ness and joy. Believing in Thee our Father, we enter another year, and advance along our endless journey, not knowing what a day or an hour may bring forth; but knowing this, as all we care to know, that during every day and hour we are "continually with Thee." A long life on earth may be ours, but neither its labours nor its cares, its temptations nor its trials, shall be able to destroy our peace, because unable to separate us from Thy love. Thy love will give life to every duty, deliverance from every temptation, guidance in every perplexity, and comfort in every trial. Death may come, in what form or in what circumstances, how soon or how late, we cannot tell; but we fear no evil, however dark its shadow, for "Thou art with us.” Eternity must come, and may come to us ere the year ends. But whatever things beyond the grave are hidden from us, Thou Thyself, our Father, art revealed! We know Thee, and this is life eternal!

ADVICES ON ENTERING A NEW YEAR.

1. Let a short portion of time be spent each day this year in private prayer, in reading God's Word, and, if possible, some devotional book.

2. Let it be the great work of the year to become better acquainted personally with Jesus Christ as the living and ever-present Friend,. Brother, and Saviour.

3. Endeavour to concentrate your efforts to do good upon some definite unselfish work in your family or

out of it, which may help others, as it certainly must help yourself.

4. In all things try to live more towards God, seeking His approval of your inner and outer life. The less you talk about yourself or your doings before men, the better for yourself and for them.

5. Aim this year at being a peacemaker between professing Christians; to allay disputes, and to heal breaches among friends and relations; and to make men respect and esteem each other more.

6. Do not leave behind you in the old year guilt unpardoned, but believe in Jesus for the remission of sins; nor enter a new year with sin loved and cherished, but accept of and rely upon His Spirit to sanctify you. Begin the year without enmity to any man on earth, "forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any even as Christ forgave you, even so do ye.”

7. If you are the head of the house, resolve to read a portion of God's Word once a-day at least to the family; and either read or offer up, always with them, a short but hearty prayer.

8. Endeavour to keep an account of your income and expenditure, that you may be able to live justly and generously. Give what you can to assist poor relatives, and poor Christians, and the Church of Christ. Try this one year to tax yourself ten per cent. on your free income for such purposes.

Learn to do these things, and many more will the Lord teach thee to know and do; and may the God of love and peace be with thee!

THE CLOSE OF A YEAR.

"REMEMBER all the way the Lord hath led

thee” during the past year.

REMEMBER HIS MERCIES.-Calmly review, as far as you can, what God has given you these bygone months.

Have you been blessed with bodily health? If so, consider what a gift it is to be spared the tortures some endure the restless, feverish nights; the long weary days; the unceasing pain; the no-hope of relief in this world.

Have you been blessed with mental health? If so, think of the mercy of not having been visited with insarity, or of having been freed from the suffering of even mental depression, so touchingly described by the poet as

"A grief without a sigh, void, dark, and drear,

A stifled, drowsy, unimpassion'd grief,

That finds to natural outlet, no relief,

In word, or sign, or tear!"

Think of the mercy of having been able to enjoy God's beautiful world, and to feel the life in its scenery,

its music, and its blue sky, during the summer that has passed, as you walked along the sea-shore, among the woods, across the green fields, up the glen, over the moorlands, or gazed on the glorious landscape from the windy summits of the old hills. Health of body and of mind!-Oh, common, most blessed, yet, alas! how often unnoticed, gifts of God!

yours.

Have you received other mercies connected with your temporal well-being? Perhaps at the beginning of the year (as at the beginning, maybe, of many a year before) things looked very dark for you and Yet "hitherto" God has helped you. You may never have had more light on your path than what enabled you to take the next step with safety, but that light has never failed you. God has been pleased thus to discipline many of His people. You may, possibly, remember also peculiar deliverances:from sickness; from money difficulties; from bodily dangers; with unexpected additions to your means of comfort and of usefulness.

Again, call to remembrance your social mercies, which have come more indirectly through others. Think of the relations and friends who have been spared to you! Begin with your dearest, and pass on from those to others less closely allied, but still most valued, and number them all, if you can. Do any remain whom death threatened to remove during the past year? Have any, have many, been a comfort to you? Have your anxieties regarding the temporal or spiritual well-being of others been lessened? Have beloved ones been given to you during the

year such as a wife, a husband, or a child? If God hath led you in this way during the past year, it ought indeed to be remembered!

And if any of those Christian friends have fallen asleep in Jesus, then it is a great mercy to know most certainly that they are your friends still, and your best friends too; and you should thank God for the happiness which they now enjoy, and which you hope to share with them.

But you have other mercies to remember besides these. Surely much has been done for your spiritual good by your Father in heaven. He has shewn patience, forbearance, and long-suffering towards you ; and has been teaching you during these past months by faithful ministers or faithful friends; and has been striving within you to bring you to Himself, and to keep you there. Have you enjoyed no peace in believing, nor gained any victories over self and sin? Have you possessed no more calm and habitual fellowship with God? Have you done no good? Has prayer neither been offered in truth, nor answered in love? Has all been fruitless and dead? Oh, let us beware of the falsehood of denying spiritual mercies bestowed on us by God! "If I should say I know Him not, I should be a liar like unto you," said our Lord. The graces of the Spirit, the least of them, are the earnests of eternal good, the assurances of enjoying the whole fulness of God.

BUT YOU HAVE SORROWS TO REMEMBER. Alas! we are in little danger of forgetting these. The sunny days may come and go unheeded, but the dark ones