The Maryville times. (Maryville, Tenn.) 1884-1944, 1892-01-27
THE CLOCK OF LIFE.
DR.. Talmage Compares 1t With the
Sun-Dial Of Ahaz.
dow God Caused the shadow of the Lat
ter to Retreat-A Lesson that the
Majority of the Human Race
Need to Learn-A Happy
Sermon.

be brought the shadow ten degrees
backward by which it had gone down
n the dial of Ahaz"
Here is the first clock, or watch, or
ehronometer or timepiecs Of which the
world has any knowledge. But it was
watch that did not tick and clock
that did not strike. 1t was a sun-dial.
Ahaz, the king, invented it Between
the hours given to statecraft and the
cares of Office he invented something
by which he could tell the time of day.
This sun-dial may have been great
column, and when the shadow of that
column reached one point it was 9
o'clock a. M, and when it reached an
other point it was 8 o'clock p. m, and
all the hours and half hours were so
measured. Or it may have been fight
OF stairs, such as may now be found in
Hindustan and other old countries, and
when the shadow reached one step it
vas 10 o'clock a. M, or another step it
was o'clock p m, and likewise other
hours may have been indicated
The clepsydra or water-clock fol-
lowed the sun-dial 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 him
self to politics, and while the third part
was burning he gave himself to rest
After awhile came the wheel and
weight clock and Pope Sylvester the
Second was its most important inventor.
And the skill of centuries of exquisite
mechanism toiled at the timepiece until
the world had the Vick's clock of the
fourteenth century, and Huyghens the
inventor, swung the first pendulum,
and DR.. Hooke contrived the recoil
escapement. And the ''endless chain
followed, and the ratchet and pinion
lever took it's place; and the compen-
sation balance and the stem winder fol.
lowed, and now we have the buzz and
clang of the great clock and watch fac
tories of Switzerland and Germany
and England and America turning out
what seems to be the perfection OF
timepieces. 1t took the world six thou.
sand years to make the present chro.
nometer So with the measurement OF
longer spaces than minutes and hours.
Time was calculated from new moon to
new moon, them from harvest to har-
vest Then the year was pronounced
to be three hundred and fifty-four days
and then three hundred and sixty days
and not until a long while after three
hundred and sixty-fve days Then
events were calculated from the foun
dalton of Rome, afterward from the
Olympic games. Then the Babylonians
had their measurement of the year anG
the Romans theirs and the Armenians
theirs and the Hindoos theirs Chronol
ogy was busy for centuries studying
monuments, inscriptions, coins, .mum
mics and astronomy, trying to lay &
plan by which all question of dates
might be settled and events put in theil
right place in the procession of the
ages But the chronologists only
heaped up mountain of confusion apt
bewilderment until in the sixth cen
fury Dionysius Exigus, 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 dated
backward and forward from that grea
event What splendid thought fol
the world! What mighty thing fol
Christianity! 1t would have been mos
natural to date everything from tn,
creation of the world. But am glat
the chronologists could not too easil,
guess how old the world was il
order to get the nations in the habit o
dating from that occurrence in its docu
ments and histories. Forever fixed i
it that all history is to be dated will
reference to the birth of Christ, and
this matter settled, Hales, the chic
chronologist, declared that the worl,
was made ), All years before Christ, an,
the deluge came 3,155 years befor
Christ, and all the illustrious events O
the last nineteen centuries, and all tn
great events of all time to come, hav,
been, or shall be. dated from the brit
of Christ. These things l say that yo
may know what watch is, what
clock Is what an almanac is, and lear
to appreciate through what tolls an
hardships and perplexities the worl
came to its present conveniences an
comforts and to help you to more re
spectful consideration of that sun-dia
of Ahaz planted in my text.
We are told that Hezekiah, the kine
was dying of boil. 1t must have bee
one of the worst kinds of carbuncles,
boil without any central core and som,
times beautiful A fig was put upon
as poultice. Hezekiah did not war
to die then. His son, who was to TAX
the kingdom, had not yet been borI
and Hezekiah's death would have bee
the death of the nation. So he pray
for recovery and is told he will get wei
But he wants some miraculous sign I
make him sure of it. He has the choic
of having the shadow on the sundial
Ahaz advance or retreat. He replied
would not be so wonderful to have I'll
sun go down, for it always does G
1 down sooner or later. He asks that
/ go backward. In other words, let IL
day. instead of going on toward SUI
down, turn and go toward sunrise. 81
the invalid king bolstered up ar
wrapped in blankets looking out of Il
window upon the sun-dial in the cour
yard While he watches the shadow c
the dial the shadow begins to retrea
Instead of going on toward o'clock
the evening it goes back toward
o'clock in the morning. The fig pou