NEW YEAR'S SERMON FOR 1847.

A YEAR CONSIDERED AS A PART OF HUMAN LIFE.

We spend our years as a tale that is told.-PSALM XC. 9.

In the margin this is rendered "as a meditation," in accordance with the usual meaning of the Hebrew word nan. Some have rendered it "as a thought," the most rapid of all things; some "as a sigh," a brief expression of sorrow that escapes from us, and vanishes. In our common version it is rendered "as a tale that is told ;" an idle story that is designed to amuse for a moment; that is not worth seriously regarding or making an effort to remember; that soon passes away from the recollection. According to this interpretation, the meaning is, that life is suffered to pass as if it were a matter of no consequence; that it is spent in no employment that is really becoming our condition; and that it is worn away by trifles which leave no permanent impressions, and which produce no important results.

Either of these interpretations conveys not an unapt account of life as it is usually spent; and either of them will accord with the object which I have in view this morning. Either of them would furnish an appropriate description of the life which many of us have led during the past year. That year has gone for ever, like a tale that is told; like a passing thought; like a sigh that is gently breathed forth, and is soon over. By many of us it has been spent without any deep sense of the value of time; of the true objects of existence; of the bearing which the passing year has on our future being; of the importance of a year regarded as a part of human life.

At the beginning of a new year it is proper to look over the past, and to inquire, as we form our plans for the future, what is the purpose for which God has placed us in this world? The joys of the past year live now only in the recollection. Its sorrows

have been passed through, and, like the joys which we have experienced, are not to be recalled. Our departed joys leave the heart sad that they are passed; the sorrows that we have experienced leave it sad at the memory of the loss of friends, or property, or health-at the memory of blasted hopes, and of disappointments in our fondly-cherished plans. In spite of ourselves, and amidst all our attempts to be cheerful, no matter what the year may have been to us, there is a sombre feeling which comes over the soul, corresponding to the sombre season of the year; and in the midst of our rejoicings the mind will be pensive and sad. We cannot help saying to ourselves, "We shall never experience these pleasures again. We shall never again grasp the hand of the friend with whom we began the year, but who has passed away for ever. We shall never now see the fulfilment of the hopes that we then cherished, which seemed to us so bright and cheering in the prospect. We shall not be able to recall the hours that we have wasted in indolence or folly; to carry out the plans which have been defeated by the allurements of sensuality, or the fascinations of pleasure; or to secure now on our own character the happy influences which might have been secured if that whole year had been devoted to virtue and true religion. We shall never be able to go back over that part of our journey, to correct the errors that we have committed; and to extract the poisoned barb with which, by ingratitude or unkindness, we have pierced the bosom of a friend. We shall never have an opportunity of asking pardon of him whom we have injured, who is now in his grave; nor can we recall the harsh word or the unkind look that has fixed itself indelibly in the memory of those who love us. We cannot re-summon from the past this part of our probation as it hastens away to join the distant centuries in the land of shades, and make it now tributary to our salvation."

A year, as our lives are bounded, may be a different thing to us from what it is to other beings. It is different from what it was to the antediluvian patriarchs, when almost a thousand of our years gave them an opportunity of repairing past follies, and regaining what might have been lost-for a year bore scarcely a greater proportion to their lives than a month does to ours. It is different to us from what it is to an angelic being, to a redeemed spirit, to a lost soul; for by them it is not passed as a season of probation, and life with them is not soon to give way to another order of things. A year on earth; a year in heaven; a year in hell; if time is thus measured there, has its distinct features in each place. We are not concerned now, however soon we may be, with what a year is to the dwellers in other worlds, but we are much concerned to know what relation it sustains to our own existence here, and what bearing it may have on our existence hereafter. With this view, I propose to ask your attention, as a suitable subject for meditation at the close of one year, and the commencement of another, to this topic-a year considered as a part of human life.

I. A year, however it may be spent, is, in respect to each individual, a very material part of his active life; of life that amounts to anything. We speak much, as the Bible does, of the shortness of life; and yet we seldom form any correct idea of the reality on the subject, and are perpetually liable, in our anticipations, to make life longer than it really is. We fix the limit at seventy years a limit brief in itself; not often reached; rarely passed. But even if life were made sure to us for seventy years, there are great and important abatements to be made from those years as to any positive efficiency in regard to the real purposes of existence. Let there be abstracted from those years, as life is in part ordered, the period of unconscious infancy; the period of playful childhood; the period in youth when we are merely preparing for the future-a time often extending into manhood; the periods of sickness, of sleep, of needful relaxation; of the infirmities of age, and a very large portion of the three-score years and ten will be absorbed. I do not say that the playful period of childhood, or the forming season of youth, or even relaxation, sickness, and infirmity, are wholly useless, and are to be cast out of the estimate of our actual existence; but I speak of what is commonly understood as life, when a man may make money, not merely learn how to make it; when he may cultivate his farm, not merely learn the art of doing it; when he may preach, not merely study to become prepared; when he may construct a steam-engine, not merely learn how to handle his tools; and when he may visit his patient, or plead a cause at the bar, instead of poring over his Galen or Coke. Abstract all that we must from life, and you take away much of what seems to be its enormous length to a child, and explain the reason why it appears so short to him who has run through it. If he had had seventy years of uninterrupted vigor and health, when he could have prosecuted life's great enterprises day and night, without sickness, infirmity, or sleep, life might appear long to the old man, too. But such is not life. Seventy such years are now unknown to man; he may count his lot a rare exception who can number anything like fifty such years. The average length of active life is far below this standard.

What, think you, is the average life of the mass of men who have survived the perils of infancy and childhood, and who have passed through the season of preparation, and have entered upon their active duties? The average life of a minister of the Gospel is said now to be less than twenty years; and after all the long season of education in childhood and youth; after all his selfdenial in procuring an education; after his seven years' patient toil in a college and seminary, and often at an expense beyond all his patrimony, what life holds out to the minister of religion in promise is, that he may labor not thrice as long as he has been employed in the mere business of making preparation. It is possible that the average of life in other professions may be somewhat more, but it is probable that this would not be a very unfair state

ment of all who are called to grapple with public duties; to meet the excitement at the bar, or in the hall of legislation; or to have all the sensibilities of our nature taxed when seeing a patient lying in peril of death. The average life of the farmer is greater; that of the seaman, and the soldier, and the miner, and of various classes of manufacturers, less; and these twenty revolving periods commonly measure active human life. A year, then, becomes a very material part of our earthly existence.

Again. The real amount of active and efficient life, so short at best, is often greatly diminished by two other causes. One is, that many begin life late, and the early portion of what might have been their vigorous or useful existence, is spent in accomplishing little. Cromwell was a farmer until he was past his fortieth year, nor until that period did he appear with any degree of prominency on the stage of public affairs. Cowper composed the Task, translated the Iliad, and wrote nearly all his poems after he was fifty, and has left few memorials of what he did during what is commonly regarded as constituting nearly the whole of life. The early part of what might be vigorous and active life, is often spent in idleness, or in dissipation, or in abortive schemes; and in such cases the individual has advanced far on his way before there is any serious purpose of accomplishing anything that will make mankind acquainted with the fact that he ever lived. Thus many a one that becomes a Christian, has spent his early years, and the best part of his life, in dissipation and riot; in vanity and frivolity; in unbelief and sensuality; and the time in which he can now truly live, and accomplish anything in the real purpose of living, is crowded into the period when already the infirmities of age begin to creep on. The other circumstance is this life is often greatly abbreviated in its closing period. I mean not merely by death, or infirmity, but by other causes. A man has gained what he wished, and withdraws from the world. He has won a battle, and retires to repose on his laurels. He has amassed a fortune, and retires to enjoy it. Or he becomes disappointed by a few bold and unsuccessful efforts, and gives over in despair. When young, he plumed his wings for a lofty flight, and meant, like the eagle, to ascend and look at the sun; but the waxen plumes melted, and he fell to the earth to attempt to rise

no more.

It is a rare instance, where one toils patiently on from youth to old age; forming a preparation for future usefulness by diligence and virtue in early life; securing all that was gained in youth by constant industry, and adding unceasingly to the treasured stock of wisdom, knowledge, and virtue, until the old man is gathered to his fathers like a shock of corn in his season, fully ripe. Newton was one such man-a man by his native talent "placed at the head of the race," and by his diligence setting an example to the humblest of mankind, who would wish to accomplish anything in wisdom or learning. Our own country at the present time

contains one such man-yet lingering among us, but sinking to an honored grave-who may not be improperly mentioned here; a man who began life earlier than almost any who have been distinguished in public affairs, except the younger Pitt, and who has gone now beyond the common limits of human existence; who made all of life at its commencement that could be made of it, and who, when other men withdrew from public affairs, seemed resolved to show the world what can be made of its close; who has accumulated more knowledge in the departments to which his attention has been turned than any other living man; who has filled up all his days with diligent acquisition and the discharge of great public duties, and who will probably die, after all the obloquy heaped upon him, as the most honored man-except one, with whom no mere mortal is to be compared-of the generations through which he has lived. But these are rare exceptions. They show what life may be, not what it commonly is. Usually short in itself, it is greatly abridged either at its beginning or its close; and a year, therefore, is a very material part of human existence.

II. A year is important as a part of human life, because it is, with many, a forming period, determining all that is to come. A single year, in certain circumstances, may do much more on this subject than many years at another period; and while, perhaps, to multitudes, that particular year may be undistinguished from others, yet to many it has an importance which no other one can have. It is to them the decisive year; the year that will be remembered though all others shall be forgotten. Let me illustrate this thought with reference to the year which has just now closed, and which, to many, ever onward will have an importance which can pertain to no other period of life. 1. It has been such to those who have during that year determined on their profession or calling in life—an act that is, probably, to shape your whole future course; to determine the nature of your studies, your plans, and your associates; and which is ultimately to measure the amount of your usefulness or your celebrity in the world. 2. It is so in regard to those who have entered on some new form of business-an act that will perhaps determine whether they will be rich or poor, honored or disgraced, when they leave the world. 3. It is so in respect to those who have formed new friendships, entered into new business relations, or contracted marriage-acts that are to affect all their destiny here below, perhaps their everlasting doom beyond the grave. 4. It is so in regard to those who have formed some plan to be developed far on in life-whose fruits they do not expect to see until many years shall have rolled away. 5. It is so in regard to those who, during the year, have surrendered themselves to some insidious form of temptation. They began the year strong in the principles of virtue. During the year those principles have been assailed with a force which they did not anticipate, and which they were not prepared to resist, and they yielded. They have taken friends to their embrace,