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MATTHEW OF WESTMINSTER The flowers of history, especially such as relate to the affairs of Britain. Vol. I. B.C. 4004 to A.D. 1066.

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MATTHEW OF WESTMINSTER
The flowers of history, especially such as relate to the affairs of Britain. Vol. I. B.C. 4004 to A.D. 1066.
page 126



B.c. 4. when thb sixth age begak. epact,4 and fifth concurrent,* on the twenty-fifth day of December, our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was born in Bethlehem of Judaea, in order, by sanctifying the people of the Gentiles, and the Jewish nation, to bind them together, and unite them to himself. And he was born, according to his most exactly ordered arrangement, on the night of the Lord's day ; because, if you reckon back in the chronological tables, you will find the fifth concurrent of this year, the third regular of January. And when they are added together, and. seven are subtracted, one remains. And so you will find that the first of January on that year fell on a Sunday, which corresponds to my calculation. For on the same day in which God said, " Let there be light, and there was light," the day-star from on high visited us, in order to give light to those who sat in darkness, and to guide them into the way of peace. And the sixth age began, according to some people, with the Nativity of Christ. According to the Apostle, for instance, wh o says, " When the fulness of time shall have come," &c. According to others, with the day on which he was baptized, o n account of the regenerative power given to the waters. iftftmmA thereof, the indiction should be made ose of by which to reckon, and date their years."—Johnson's Diet, in voc. But this can hardly be what our author means. Ducange says, " Indiction is a name given by the Latins to a number of fifteen years, usually added to the years of Christ, to prevent mistakes in chronology." The passage in the text is not very dear, and Ducange confesses that there is great difficulty about the word, on more accounts than one. * " Epact, a number whereby we denote the excess of the solar year above the lunar, and thereby may find out the age of the moon every year. In the solar year consisting of 36 5 days, and the lunar but of 35 4 ; the lunations every year get eleven days before the solar year, and thereby, in nineteen years, the moon completes 20 minutes (times ?) 12 lunations, or geta up one whole solar year, and having finished that circuit, begins again with the sun, and so from 19 to 19 years/'—Johnson's Diet, in voc. ft " Concurrents is a name given to a number of days never exceeding seven, which, being added to the regulars, make up a festival/'—Ducange in voc. Come. " In the works of the ecclesiastical chronologers, there are solar and lunar regulars. A solar regular is an invariable number added to a month, which, being added to a concurrent, points out in what day of a week any month of which it is the regular begins. A lunar regular is an invariable number added to a month, in order to find out the moon in the calends of each month."—Ibid. Reguiaris.


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