For it is a known fact that the great cities are veritable cesspools of vice and corruption. This fact is admitted and deplored by every one who knows the facts so far as they are revealed, for it can not be assumed that any one, aside from God Himself, knows all of the awful facts of the wickedness with which these great centers of population are both openly and secretly reeking. History and the Bible have given us the accounts of numerous cities in the past that have become infamous for their vaunted wickedness. And it has been the invariable example that they have been overthrown by the mighty judgments of God. These are simple facts that any one may know who will take the pains to inquire into the subject. God's unvarying plan will be carried out with the wicked cities of this time, as the following words from His own Book abundantly show: "Destruction upon destruction is cried; for the whole land is laid waste: suddenly are my tents destroyed, and my curtains in a moment. How long shall I see the standard, and hear the sound of the trumpet? For My people are foolish, they know Me not; they are sottish children, and they have no understanding; they are wise to do evil; but to do good they have no knowledge. "I beheld the earth, and, lo, it was waste and void; and the heavens, and they had no light. I beheld the mountains, and, lo, they trembled, and all the hills moved to and fro. I beheld, and, lo, there was no man, and all the birds of the heavens were fled. I beheld, and, lo, the fruitful field was a wilderness, and all the cities thereof were broken down at the presence of Jehovah, and before His fierce anger. "For I have heard a voice as of a woman in travail, the anguish as of her that bringeth forth her first child, the voice of the daughter of Zion, that gaspeth for breath, that spreadeth her hands, saying, Wo is me now! for my soul fainteth before the murderers." Jer. 4:20-26, 31.11 This scripture pictures the time when the whole earth will be a desolation—the time when there will be "no man," and when the fruitful fields will become one vast wilderness. Such language could apply to no other time than when the judgments of God have depopulated the earth in the great day of its final doom. And in that time observe that it is said that "My people are foolish, they know Me not; they are sottish children, and they have no understanding; they are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge." And then again it speaks of the anguish that is caused among those who cry out, "My soul fainteth before the murderers." This is a day and age of the world when a very large portion of mankind claims to be the children of God. But of them he says, "My people are foolish, they know Me not." They are skilled in doing evil, but they know not how to do the right. They claim to know the Lord of righteousness, but they have not really learned of Him the ways of right-doing. And now do not fail to note particularly that the text clearly says that because of this wickedness "all the cities thereof were broken down at the presence of Jehovah, and before His fierce anger." We may know from this divine decree that there will not be a city on the face of the earth that will not be "broken down." And when the wickedness that may be seen just on the surface of any of these cities is taken into consideration, who can say that the decree is not a just one? It will be an awful time when these cities, with their towering structures that men claim can not be thrown down, are turned into tumbling ruins. The majority of mankind will not sense the meaning of all this till it is forever too late. They mock at the warnings that God is giving us thru His word. But those who will heed the warning will not be flocking to these great, wicked centers, neither will they be found dwelling in these death-traps that men are erecting in every city in the world. This is a time for serious reflection concerning these important subjects.