The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1892-01-15
SUNDIAL OF AHAZ.
SERMON PREACHED BY REV. T. DE
WITT TALMAGE, D. D.


ows-Daybreak on the Heights of the
Mountain Tops-Fun Report of a Re-
markable Discourse
BROOKLYN, Jan. 1O.-Dr. 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
were conspicuous throughout and
must have been impaired to his hear
ers. 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."
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. 1t was a
sundial. 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.
M, 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 he gave himself to rest.
After awhile came the wheel and
weight clock, and Pope Sylvester the
Second was its most important in
ventor 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. 1t took
the world six thousand years to make
the present chronometer. So with {
the measurement of longer spaces 6
than minutes and hours. I
Time was calculated from new t
moon to new moon; then from har- v
vest to harvest. Then the year was +
to be three hundred and I
fifty-four days and then three hun
dred and sixty days and, not until s
a long while after, three hundred and Y
sixty-five days. Then events were /
from the foundation of G
Rome, afterward from the Olympic l
games. Then the Babylonians had Y
their measurement of the year. and q
the Romans theirs, and the Armen- l
ians theirs, and the Hindoos theirs. |
Chronology was busy for centuries
studying monuments, inscriptions, t
coins, mummies and astronomy try S
ing to lay plan by which all ques- S
tons of dates might be settled and t
events put in their right place in the &
procession of the ages. But the 7
chronologists only heaped up a noun S
tain of confusion and bewilderment i
until in the Sixth century Dionysius
Exiguus, a Roman abbot, said, Let /
everything date from the birth at t
Bethlehem of the Lord Jesus Christ, L
the Saviour of the world" t
The abbot proposed to have things @
dated backward and forward from d
that great event. What a splendid a
thought for the world What a U
mighty thing for Christianity 1t o
would have been most natural to
date everything from the creation of "
world. But | am glad the chronolo- b
gists could not too easily guess how t
old the world was in order to get the S
nations in the habit of dating from v
that occurrence in its documents and
histories.
Forever fixed is it that all history n
IS to be dated with reference to the o.
birth of Christ, and, this matter set G
He'd, Hales, the chief chronologist, lie
declared that the world was made Ct
i've thousand four hundred and 81
eleven years before Christ, and the b.
leluge came three thousand one Y,