Appendix H

Heralds of the Judgment

As the time of the papal persecutions were coming to an end, the prophecies of Matthew 24, by our Lord, concerning the moon and the sun and the stars commenced their fulfillment just as He had told His disciples they would. Thousands recognized these as the harbingers of the judgment and second advent and began to preach the soon return of our Lord Jesus Christ. It was these events that were most responsible for the great religious awakening of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

"Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:  And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.  And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. ¶Now learn a parable of the fig tree; When his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh: " Matthew 24:29-30

"And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;  And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.  And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains;" Revelation 6:12-15

"The earth shall quake before them; the heavens shall tremble: the sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw their shining: And the LORD shall utter his voice before his army: for his camp is very great: for he is strong that executeth his word: for the day of the LORD is great and very terrible; and who can abide it?...  And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.  The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come.  And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the LORD shall be delivered: for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the LORD hath said, and in the remnant whom the LORD shall call."  Joel 2:10,11,31,32  

"Behold, the day of the LORD cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it.  For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine.   And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.  I will make a man more precious than fine gold; even a man than the golden wedge of Ophir.  Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth shall remove out of her place, in the wrath of the LORD of hosts, and in the day of his fierce anger." Isaiah 13:9-13

Sign #1: November 1, 1755, "Lo, there was a great earthquake."

Source: Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica (1961 ed.), Vol. 7, p. 848.

Probably the most famous of all earthquakes is that which destroyed Lisbon on Nov. 1, 1755. There were three great earthquakes (the first was the largest) at 9:40 A.M., 10 A.M. and at noon. The main shock lasted six to seven minutes, an unusually long duration. Within six minutes at least 30,000 people were killed, all large public buildings and 12,000 dwellings were demolished. It was a church day, and great loss of life occurred in the churches. A fire followed which burned for six days. A marble quay at the riverside disappeared into the river bottom laden with people. Alexander von Humboldt stated that the total area shaken was four times that of Europe.

Source: G. A. Eiby, About Earthquakes (New York: Harper, 1957), pp. 141, 142.

By far the most spectacular earthquake of earlier times was that of Lisbon, in 1755. This has some claim to be regarded as the greatest earthquake on record. If it is possible to believe reports, the felt area, which was certainly more than 700 miles in radius, extended from the Azores to Italy, and from England to North Africa. A source of confusion in the reports of this shock, which makes it difficult to judge the real extent of the felt area, was the widespread occurrence of seiches,...wave movements in ponds and lakes....

Oscillations of this kind were observed in France, Italy, Holland, Switzerland, and England, and reports of the movements even came from Norway and Sweden, at a distance of nearly 1800 miles from the epicentre. In those countries, however, the shock was certainly not felt....

In 1755, the damage to Lisbon itself was very great. At that time, the city had about 230,000 inhabitants, nearly 30,000 of whom were killed, according to conservative estimates. Great numbers of people were in the churches, for it was All Saints’ Day, and the time of the first Mass. The shock was followed by a tsunami (tidal wave:) about twenty feet in height, and by fire.

The disaster shocked all Europe, and the moralists and the wiseacres were not slow to make capital of it.

Source: The Boston Gazette and the Country Journal, May 29, 1780, p. 4.

About eleven o’clock the darkness was such as to demand our attention, and put us upon making observations. At half past eleven, in a room with three windows, 24 panes each, all open towards the south-east and south, large print could not be read by persons of good eyes. About twelve o’clock the windows being still open, a candle cast a shade so well defined on the wall, as that profiles were taken with as much ease as they could have been in the night. About one o’clock a glint of light which had continued ‘till this time in the east, shut in, and the darkness was greater than it had been for any time before, Between one and two o’clock, the wind from the west freshened a little, and a glint appeared in that quarter. We dined about two the windows all open, and two candles burning on the table. In the time of the greatest darkness some of the dunghill fowls went to their roost: Cocks crowed in answer to one another as they commonly do in the night: Woodcocks, which are night birds, whistled as they do only in the dark: Frogs peeped. In short, there was the appearance of midnight at noonday.

Source: Samuel Williams (a Harvard professor), Memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences: to the End of the Year 1783 (Boston: Adams and Nourse, 1785), Vol. 1. pp. 234, 235.

[p. 234] People were unable to read common print to determine the time of day by their [p. 235] clocks or watches dine or manage their domestic business, without the light of candles. In some places, the darkness was so great, that persons could not see to read common print in the open air, for several hours together.

Source: Timothy Dwight, quoted in Connecticut Historical Collections, compiled by John Warner Barber (2d ed.; New Haven: Durrie & Peck and J. W. Barber, 1836), p. 403.

The 19^th of May, 1780, was a remarkable dark day. Candles were lighted in many houses; the birds were silent and disappeared, and the fouls retired to roost. The legislature of Connecticut was then in session at Hartford. A very general opinion prevailed, that the day of judgment was at hand. The House of Representatives, being unable to transact their business, adjourned. A proposal to adjourn the council was under consideration. When the opinion of Colonel [Abraham] Davenport was asked, he answered, "I am against an adjournment. The day of judgment is either approaching, or it is not. If it is not, there is no cause for an adjournment: if it is, I choose to be found doing my duty. I wish therefore that candles may be brought."

Source: John Greenleaf Whittier, "Abraham Davenport," in his Complete Poetical Works (Cambridge ed.; Boston: Houghton, 1894), p. 260.

‘Twas on a May-day of the far old year 
Seventeen hundred eighty, that there fell 
Over the bloom and sweet life of the Spring, 
Over the fresh earth and the heaven of noon, 
A horror of great darkness.

Men prayed, and women wept; all ears grew sharp 
To hear the doom-blast of the trumpet shatter 
The black sky, that the dreadful face of Christ 
Might look from the rent clouds, not as he looked 
A loving guest at Bethany, but stern 
As Justice and inexorable Law.

Meanwhile in the old State House, dim as ghosts, sat the lawgivers of Connecticut, 
Trembling beneath their legislative robes. 
"It is the Lord’s Great Day! Let us adjourn," 
Some said; and then, as if with one accord, 
All eyes were turned to Abraham Davenport. 
He rose, slow cleaving with his steady voice 
The intolerable hush. 
"This well may be The Day of Judgment which the world awaits; 
But be it so or not, I only know 
My present duty, and my Lord’s command 
To occupy till He come. 
So at the post 
Where He hath set me in His providence, 
I choose, for one, to meet Him face to face, 
No faithless servant frightened from my task, 
But ready when the Lord of the harvest calls; 
And therefore, with all reverence, I would say, 
Let God do His work, we will see to ours. 
Bring in the candles."

Source: Discourse by eyewitness Elam Potter, delivered May 28, 1780, in Enfield, Conn., quoted in The Advent Herald, March 13, 1844, p. 46.

Perhaps some, by assigning a natural cause of this, ascribing it to the thick vapor in the air, will endeavor to evade the force of its being a sign, but, the same objection will lie against earthquakes being signs which our Lord expressly mentions as such. For my part, I really consider the darkness as one of the prodigies foretold in the text; designed for our admonition, and warning.

[Note: Any suggestion of a natural cause can in no wise militate against the significance of the event as a prophetic fulfillment. The time-honored explanation is that seventeen and a half centuries before it occurred, the Saviour had definitely foretold this twofold sign saying, "In those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light" (Mark 13:24); and these signs occurred exactly as predicted and at the time indicated so long before their occurrence. It has long been pointed out that it is the fact, and not the cause, of the darkness that is significant in this connection; as also in the case of earthquakes, falling stars, and other events seen as signs of the times. When the Lord would open a path for his people through the sea, he did it by "a strong east wind." Ex. 14:21. Was it for this reason any less miraculous? In like manner, to account for the remarkable darkening of the sun and moon or of the falling of the stars as events in nature is not to discredit them as merciful signs of the approaching end of probationary time.]

Source: Benjamin Gorton, A View of Spiritual, or Anti-typical Babylon (Troy [N.Y.]: the Author, 1808), p. 73.

The second is that of the moon’s turning to blood; this I have not seen, but, from information, I have reason to believe it did take place between 2 o’clock and day break in the morning of the same night after which the sun was darkened, which was said to appear as a clotter of blood; and it is the more probable, as that night, before the moon appeared, was as dark, in proportion, as the day, and of course would give the moon an extraordinary appearance-not suffering her to give her light.

Source: News item from Providence, R.I., dated May 20, in The Pennsylvania Evening Post (Philadelphia), June 6, 1780, p. 62.

[Note: This news dispatch refers to a red moon in certain areas for a three day period.]

Source: Denison Olmsted, "Observations on the Meteors of November 13^th, 1833," The American Journal of Science and Arts, 25 ([Jan.?] 1834), 363, 365, 366, 386, 393, 394.

[p. 363] The morning of November 13^th, 1833, was rendered memorable by an exhibition of the phenomenon called SHOOTING STARS, which was probably more extensive and magnificent than any similar one hitherto recorded. . . .

Probably no celestial phenomenon has ever occurred in this country, since its first settlement, which was viewed with so much admiration and delight by one class of spectators, or with so much astonishment and fear by another class. . . .

[p. 365] The reader may imagine a constant succession of fire balls, resembling sky rockets, radiating in all directions from a point in the heavens, a few degrees south-east of the zenith, and following the arch of the sky towards the horizon. . . . The balls, as they travelled down the vault, usually left after them a vivid streak of light, and just before they disappeared, exploded, or suddenly resolved themselves into smoke. No report or noise of any kind was observed, although we listened attentively. . . .

The flashes of light, although less intense than lightning, were so bright as to awaken people in their beds. One ball that shot off in the north-west direction, and explo- [p. 366] ded a little northward of the star Capella, left, just behind the place of explosion, a phosphorescent train of peculiar beauty. . . .

[p. 386] The meteors began to attract notice by their unusual frequency or brilliancy, from nine to twelve o’clock in the evening, were most striking in their appearance, from two to five, arrived at their maximum, in many places, about four o’clock, and continued till rendered invisible by the light of day

Source: Peter M. Millman, "The Falling of the Stars," The Telescope, 7 (May-June, 1940), 57.

To understand the use of the word shower in connection with shooting stars we must go back to the early morning hours of Nov. 13, 1833, when the inhabitants of this continent [of North America] were in fact treated to one of the most spectacular natural displays that the night sky has produced. . . . For nearly four hours the sky was literally ablaze . . . . More than a billion shooting stars appeared over the United States and Canada alone.

Source: Denison Olmsted, Letters on Astronomy, Addressed to a Lady: in Which The Elements of the Science Are Familiarly Explained in Connexion With Its Literary History (1840 ed.), pp. 348, 349.

The shower pervaded nearly the whole of North America, having appeared in nearly equal splendor from the British possessions on the north to the West-India Islands and Mexico on the South, and from sixty-one degrees of longitude east of the American coast, quite to the Pacific Ocean on the west. Throughout this immense region, the duration was nearly the same.

Source: J. T. Buckingham, "The Meteoric Shower," The New-England Magazine, 6 (Jan.-June, 1834), 47, 48.

Neither language, nor the pencil, can adequately picture the grandeur and magnificence of the scene. . . . It may be doubted, whether any description has surpassed, in accuracy and impressiveness, that of the old negro in Virginia, who remarked "It is awful, indeed, sir, it looked like ripe crab-apples falling from the trees, when shaking them for cider."

Source: Garrick Mallery, "Picture-Writing of the American Indians," [U.S.] Bureau of Ethnology. Tenth Annual Report . . . to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1888-‘89 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1893), p. 723. Garrick Mallery, "Picture-Writing of the American Indians," [U.S.] Bureau of Ethnology. Tenth Annual Report . . . to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1888-‘89 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1893), p. 723.

The five winter counts [chronological records in picture writing naming each year (winter) by an outstanding event] next cited all undoubtedly refer to the magnificent meteoric display of the morning of November 13, 1833, which was witnessed throughout North America and which was correctly assigned to the winter corresponding with that of 1833-‘34. All of them represent stars having four points, except The-Swan, who draws a globular object followed by a linear track.

Fig. 1219. It rained stars. Cloud-Shield’s Winter Count, 1833-‘34. White-Cow-Killer calls it "Plenty-stars winter."

Fig. 1220. The stars moved around. American-Horse’s Winter Count, 1833-‘34. This shows one large four-pointed star as the characterizing object and many small stars, also four-pointed.

Fig. 1221. Many stars fell. The Flame’s Winter Count, 1833-‘34. The character shows six stars above the concavity of the moon.

Fig. 1222. Dakotas witnessed magnificent meteoric showers; much terrified. The- Swan’s Winter Count, 1833-‘34.

Battiste Good calls it "Storm-of-stars winter," and gives as the device a tipi with stars falling around it. This is presented in Fig. 1223.

Source: Frederick Douglass, Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (New York: Pathway Press, 1941), p. 117. (Original edition 1855.)

I witnessed this gorgeous spectacle, and was awe-struck. The air seemed filled with bright descending messengers from the sky. It was about daybreak when I saw this sublime scene. I was not without the suggestion, at the moment, that it might be the harbinger of the coming of the Son of Man; and in my then state of mind I was prepared to hail Him as my friend and deliverer. I had read that the "stars shall fall from heaven," and they were now falling.

We now stand between verses 13 and 14 of Revelation chapter 6. The next event to occur is the end of the world (verses 14-17).