y its
"heliacal rising" the beginning of spring, another the coming of winter;
the time to plough, the time to sow, the time of the rains, would all be
indicated by the successive "morning stars" as they appeared. And after
an interval of three hundred and sixty-five or three hundred and
sixty-six days the same star would again show itself as a morning star
for a second time, marking out the year, whilst the other morning stars
would follow, each in its due season. So we read in Job, that God led
"forth the Mazzaroth in their season."

This wonderful procession of the midnight sky is not known and admired
by those who live in walled cities and ceiled houses, as it is by those
who live in the open, in the wilderness. It is not therefore to be
wondered at, that we find praise of these "works of the Lord . . .
sought out of all them that have pleasure therein," mostly amongst the
shepherds, the herdsmen, the wanderers in the open--in the words and
prophecies of Job, of Jacob, Moses, David and Amos.

The thought that each new day, beginning with a new outburst of light,
was, in its degree, a kind of new creation, an emblem of the original
act by which the world was brought into being, renders appropriate and
beautiful the ascription of the term "morning stars" to those "sons of
God," the angels. As the stars in the eastern sky are poetically thought
of as "singing together" to herald the creation of each new day, so in
the verses already quoted from the Book of Job, the angels of God are
represented as shouting for joy when the foundations of the earth were
laid.

The "morning star" again stands as the type and earnest of that new
creation which God has promised to His servants. The epistle to Thyatira
concludes with the promise--"He that overcometh, and keepeth my works
unto the end, . . . I will give him the morning star."

The brightest of these heralds of the sun is the planet Venus, and such
a "morning star" for power, glory, and magnificence, the king of
Babylon had once been; like one of the angels of God. But as addressed
in Isaiah's prophecy, he has been brought down to Sheol:--

"How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the
morning!. . . For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend
into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God
. . . I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be
like the most High."

But the "morning star" is taken as a higher ty