Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1889-04-06

because OF the Storm. some Oh you III
the old time sailing vessels were KEEP
nearly a month with the matches down
because OF some long storm.
Then infdels say that the ark landed
on a mountain II, 600 feet high, and that,
Of course, as o o as the animals came
forth they would all be frozen in the ice.
That is geographical ignorance. Ararat
is not merely the name for a mountain,
but for a hilly district, and il may have
been = hill 100 feet high, or 500, or ], 900
feet high on which the ark alighted.
Noah measured the depth of the water
above the hill, and it is fifteen cubits, or
twenty-sevenfeet
All my friends this story Of the ark
is nc more incredible than if you should
say t o me: Last summer ! was among
the hills of New England, and there came
on the most terrific storm / ever saw, and
the whole country was flooded. The
waters came up owe the hills, and TO save
our lives we got in a boat on the river,
and even the dumb creatures were SO af-
frighted they came moaning and bleating
until we let them ia the same boat"
We are not dependent upon the Bible
for the story Of the food, entirely. All
ages and all literatures have traditions,
broken traditions, indistinct traditions,
but still traditions. The old books Of the
Persians tell about the food at the
time of Ahriman, who 3 o polluted the
earth that it had to be washed by a great
storm. The traditions OF the Chaldeans
say that in the time when Xisuthrus was
king there was a great flood, and he put
his family and his friends in a large yes
sci and all outside OF them were destroyed,
and after awhile the birds went forth and
they came back and their claws were
tinged with mud. Lucian and Ovid,
celebrated writers who had never seen
the Bible, described a flood in the time of
Deucalion. He took his friepds into a
boat, and the animals came running to
him in pairs. So all lands and all ages,
and all literatules, seem to have a broken
and indistinct tradition of a calamity
which Moses, here incorporating Noah's
account, 80 grandly, so beautiful, SO &C
curately, 50 solemnly records,
My prayer is that the God who created
the world may create us anew in Christ
Jesus; and that the God who made light
three days before the sun shCne may kin
die in our hearts a light that will burn on
long after the sun has expired; and that
the God who ordered the ark built and
kept open more than 100 years that the
antediluvlans might eater it for shelter,
may graciously incline us 10 accept the
invitation which this morning rose in
music from the Throne, saying: Come
thou and all thy house into the ark
Another hard thing to be understood
The story that the sur and moon stood
still to allow Joshua to complete his vic
tory. Intdel scientists declare that an
impossibility. But if a man have brain
and strength enough TO make a clock, can
he not start it and stop it, and start ii
again and stop it again? II a machiaist
have strength and brain enough to make
a corn thresher, can he not start II and
stop it, and start it again and stop j,
again? If God have strength and wisdom
to make the clock of the universe, the
great machinery Of tho worlds, has he
not strength enough and wisdom enough
to start it and stop it, and start il again
and stop it AGAIN. Or stop one wheel, oil
stop twenty wheels, or step all the
wheels? Is the clock stronger than the
cl9ck maker? Does the corn tlfresher know
more than the machinist? Is the uni
verse mightier than its God2 But peo
PIE ask how could the moon have beor
seen 10 stop in the daytime? Well, 4
YOU have never seen the moon in th,
i6aytime, it is because you have nOt beer
G very diligent observer Of the heavens
Beside that, II was not necessary fo.'th,
lworld literally to ftop. BY unusual re
fraction Of the suns RAYS the day Nigh
EAave been prolonged. So that, while thu
! earth continued on its pfth in the aeav
ems it fguvativey stopped. You mus
remember that these Bible authors useC
the vernacular of their own day. hJst a
you and ! say the sun went down. Tn
sun never goes down. We simply de
scribe what appears to the humSR eye
! Besides that, the world, u world, coulc
have literally stopped without throwin!
the universe oat Of Reliance. Or worlt
I has two moti9ns-theoon around the SUI
and the other on its own axis. |
might have stopped on It's WI axis
while at the esme time II kept on It's patl
through the heavens. SO there was N
need OF stellar confusion because on
I world slaclsDned ito speed or entlrel,
stopped in it's revelation Oh it's ovn axis
That is none Of the business Of Jupiter
or Mars, or Mercury, or Saturn, or tn
Dipper. Beside thai, within the cnemor.
Of man there have been worlds that wer
born and that died. A few years az
astronomers telegrashed, through tn
Associated Press, to all the world-th
astronomers from the city OF v ashing
ton-that another world had been dis
covered. Within compa-ativel.
short space Of time, astenomer
Tell us, thirteen worlds hav
burned down. Frooa their obse-vator.
ehey notice frat tina: the worlds look lik
other worlds, then they became & deer
red, showing they were on fire; the
they became asher, chewing they wer'
burned down; then they EN-
tisely disappeared, showing that even tn
ask es were scattered. Now. / soy, j
God can start q world, and swing q world
ant destroy a world, ,he could stop on
or two of them without a great dsal o
exertion, or he could by unusual refrac
ton of the suns rays continue the illu
minAtion. But inidel scientists soy
would have been belittling for Nthe
worlds to stop on scooupt Of such q ba
tie. Why, sirs. what yorktown was fc
revolutionary times, and what Getty
burg vas in IL civil contest, and VIII,
Sedan WAS in the Franco German var
and what Waterloo was inthe Napoleon
destiny--that was this battle of Josbu
against ahe five armies of Gideon.
was that battle that changed the entil
course Of history. IL Was y battle