New Year's Day

“’Tis a time for memory and tears.” - Prentice.

   We have just passed the threshold of another year. We are enjoying the light of its first day; and it is meet that we should turn aside from the gay and thoughtless crowd, to spend an hour in calm reflection—to survey the past, and repent of its follies—to look forward to the future, and resolve to spend it to the honor and glory of God.

   To devote this day to mere sensual gratification, is unworthy of any whom the Creator has endowed with reason and intelligence; for it is in accordance with their plainest dictates, that we should this day acknowledge the Hand which has led us along the past, and implore the same guardian power for protection, during the year upon which we have just entered.

   Human life is a journey—a long and toilsome pilgrimage, and each New Year’s day is but one of the milestones which serves to tell every one of us, how much of that journey is behind—how much, in all probability, remains to be traversed by our weary feet. To the young, the middle-aged, and the old, this period calls for reflection. Let us, then, give a moment to serious thought; and though we may become sadder, I doubt not we shall be wiser and better than before. Are we young, flattering ourselves with the thought that much of life’s pathway is yet untrod; and in the joyousness of life’s springtime, promising to our own hearts many long and happy years? We should remember that the tender blossom is most easily blighted—that it is not for mortal eyes to perceive the veil which shrouds the impenetrable future; for though we may retrace the past, and number its years, to none is it given to know the number which still lie before. Are we in manhood’s prime—rejoicing in the fullness of our strength, and thinking that coming years will but add to its vigor—that activity will not depart from our limbs; and light from or eyes? The past, like a teacher, raises a voice of solemn warning, and tells us that the perfection of manhood is, like the full bloom of the rose, the beautiful but sure precursor of its near decay.

   Are we aged? Have many occasions like the present furrowed the brow and silvered the hair? Do we feel that the elastic buoyancy of youth, and the firm strength of manhood, have departed? If so, our years are solemn monitors. Each of them should now find a tongue, to tell us that our weary pilgrimage is nearly accomplished, and the grave must soon open to receive us to its chill but welcome embrace.

   Youth, manhood, old age, be wise! Listen to the solemn voices of your departed years. They bid you improve those yet to come; but of themselves they say, we return no more. The year just past is an emblem of our life. We have seen spring smile in beauty over the land; the flowers, warmed by her breath, spring into life, to enjoy a bright but transitory existence; the fields were arrayed in their richest verdure, and the grove rejoiced in its leafy honors; every breeze was laden with perfume, and every scene afforded delight; melody was breathed from every bough, and all things above, beneath, around, rejoice in the return of spring’s bright sunny hours.

   Summer, with maturer beauties, came upon us, and in her rich gifts we found the fulfillment of all that spring had promised; the blossoms, whose beauty and perfume had charmed, were changed to the pulpy and refreshing fruit; the field of waving emerald assumed a golden tinge; strong hands grasped the sickle, and the song of harvest resounded through the land—the bounties of a beneficent Providence were richly lavished upon us, and the hearts of all were filled with food and gladness.

   With sober tread Autumn succeeded; moaning winds sighed farewell to the glories of summer; the flowers drooped beneath the keen blast; the leaves, in eddying circles, fell sadly to the earth; and the monarch of the forest, despoiled of his glory and beauty, waved his bare arms aloft, making melancholy music, as if already anticipating the approaching storm.

   And now Winter, with its howling blasts and drifting snows, investing the earth like a winding-sheet, is upon us, and all the loveliness of the year that is past, remains but in sorrowful recollection. And such is life: first, joyous, smiling youth; active, vigorous manhood; the melancholy and sober thought of life’s decline; fit preparation for the winter of death.

   With many, this is the last New Year. Before another rolls round, thousands will have gone to the world of spirits. Many a new grave will be made in the earth’s cold breast. Many a tear will be shed at the tomb of departed excellence, and daily the slow winding funeral train, and the convulsive sob of the disconsolate mourner, will force upon our hearts the conviction of our own mortality.

   Let us, then, gird ourselves up for the year upon which we have just entered; and if spared to see its close, may we be enabled to look back upon it as one of the happiest in our lives—one in which

we have done more for the cause of God and humanity, than in any which has preceded it! Let us be prepared to resist all the temptations it may present, and humbly endeavor to correct the errors of the past. Let us be more zealous, persevering, devoted, and self-denying. Let us read more, meditate more, pray more; and in order to be strengthened for every good word and work, let each offer for himself the fervent petition, “Teach me my days to number, and apply my trembling heart to wisdom.”

Millennial Harbinger. Vol. 2. No. 1 (January 1852). Joplin: College, 1987.