The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1892-01-15
SUNDlAL OF AHAZ.
SERMON PREACHED BY REV. 7. DE
WITT TALMAee, D, D.

] ows-Daybreak ON the Heights of the
Mountain Tops-Fuil Report of "a Re-
markabie Discourse.
BROOKLYN, Jan 10 DIR Talmage's
sermon this morning was full of
brightness and good cheer, He might
have called tia receipt for happiness
The buoyancy and elasticity of tenn
permanent which characterize him
We're conspicuous throughout, and
must have been impaired to his hear
ets, His text was ii Kings Xxx, II,
And Isaiah the prophet cried unto
the Lord and he brought the shadow
ten degrees backward, by which it
had gone down in the dial of Ahaz. 4"
Here is the first clock or watch or
chronometer or timepiece of which
the world has any knowledge. But
it was watch that did not tick and
a clock that did not strike. twas a
supdial Ahaz, the king, invented
it. Between the hours given to state
craft and the cares of office he in
vented something by Which he could
tell the time of day. This sundial
may have been great column, and
when the shadow of that column
reached one point it was nine o'clock
a. M, and when it reached another
point it was three o'clock p, m, and
all the hours and half hours were so
measured. Or it may have been a
fight of stairs such as may now be
found in Hindostan and other old
countries, and when the shadow
reached one step it was ten o'clock a,
NJ, or another step it was four o'clock
p. M, and likewise other hours may
have been indicated
TIME MEASURE.
The clepsydra or water clock fol
lowed the sundial. and the sand
glass followed the clepsydra, Then
came the candle clock of Alfred the
Great, and the candle was marked
into three parts, and while the first
part was burning he gave himself to
religion, and while the second part
was burning he gave himself to poll
tics, and while the third part was
burning ne gave himself to rest.
After awhile came the wheel and
weight clock, and Pope Sylvester the
Second was its most important in
yentor. And the skill of centuries
of exquisite mechanism toiled at the
timepieces until the world had the
vick's clock of the Fourteenth cen
fury, and Huyghens, the inventor,
swung the first pendulum, and DR..
Hooke contrived the recoil escape
ment.,
And the endless chain" followed,
and the ratchet and pinion lever"
took its place, and the compensation
balance and the stemwinder fol
lowed, and now we have the buzz
and clang of the great clock and
watch factories of Switzerland and
Germany and England and America
turning out what seems to be the
perfection of timepieces. It took
the world six thousand years to make
/ the present chronometer So with
the measurement of longer spaces
than minutes and hours.
Time was calculated from new
moon. to new moon; then from har-
vest to harvest. Then the year was
pronounced to be three hundred and
! fifty four days and then three hun
dred and sixty days and, not until
a long while after, three hundred and
sixty five days. Then events were
calculated from the foundation of
Rome, afterward from the Olympic
games. Then the Babylonians had
their measurement of the year, and
the Romans theirs, and the Armen-
ians theirs, and the Hindoos theirs.
Chronology was busy for centuries
studying monuments, inscriptions,
coins, munmies and astronomy, try
ing to lay plan by which all ques-
tions of dates might be settled and
events put in their right place in the
procession of the ages. But the
chronologists only heaped upa noun
tain of confusion and bewilderment
until in the Sixth century Dionysius
Exiguus, a Roman abbot, said, Let
everything date from the birth at
Bethlehem of the Lord Jesus Christ,
the Saviour of the world
The abbot proposed to have things
/ Iotn1 hnn1r1ro,l or1 fnprx,n,.J
that great event. What splendid
thought for the world What a
mighty thing for Christianity! 1t
would have been most natural to
date everything from the creation of
world But | am glad the chronolo-
gists could not too easily guess how
old the world was in order to get the
nations in the habit of dating from
that occurrence in it's documents and
histories.
Forever fixed is it that all history
is to be dated with reference to the
birth of Christ, and, this matter set
tied, Hales, the chief chronologist,
declared that the world was made
five thousand four hundred and
eleven years before Christ, and the
deluge came three thousand one
hundred and fifty five years before
Christ, and all the illustlious events
of the last nineteen centuries and all
the great events of all time to
come have been or shall be dated
from the birth of Christ These
things | say that you may know
what watch is, what clock is,
what an almanac is, and learn to ap
preciate through what tolls and hard
ships and perplexities the world came
to its present conveniences and com
forts. and to help you to more respect
full consideration of the sundial OF
lAhaz planted in my text.
We are told that Hezekiah, the
king, was dying of boil. 1t must
have been one of the worst kind OF
carbuncles, boil without any cen
tral core and sometimes beautiful. A
fig was put upon it as a poultice.
HeZekiah did not want to die then.