Toward the breaking of day

I'm reading Princes at War: The Bitter Battle Inside Britain's Royal Family in the Darkest Days of WWII. This was quoted by George VI in his Christmas address in 1939. Britain had entered the war in September but there had thus far been little fighting in the West. It was the period known as "Phony War" leading up to Germany's invasions in the spring and summer of 1940 and the fall of France.

And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year:
“Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.”

And he replied:

“Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God.
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way.”

"So I went forth, and finding the Hand of God, trod gladly into the night.
And He led me towards the hills and the breaking of day in the lone East.”

Minnie Louise Haskins, God Knows, 1908

▶ King George VI's Christmas Speech 1939 - YouTube