Joshua's long bay. 



141 



fulfilled that choice to him. The fact of the event conforming to 

 Hezekiah's choice warrants us, I think, in saying that this was no 

 natural consequent of the antecedents. 



In the case now before us, our only authority concerning the 

 miracle is contained in the chapter itself. The prophet Habakkuk 

 (Hab. iii, 11) indeed alludes to the events recorded in the chapter, 

 but it is no more than an allusion. In the book called Ecclesiasticus, 

 or '* The Wisdom of Jesus the Son of Sirach " (xlvi, 1-6), those events 

 are fully described, but nothing is added to our knowledge thereby ; 

 mdeed, one important statement is contrary to the Scripture, and 

 I believe that in general members of the Victoria Institute approve 

 the Vlth Article of the Church of England, which expressly confines 

 the name and authority of " Holy Scripture " to the books of the 

 Canon, from which Ecclesiasticus, and the other books which we 

 usually denominate " the Apocrypha," are excluded. Much more, 

 then, can no authoritative evidence regarding a Scripture miracle 

 be derived from any heathen source. I was very sorry, therefore, 

 to find that a number of " old wives' fables," which I had hoped had 

 long ago passed into deserved oblivion, were again brought forw^ard. 

 They bear on their face the signs of being mere " lying wonders." 



Thus we have the alleged stopping of the sun in Mexico, which 

 cannot have corresponded to Joshua's Long Day," because Mexico 

 is more than nine hours distant in time from Palestine, so that it 

 was only two or three hours past midnight in Mexico at the moment 

 when Joshua at Gibeon gave his command at noon. The sun, there- 

 fore, had not risen in Mexico, and no observation of it could have 

 been made, either of its moving or of its ceasing to move. 



The Chinese record is clearer still, for it states that the sun went 

 backwards in the sky to the extent of three zodiacal signs. That is 

 to say, the sun seemed to go back with respect to the stars, which 

 implies, not that the diurnal rotation of the earth was reversed for 

 six hours, but that the annual revolution of the earth round the sun 

 was reversed for three months ; in other w^ords, that the year was 

 put back by a full season. When we have swallowed this camel, 

 there is still a gnat to be strained at, viz. — that the constellations 

 of the zodiac are not visible while the sun is up. 



The quotation from Herodotus is even less satisfactory, because 

 it is evidence on very indirect hearsay, removed a thousand 

 years from the occurrence. The statement of Herodotus further 



