Audubon County Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Audubon Co., Iowa) 1885-1894, 1893-01-05
THE MARCH OF YEARS
A NEW YEARS SERMON BY THE
REV. TALMACE.



the subject OF his New Years Day sermon.
The Chronology OF tho Bible or God Among
the Centuries. Before the discourse. the great
audience which fully crowded tho Tabernacle,
sang the hymn;
ouruod, our help in ages past
Our hope for years to come,
The text chosen was Deut -. :; Consider
the years OF many generations,
AT IL o'clock last night, while so
many good people were watching, an
old friend passed out of our homes and
stranger entered. The old friend
making yalcdictory was 1902; the
stranger arriving Is 1898, The old
friend was garrulous with the occur
renccs OF many days, but the stranger
put his finger over his lip and said
nothing and seemed charged with
many secrets and mysteries, didno
sec either the departure or the arrival,
but was sound asleep, thinking that
was for me the best way to be wide
awake now, Goodbye, 1901 Wei
come, 1893!
As an army is divided into brigadcs
and regiments and companies, and
they observe this order in their march,
aud their tread Is ma cstic, so the time
IF the worlds existence isrdivided into
IN army, divinely commanded; the
sras, are the brigades, the centuries
are the regiments, and the years are
the companies. Forward into the
eternity past, out of the eternity to
some. Forward, Is the command, and
nothing can halt them even though
the world should die, While obeying
my text, Consider the years of many
generations, propose TO speak of the
Chronology of the Bible, or God
among the Centuries,
We make distinction between time
and eternity, but time is only II piece
Of eternity, and chronology has been
engaged In the sublime work OF divid'
ing up this portion of eternity that we
call time into compartments, and put
ting events in their right compart'
ments. II is MS much an injustice
against the past 10 wrongly arrange
its events, as IL would be an injustice
IL, through neglect of chronological
accuracy, 1t should, in the far distant
future, be said that America was dis
| covered in 1875 and the Declaration OF
| Independence was signed In lipa, and
! Washington born on the ald of March,
and the Civil War OF the United States
| was fought in 1910. As God puts all
the events of time in the right place,
let us be careful that we do not put
themin the wrong place The chro-
nology of the Bible takes six steps, but
they are steps so long, it makes us
hold our breath rs we watch the move
ment From Adam to Abraham. From
| Abraham to the exodus out OF Egypt
/ From the exodus to the foundation of
I Solomon's Temple. From the founda'
ton of Solomons Temple To the de-
struction OF that temple. From
the destruction of the temple
to the return from Babylonish
captivity From Babylonish cap.
tivity to the birth of Christ Chro-
nology takes pen and pencil and call
ing astronomy and history TO help, says:
LET us fix one event, from which Ia
calculate everything. Lett 1t be star,
! the Bethlehem star, the Christmas
star" And from that we go back and
see the world was created 1904 years
before Christ, the deluge came a,33s
years before Christ, the exodus out OF
Egypt i,40l years before Christ, and
| Solomon's temple was destroyed 5s6
wears before Christ. Chronology enters
! the first chapter of Genesis and says
| the day mentioned there is not u day
| of twenty-four hours, but of
ages; the word there translated
| as day" in other places meaning
ages and so the Bible account Of the
creation and the biologists account of
the creation are completely hnrmoni.
Gus. Chronology enters the Book of
Daniel, and says Mat the words slime
and a-half" mean u year and a-half.
Chronology enters at another point
| and shows MS that the seasons of the
| year were then only two-summer and
| winter. We find that the Bible year
was 800 days, instead OF 3G5; that the
| day was calculated from six o'clock in
| the morning to six o'clock at night
| that the night was divided into -four
watches, namely, the late watch, the
midnight. the cocls-crowing, the
| early watch. The clock and watch
were invented so long after the
world began their mission that
| the day was not very sharp
ly divided in Bible times. Ahaz had u
| sun-dial, or u flight of stairs with n
column at the top, and the shadow
which that column threw on the steps
beneath indicated the hour, the shadow
| lengthenIng, or Withdrawing from
step to step. But the events of life
and the events of the world moved so
slowly, for the most part, in Bible
| times, that they had no need of such
| timepieces as we stand on our mantcls
| or carry in our pockets in an age when
a man may have u half dozen or n
| dozen engagements for one day and
| needs To know the exact minute for
each one of them. The earth itself in
| Bible times was the chief timcpiecc,
| and IL turned once on its axis and that
was day, and once around the
| sun and that was year.
| IL was not until the fourteenth
century that the almanac was
| born, the almanac that we toss care
lessly about, not realizing that it took
| the accumulated ingenuity OF more
than 1000 years To make one. Chro-
| nology had to bring into its service the
monuments of Egypt, and the cylin-
| ders of hssyria, and the bricks OF
| Babylon, and the pottery of Nineveh,
| and the medals struck at Antioch for
| the battle of Actium, and all the hero
| glyphics that could be deciphcrcd and
| had to go into the extremely delicate
business of asking the ages of Adam,
and Seth, and Enoch, and Methuselah
who, after their 300th year wanted to
| be thought young ! think IL must
have been in recognition Of the stu
pendous work of making an almanac
that all the days of the week
are named after the gods. Sun
day, after the Sun, which was
of old worshipped as a god. Mon
day, after the Moon, which was also
worshiped as God Tuesday, after
| Tuesco, the God of War, Wednesday,
after Wooden, the chief God of the Scan.
dipavians. Thursday, after Thor, the
God of Thunder Friday, after Frea,
the Goddess of Marriage. And Satur.
day, after Saturn. The old Bible year
began with the a5th of March. Not
until lT5s did the first of the month OF
January get the honor in legal docu'
ments in England of being called the
! first day of the year. improvements
all along have been made in chronology
until the calendar and the almanac and
| the clock and the watch seem to have
reached perfection, and all the
nations of Christendom have SINH
\ larity of time calculations and have
adopted what Is called New Style, y
except Russia, which keeps what is
called the ''Old Style" and is twelve
days different, SO that, writing from
there, If you wish to be accurate, you