The daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1848-1851, 1850-01-28
Tho Half-Century Problem.


The newspapers continue to keep up an active
discussion Of the question, whether we are in the
first or second half of the nineteenth century-in
other words, whether the LIST Of January commenced
the last year of the first halfcentury, or the first
year Of the second half Many columns have been
written and yet the question appears to be unsettled
in many minds. A great deal of learning has been
brought forth on both Sides and yet it seems to us
to be very simple matter, when separated from
the extraneous matter which has been mixed up
with it
Considered as the simple inquiry, how many
years must elapse before half-centuryis computed,
there is no ground for dispute As the first fifty Of
hundred dollars is not paid until the last cent Of
the tieh dollar is counted out the fifteth year
Of century is NOT completed until the last day Of
the year is over and as the second fifty commences
with the first cent Of the fifty first dollar, so the
second halfcentury commences with the first day
of the tffy-first year We say the fifteth year has
commenced on the day after the forty-nne years
are completed just as a man begins paying
his iftieth dollar after he has told one hundred
cents over forty-nine times, and begun to pay on
the ast but in both it takes full fifty to make
either halt.hundred. That is plain statement Of
SIMPLE problem, and not to be disputed
But to this is opposed intricate dicussion about
the date of the birth Of Christ, and the manner in
which the era of his birth is computed. Some
write deliberately about the year o. and the year
one, and make nice distinctions about the day oil
the month in which the Saviour was born, and the
query whether the Era should or rather does, date
from the January preceding, or the January imme-
diately after-and hence dispute is raised upon
the rule to be observed in commencing the Era.
All these speeulations, which have really
nothing 70 do with the single question of the com
mencement and the close Of the century. The
Christian era is not date originally fixed or fixed
at period from which its chronology was traced
backward, so as to leave no doubt of the correct
! ness oil the computation. 1t was not used as an
Era at all until several centuries had elapsed and
after it had been used partially at least for more
than thousand years, it was discovered that error
had certainly been made in the computation and
chronologists for long time had argued that the
error amounted to four years. A later computation,
approved by men of eminent science, makes the
error in the common era six years According to
Dr. Jarvss tables, in his introduction to the History
Of the Church, the year of the Cruciixon was in
the 2Sth year of the present era, and it should have
should be 1886, so that in fact, we have already en-
tered the last half Of the true nineteenth century
if the calendar were rect6ed exactly The various
rectfcatons Of the year, from that of Julius Caesar
which made one year of fifteen months, and 445
days, down to that of Pope Gregory, which made
one of only 355, have all searched for the era Of
the birth Of Christ by computation backwards
not by receiving regular succession of constantly
authenticated years. Hence the dispute how this
particular year, the first last half OF century
in exact series from the birth of the Saviour, is
idle, because it is neither the one nor the other
but several years advanced in the second half oil
the real nineteenth century.
The other question, that of the mere system Of
counting under the Christian era as fixed in the
sixteenth century, is only a matter of figures
whether the half of hundred is forty-nine or any
thing less than fifty = and there is not much
ground for difference of opinion about that.