In Mark, Jesus speaks of the Fifth Vial as the time when "the Sun shall be darkened and the Moon shall not give her light."

         This Plague follows the Plague of scorching heat as if God in mercy would hide the Sun whose rays had been so hard to bear.

                   The effect of the darkness was that men gnawed their tongues for the pain and for their sores, showing that these Plagues overlapped each other or followed in such rapid order that they were not over suffering of one before they suffered another.

Their sufferings brought no repentance but caused them to blaspheme the God of Heaven.