The Terrible Visitation

1 aBlow a trumpet in Zion,

And sound an alarm on My holy mountain!

Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble,

For the bday of the Lord is coming;

Surely it is near,

2 A day of adarkness and gloom,

A day of clouds and thick darkness.

As the dawn is spread over the mountains,

So there is a bgreat and mighty people;

There has cnever been anything like it,

Nor will there be again after it

To the years of many generations.

3 A afire consumes before them

And behind them a flame burns.

The land is blike the garden of Eden before them

But a cdesolate wilderness behind them,

And nothing at all escapes them.

4 Their aappearance is like the appearance of horses;

And like war horses, so they run.

5 1With a anoise as of chariots

They leap on the tops of the mountains,

Like the 2crackling of a bflame of fire consuming the stubble,

Like a mighty people arranged for battle.

6 Before them the people are in aanguish;

All bfaces 1turn pale.

7 They run like mighty men,

They climb the wall like soldiers;

And they each amarch 1in line,

Nor do they deviate from their paths.

8 They do not crowd each other,

They march everyone in his path;

When they 1burst through the 2defenses,

They do not break ranks.

9 They rush on the city,

They run on the wall;

They climb into the ahouses,

They benter through the windows like a thief.

10 Before them the earth aquakes,

The heavens tremble,

The bsun and the moon grow dark

And the stars lose their brightness.