LOST TIME by Elder A. S. Hutchins

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Feb 24, 1881

LOST TIME.

By Elder A. S. Hutchins

BY ELD. A. S. HUTCHINS.

AMONG objections often met against the Sabbath of the fourth commandment is this: "Time has been lost and we cannot tell when the seventh day comes; therefore, that day cannot be binding." When shown that the Sabbath was known and kept according to the commandment in the days of the apostles, then we are told time was lost in the change from Old Style to New Style. Many appear to make themselves feel perfectly secure while shielded with this excuse. We marvel how men professing godliness, claiming to love and obey the teaching of the Bible, can trifle as they do with a subject of such importance.

Not long ago, while in conversation with a minister on the subject of the Sabbath, he said time had been lost, and that no man could tell when the seventh day comes. This loss he maintained was owing to the change from Old Style to New Style. No reasoning on the point could convince him of his error.

I told him what the change consisted in, and why it was made, and labored to help him to see that it neither did, nor could, in any way affect the weekly cycle; whereupon I received from him some information entirely new in astronomical minuteness of observation.

He said the reason for the change from Old to New Style was this: The earth in its diurnal revolution falls about one minute behind in each revolution, causing a loss of about one minute every twenty-four hours, hence the necessity of the change. When asked for his authority on this, he quickly replied, "I am my own authority, I have looked it out." Now it will certainly take another person of equally good discriminating powers of mind, to tell us how such a change would balance or correct the motion of the earth, and set this matter right.

But what was the change from Old to New Style? and why was it made? The following clear explanation of this matter, which I clipped several years ago from the Christian Almanac, answers these questions, and shows conclusively that not a moment of time was, or could have been, lost in the change.

"THE GREGORIAN YEAR, AND OLD AND NEW STYLE. "The inquiry is often made, 'What is the meaning of the expression, March 7, 1738-9? The real date is March 7, 1739. The civil or legal year in England formerly commenced on the 25th day of March. This practice continued throughout the British dominions till the year 1752. Then the new, or the Gregorian style was introduced, which makes the year commence the 1st of January. But before that period (1752), as some other nations had adopted the New Style, it was usual for English writers to designate both years, if the event occurred before the 25th day of March. Thus we have Washington's birth designated, February 11th, 1731-2. That is, if the year commenced the 25th of March, it would be February 11, 1731; if the year commenced the 1st of January, it would be February 11, 1732, or according to New Style, February 22, 1732."

In order to make the above statements more fully clear, it is needful to remember that a year is designated to include the exact period of time which the earth takes to make one revolution around the sun. This is accomplished in 365 days and nearly 6 hours, but as the calendar must consist of complete days, these six hours are omitted, and in four years they make up a whole day, when one is added to the year, making what is called a leap-year. This, however, is not strictly correct, for it is ascertained by accurate calculations that a solar year is exactly 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 57.7 seconds; consequently, in putting on the six hours, we add 11 minutes 12.4 seconds in four years. This in the course of 158 years would amount to 24 hours, or a complete day. If this were permitted to go on, the 1st of January would gradually fall back toward mid-summer; and in the time of Pope Gregory XIII. (1582), it was found that the vernal equinox, which, A. D. 325, happened on the 21st of March, actually occurred on the 10th. The Pope, for the purpose of restoring the correctness of the calendar, ordered ten days to be dropped that year. This reformation was called "the New Style," while the former calendar was denominated "the Old Style." This New Style was not adopted in England until 1752, when it was found that another day had accumulated. An act of Parliament was then passed, in which it was directed that 11 days be dropped out of the calendar in 1752.

In this country the Old Style was not discarded in colloquial discourses until about fifty years ago. To guard against the disarrangement of the calendar in future, chronologers now omit the leap year at the end of three or four centuries, which plan is formed to balance the excess of 11 minutes 12.4 seconds, this being added by making every fourth year leap year, as people generally suppose. The year 1800 was not a leap year, for one of these intercalary days had accumulated, and was dropped; and the same will have to be done in 1900. There are now, therefore, twelve days difference between the Old and New Styles; and in order to compute the date of events correctly, and not fall into blunders which even some able historians have not avoided, we should recollect to allow ten days for the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, eleven for the eighteenth, and twelve for the nineteenth.