Milford chronicle., 1889-03-29

might have been prolonged so that, while
the earth continued on its path in the heav-
ems, it iguratively stopped You must re-
member that these Bible authors used the YER
nacular of their own day, just as you and
say the sun went down. The sun never goes
| down We simply describe what appears 70
the human eye Besides that, the world, our
world, could have literally stopped without
throwing the universe out Of balance. Our
world has two motions-the one around the
sun and the other on its own axis. 1t might
have stopped on its own axis, while at the
same time it kept on its path through the
heavens. So there was no need Of stellar con-
fusion because our world slackened its speed
or entirely stopped in its revolution on its
own axis That is none Of the business Of
Jupiter, or Mars, or Mercury, or Saturn, or
| tho Dipper Beside that within the memory
of man there have been worlds that were
! born and that died A few years ago astrOno-
mers telegraphed, through the Associated
! Press, TO all the world-the astronomers from
! the city of Washington-that another world
had been discovered. Within a COM
paratively short space Of time astrono-
mers tell us thirteen worlds have
/ burned down. From their observatory
they notice first that the worlds look like
other worlds, then they became a deep red,
ashen, showing they were burned down;
then they entirely disappeared, showing that
/ even the ashes were scattered. Now, / say,
if God can start a world, and swing a world,
and destroy a world, he could stop one or
| two Of them without great deal Of exertion,
4 or he could by unusual refraction of the suns
rays continue the illumination. But infidel
scientists say it would have been belittling
for other worlds to stop on account Of such a
battle Why, sirs, what Yorktown was for
revolutionary times, and what Gettysburg
/ was in our civil contest and what Sedan was
/ in the Franco-German wal, and what Water
| loo was in the Napoleonic deStiny-that was
this battle Of Joshua against tho five allied ar
miesof Gideon. 1t was that battle that changed
/ the entire course Of history. It was a battle
to Joshua as important as though battle
now should occur in which England and the
United States and France and Germany and
/ Italy and Turkey and Russia should fight for
victory or annihilation However much any
/ other world. solar, lunar or stellar, might be
hastened in its errand Of light it would be
excusable if it fingered in the heavens for a
| little while and put down its sheaf of beams,
and gazed on such an Armageddon.
In the early part of this century there was
what was called tho Dark Day Some of
these aged men perhaps may remember it.
/ II is known in history as the Ozark Day.
/ Workmeu at noon went to their homes, and
courts and legislatures adjourned. No as
! tronomers have ever been able to explain
that Dark Day Now, if God can advance
the night earlier than its time, can he not
adjourn the night until after its timel l
/ often used to hear my father describe night
/ Il think he said it was in 1S33-when his
neighbors aroused him in great alarm. All
/ the heavenly bodies seemed to be in motion
People thought our earth was coming to its
destruction. Tens of thousands of stars shoot
ing. No astronomers have ever been able to
explain that star shooting. Now, does not
your common sense teach you that If God
could start and stop tens Of thousands Of
worlds or meteors, he could start and stop
two worlds9 If God can engineer a train Of
ten thousand worlds OF meteors, and stop
them without accident or collision, cannot
he control two carriages of light, and by
putting down golden brake stop the sun,
and by putting down a silver brake stop the
mooni Under this explanation, instead Of
being skeptical about this sublime passage Of
the Bible you will, when you read it, feel
more like going down on your knees before
God as you read: "Sun, stand thou still
above Gibeon and thou moon in the valley
of Ajalon."
A POINT THAT IS MUCH DISCUSSED.
Then there is the Bible statement that a
whale swallowed Jonah and elected him upon
the dry ground in three days. If you win
30 to the museum at Nantucket, Mass, you
will find the skeleton of a whale large enough
to swallow a man. / said to the ianitor,
while / was standing in the museum, ''Why
it does not seem from the looks Of this skele-
ton that that story in the Book Of Jonah is so
very improbable, does itP "Oh no,n he re-
piled. lit does not" There is a cavity in the
mouth of the common whale large enough
for a man TO live in. There have been sharks
found again and again with an entire human
body in them Beside that, the Bible says
nothing about whale. 1t says, ''The Lord
prepared great fish I" and there are scien-
fists who tell US that there were sea monsters
in othsa days that make the modern whale
seem very Insignificant know in one place
in the New Testament it speaks Of the whale
as appearing in the occurrence 1 have just
mentioned, but the word may just as well be
translated ''sea monstern-any kind Of a sea
monster. Procopius says in the year
$50 a sea monster was slain which
had for fifty years destroyed ships
| l suppose this sea monster that took care Of
Jonah may have been one Of the great sea
monsters that could have easily taken down
a prophet, and he could have lived there
three days if he had kept in motion so as to
keep the gastric juices from taking hold Of
him and destroying him, and at the end Of
three days the monster would naturally be
sick enough to regurgitate Jonah. Beside
that, my friends, there is one word which ex-
plains the whole thing 1t says: "The Lord
prepared a great fish, If a ship carpenter
prepare a vessel to carry Texan beeves to
Glasgow, suppose it can carry Texan
beeves; If ship carpenter Irepare a vessel to
carry coal to one Of the northern ports,
suppose it can carry coal; if a ship carpenter
prepare a vessel to carry passengers to Liver
pool, l suppose it can carry passengers to
Liverpool; and if the Lord prepared fish to
carry one passenger, suppose Il could carry
a passenger and the ventilation have been all
right
So all the strange things in the Bible can
be explained if you wish to have them ex-
planned And you can build them into
beautiful and healthful fire for your hearth,
or you can with them put your immortal in
terests into conaagration. But you had bet
ter decide about the veracity Of the Bible
very soon want this morning to caution
you against putting off making up your mind
/ about this book Ever since 1172 there has
been great discussion as to who was the au-
thor Of Junius' Letters, those letters so full
Of sarcasm and vituperation and power. The
whole English nation stirred up with it
More than hundred volumes written TO dis
cuss that question, "Who was JuniusP "Who
wrote the letters Of Juniusr Well, it is an
interesting question to discuss, but still, after
all, it makes but little practical difference to
you and to me who Junius was, whether Sir
Philip Francis, or Lord Chatham, or John
Horne Tooke, or Horace Walpole, or Henry
Grattan, or any one Of the forty-four men
who were seriously charged with the au-
thorship But {. is an absorbing question,
it is a practical question, it is an overwhelm-
ing question to you and to me, the author
ship Of this holy Bible-whether the Lord
God Of heaven and earth or pack of dupes,