There is in this expression, which occurs in various parts of this book of prophecy, a certain vagueness which is not inconsistent with grandeur and sublimity. The prophet's own mind was evidently impressed with the fact that, whilst every day is an occasion for the manifestation of the Divine presence among men, there are days which are peculiarly the Lord's, because connected in an especial manner with the purposes of the Eternal with regard to the sons of time.

I. THE DAY OF THE REVELATION OF THE LORD'S POWER. Memorable are such days as those which witness a great king's accession to the throne, a great battle deciding the fortunes of nations, the passing of a great measure affecting the welfare of millions, the sending forth of a religious mission to a heathen community. But, whilst every day upon which some grand deed is wrought, or some noble institution founded, is in a sense a day of the Lord, there are days in which Divine providence signally asserts or vindicates itself, in which the might of the Omnipotent is convincingly displayed; and such days are emphatically designated by the term employed in the text.

II. THE DAY OF THE EXECUTION OF THE LORD'S RECOMPENSE AND JUDGMENT. Judging by the language here employed by the prophet, the day of the Lord he announces seems especially of this character. "Howl ye! Woe worth the day!" are expressions which surely betoken the coming of the Lord in vengeance - "a day of clouds," "the time of the heathen." Long-deferred correction is now to be inflicted; threatenings often repeated are now to be fulfilled. Forbearance is exhausted, and the day of the Lord shall see him arise to judgment.

III. THE DAY OF THE REDEMPTION OF THE LORD'S PEOPLE. The defeat and confusion of the adversaries is accompanied by the deliverance and exaltation of the friends of God. When the day comes which shall see the destruction of Israel's foes, Israel shall go free and shall rejoice in her liberty, with the shout, "Now is the day of salvation!" "Lift up your heads, for the day of redemption draweth nigh!"

IV. THE DAY WHICH DISPELS THE NIGHT OF HUMAN MISUNDERSTANDING AND DOUBT. The day of man is the day of ignorance and of fear, and is little better than the night when compared with the brightness which God's presence brings. To Christians, the day of the Lord is the day of their Savior's birth and coming to this world of sin. "The people which sat in darkness saw a great light." Then the errors and hopelessness of long ages were rolled away, like mists before the rising of the Sun of Righteousness, with healing in his wings.

V. THE DAY WHICH SHALL MANIFEST THE LORD'S GLORY AND FULFILL HIS PURPOSES. The day of the Lord has interest and significance for men; but the very term implies that its central meaning is not human, but Divine. The fools who have said in the heart, "There is no God!" the hypocrites and formalists, who have professed belief in God, but to whom the meaning of such belief is limited to words; the defiant and rebellious sinners, of whom it may justly be said, "God is not in all their ways; " - all these are addressed with power, and are aroused from their infidelity, when the day of the Lord breaks upon the world, and when the Lord himself draws near. - T.

(Zechariah 7:12): — A great and good man who served and suffered for Christ in North Africa seventeen centuries ago won for himself a noble name by which he is still known, Origen the Adamantine. There isn't a boy nor, in her own quiet way, a girl who does not feel some glow of heart or flush of face at the magic of this name, "the Unsubduable," "the Invincible." But he was not the first who bore the name. It was given long before by God Himself to His captive prophet in Babylon, whose forehead, as he faced the people, whose hearts were cold and hard as stones, might well be firm as adamant, since, in his very name, Ezekiel, he carried the great power of God. Now, what is adamant? Look at a lady's finger ring, and find among the precious stones set in its golden circle one that is quite clear and lustrous, and that throws off from every facet whatever rays of light are falling upon it. We call this sparkling gem, as you know, a diamond. But that is just another form of the word adamant, which we owe to the old Greeks, who naturally called the precious stone which could not be broken, adamas or "the unsubduable."

1. The diamond now flashing on your mother's finger was not always the hardest of stones. It was once a bit of soft, vegetable matter. For the diamond is not really different from the coal which makes our winter fires, and which, long, long ages ago, was a thick, steaming forest. Hence it is quite true that "the sunbeams are driving our railway trains." And the exiles in Babylon, who had grown so adamantine in evil that the sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God made no more impression on their hearts than your penknife on the angles of a diamond, were once boys and girls playing in the streets of Jerusalem, singing the songs of Zion, and dreaming their day dreams of ministering to the Lord like Samuel, or fighting with Goliaths like David, or leading the dance of triumph like Miriam. This terrible process of heart petrifying, or turning to stone, comes about by the action of the wise and good, though solemn and awful, law of habit. "The oftener, the easier." How woeful to reach at last the state when, as regards all that is highest and best, one is "past feeling," as though the conscience had been burned with a hot iron, or the heart made as hard as an adamant stone! From which may the good Lord deliver us!

2. We may find a promise of better things even in Zechariah's awful image of disobedience. The exquisite diamonds, or carbon crystals, are combustible, and, if subjected to a sufficient degree of heat, will pass off in carbonic acid gas. Fine ladies need not be so proud of their diamonds, since they may all be dissipated by fire; and poorer folks need not so greatly covet their possession, since they are breathing out diamond essence with every exhalation! And if we were so foolishly greedy as to want our diamond breaths back again, they would poison us. However this may be, it is certain that hearts as hard as an adamant stone are every day being softened, melted, transformed, by the fire of God's holy love, which saves the sinner by consuming his sins.

3. But "the broken heart," though it may seem strange to say so, is the stoutest and bravest of hearts. The true hero has always a tender conscience. He who fears God has no other fear. If Christ is your Master, and you are learning in His school, you may well appropriate the sturdy words over the gate of Marischal College, Aberdeen: "They say: what say they? let them say." God has His diamonds as well as the devil. Against the whole "House of Disobedience" stood up the son of Buzi, the prophet of the exile, in the strength of God. If the people were hard as flint in their own evil ways, he was firm as the adamant, which is harder than flint in the service of God. They did well to call Origen, the Adamantine, the Invincible, for when, at the age of sixteen, his father was thrown into prison for his confession of Christ, he wanted to go and suffer with him; and when it was shown him that this was not his duty, he wrote to his father not to falter in his faith for their sakes, for he would undertake the support of his mother and his six younger brothers. And nobly did he fulfil his promise, selling his books, working early and late as a teacher in Alexandria, and inspiring his pupils with such devotion that they called his college "a school for martyrs."

(A. N. Mackray, M. A.)