The Somerset press. [volume] (Somerset, Ohio) 1873-1977, 1881-03-03
The Terrible Year at Hand.
The world to an end shall come
In eighteen hundred and eighty-one.


she sinister predictions that have, as by
common consent, been concentrated
lpon the coming year. The soothsay-
ers, diviners, oracle makers, astrologers
and wizards seem to have combined to
East their spell upon it. Superstitious
people of every sort, and some who are
not willing to admit that they are SUPER
stitious, regard the year 1881 with more
or less anxious expectation and dread.
As the earth, on New Years Day, swings
out into another round about the sun,
It will go to meet a host of evil omens.
1t will go cursed by theomancy and
bibliomancy. Aeromancy and meteoro-
NANCY will glare at it from comets and
shooting stars. Oneiromancy will in
tercept its path with visions of evil, and
nOmancy will shake the ominous, back
ward-reading numerals .. 1881" before
Il. 1t will be beset with scarescrow
figures by arithmancy, and with me-
nacing phrases by stichomancy. Yet
there is no reason why persons of good
digestion should not go to sleep on New
Years night confident that, after hav-
ing encountered the average quantity of
storm and sunshine, the One-horse ball
that we call the world will bring them
safe through the perils of its five
hundred-million-mile flight round to the
starting point again
Timfd persons first began to look for
ward with some alarm to the year that
is about to open, when. several years
ago, the key to the so-called prophetic
symbolism of the Great Pyramid of
Egypt was made public, backed by the
name and reputation of the British as
tronomer, Piazzi Smyth. Others, using
Mr.. Smyth's observations and measure
ments, have gone much further than he
did in drawing startling inferences; but
no one can read his book without perceiv-
ing how powerfully it must affect those
who have the slightest leaning toward
superstition or credulity. Besides, this
record of explorations and experiences
in the heart of Egypt's greatest marvel
has all the charm and interest of DIR.
Schliemann's descriptions of his dis
coveries in Homer's Troy. Such q
book could not well be neglected by the
world of readers; and by the nature of
| the human mind, many of its readers
| were sure to be imbued with its omin-
GUS dOgmas. So the belief, or at least
the suspicion. spread that the secret
chambers of the Great Pyramid, under
Divine guidance by the most mystical
character in all history. Melchisedek,
King of Salem, foretel, among other
things, that the Christian era will end
in 1881.
Mother Shipton's so-called prophecy
6xes upon the same date for the end of
the world. The ominous jingle of her
rhymes has probably done at least as
much to disturb the equanimity of cred
ulous persons as the more elaborate
vaccinations of the pyramid interpre-
ters. Moreover, Mother ,Shipton is
represented as foretelling that in the
latter days England will "accept a
Jew" As England has, with consid-
cradle emphasis and more than once,
accepted the remarkable son of old
Isaac Disraeli for her Prime Minister,
this has been taken as a fulflment of
the prophecy. So Lord Beaconsfield' 8
dramatic personality is made principal
figure in the murky cloud of evil proph-
ecy that hangs over 1881.
As if the evil eye of Mother Shipton
and the mystical menace of the Great
Pyramid were not enough for one poor
twelvemonth to bear, the "horrors OF
the perihelia'' have been denounced
upon the coming year. About two
years ago certain pamphlets were cir
culated about the country, purporting
to be written by men of science, and
predicting that awful consequences to
mankind would result from all the
great planets reaching their perihelia,
or nearest points to the sun, together.
According to these prophets the sinister
effects OF the perihelia were to begin
making their appearance this fall, when
Jupiter passed his perihelion, and next
year the scythe of death was to be put
to the harvest in the far east, and to
!! sweep westward with swathe as broad
! as the continents, until it reached the
Pacific Ocean. The narrow Atlantic
was to be no more than a brooklet ir
the path of this terrible harvester
Plaques, famines, pestilences, fire
! earthquakes, floods and tornadoes were
to scourge the human race until only 6
few remained, like Noah and his fami
, ly, to repeople the earth with stur
, der and more God-fearjng race.
So much alarm was caused by thi
!. hocus-pocus of pretended science anG
' prophecy, that some real men of scienc,
MIR. Proctor among others were q
2 2 the pains to show that so far as thes'
predictions professed to rest upol
|; scientific facts they were baseless. Th'
great planets will not all be in peri
hellon in 1881, and they will not all b.
= In perihelion together at any time. /
2 Is true that several of the chief planet
will reach their perihelia within few
2 years. and that it is rare for them to b
grouped so close together as they vii
!: be at one time next year. 1t is ais
= true that remarkable condolences hav
> been observed between the existence @
great storms on the sun, that produc
!: electrical disturbances and possibl
meteorological changes upon the earth
y and the presence OF Jupiter near hi
: perihelion. Astronomers have also sus
y pected that the influence of some of tn
other great planets upon the earth ca
= = be perceived, but they have never dis
" covered any reason to believe that tn
combined forces of all the planet
could, under any circumstances, pro
duce upon the earth 8 thousandth pal
q of the evil effect ascribed to them b
% the astrologers, If indeed they produce
st any evil effect whatever.
ie Still the astrological almapaos fG
N next year are repeating substantial
Is the same predictions of evil things
" begin, If not to eliminate, in 1881. b
n cause, as they say, the ravages of th
ID Black Death In the middle ages TO
j, lowed the nearly coincident periheli
10 of four great planets, they predict sim
,B lar consequences from the confguratio
10 Of the planets now. But neither in the
p premises nor their inferences does SC
enoe recognize any validity.
s. In truth, however, the astrologer
n not less than the astronomers and q
In star gazers, will have plenty of phi
or aomena in the heavens to occupy the
be attention for the next twelve month
90 The sky will not present such briilial
ss pageants again this century. There vi
u and double and triple conjunction
th The most interesting of these is Il
M grea.twenty-year onjunotion Of Jupit' t
40 and Saturn in April. This conjunctie