Moroni then quoted the eleventh chapter of Isaiah. It predicts a day of peace and righteousness, when an ensign shall be set up for the Gentiles, and when the Lord shall set His hand again the second time to gather His scattered people. This time was at hand, and was about to be fulfilled.
Next the angel read from the sermon of Peter on Solomon's Porch:
"For Moses truly said unto the fathers, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto me; him shall ye hear in all things, whatsoever he shall say unto you. And it shall come to pass that every soul which will not hear that prophet shall be destroyed from among the people."[B]
[Footnote B: Acts 3:22, 23.]
This prophecy, also, was about to have a complete fulfillment.
Finally, among many other scriptures, the angel quoted from the great prophecy of Joel. Before the great and terrible day of the Lord, according to this wonderful prediction, the old men shall dream dreams, and the young men shall see visions, and wonders shall appear in the heaven and the earth. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood; but whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be delivered.[C] This same prophecy was referred to by Peter on the day of Pentecost, and was possibly in part accomplished then. But the prediction refers unmistakably to the last days—before the great and terrible day of the Lord. Now is the day of Joel's great prophecy, and now, said the angel Moroni, it is about to be fulfilled.
[Footnote C: Joel 2:28-32.]
Thereupon, the vision was closed. Gradually the light assembled from the room about the person of the angel. Then he disappeared into heaven, leaving the room in total darkness. The youth to whom had been given this marvelous manifestation lay wide awake on his bed. Sleep was driven from his eyes. He was filled with amazement at the singularity of the vision, and at the doctrines that had been explained to him. Then suddenly, in the midst of his wonder and meditation, the heavenly messenger appeared again. He stood again in the air by the bedside, and repeated minutely all the instructions he had given before. He added predictions concerning the great judgments that should come to the earth, with desolations by famine, sword, and pestilence—and all these things should come during the present generation.
Again the vision closed. Again the light centered in the angel as he disappeared and left the room in darkness. The youth lay again wondering at the marvelous vision, when, to his astonishment, the same divine messenger appeared the third time, and repeated all that he had said before. "After this third visit," writes the Prophet, "he again ascended in heaven as before, and I was again left to ponder on the strangeness of what I had just experienced; when almost immediately after the heavenly messenger had ascended from me the third time, the cock crowed, and I found that day was approaching."[D] Thus ended the second act in the great drama of the Restoration.
[Footnote D: "History of the Church," Vol. I, p. 14.]