THE

ORTHODOX PRESBYTERIAN.

No. XXXIX. DECEMBER, 1832.

THE CLOSING YEAR.

VOL. IV.

WE have now arrived at the close of another year; another annual revolution of our world has been numbered with the thousands that are past, and we are startled when we reflect that we are now one year nearer eternity than we were at the closing of the last-one year nearer the glorious realms of happiness and peace, or one year nearer the precincts of misery-the abodes of unmitigated woe and sorrow. There are moments when the most profligately immoral of our species are arrested in the mad recklessness of their career of folly and of crime-there are moments when the spell which binds them to their vices and their abominations is burst asunder ;when conscience assumes its empire over their hearts, and they are forced to behold themselves polluted with all the foulness of moral enormity and uncleanness, as rebels against their God, and as cumberers of the vineyard of the Lord. This is not, perhaps, such a time-this is not such an awakening moment; but it is a season when we are called upon, as rational and accountable creatures, to ponder the paths of our feet; and, as the expectants of glory and of immortality, to reflect upon our former ways. There are periods of peculiar importance in the personal history of every individual, from the circumstances connected with which a new or more vivid tone of moral feeling is given to the mind, and a path, hitherto untrodden or unobserved, is opened up to invite the footsteps of the earthly sojourner. But this, unless sanctified by the blessing of the Lord, is, perhaps, not such a time. There is nothing in it so peculiarly marked and impressive, no circumstance connected with it so astonishing or so startling as to arrest the votary of crime or of folly in his unholy career;-and by many it may be regarded as a time to be set apart for joyous revelry, when a loose is to be given to the social feelings in all the glad hilarity of thoughtlessness and of mirth. But to us it has always come bearing with it feelings of sobered reflection, if not of melancholy interest. It is one of those oc

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currences in our history, which not unfrequently exercise over our associations, if not a legitimate, at least an unrestrained and beneficial control :-and we envy not the obtuse indifference of that man's mind who can let such a season escape without casting a look of sorrow over the errors of the past, or without forming resolutions respecting the future, in dependence upon the grace and strength of heaven for ability to serve the Lord with greater zeal, devotion, and purity than heretofore. It is not that there is any thing in the close of the year naturally or positively to demand this-it is not that the Almighty has hallowed it as a time especially to be devoted to such exercises-it has had its origin in the arbitrary appointment of man in harmony with the revolutions of nature and for the purposes of utility. We do not therefore attach to this period any of those superstitious feelings which the Church of Rome associates with its fasts and its festivals. We are strangers and sojourners before the Lord, as were all our fathers; and this is one of those eminences to which we occasionally attain in our earthly pilgrimage, from whose summit we can look back over the bewildered path which we have trodden, and mark the windings of our onward way, so far as we are permitted to gaze upon it, studded with temptations, or strewed with sorrows and with cares.

We live, perhaps, with one exception, in the most eventful period of the history of man-in an age when mighty moral movements are taking place in our own land, and in the nations around us. We, perhaps, may not be able to tell what will be the result of all-we may not be able to uplift the vail which shrouds in darkness the wonder-working hand of God we may not be able to penetrate with one gaze the dim vistas of futurity, and read the effects which existing causes are calculated to produce; but one thing we do know, and one thing we have the testimony of heaven itself to warrant us in believing that all things are working together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. Every event, even the most trifling in the mighty system of moral machinery, is contributing its part, as assigned by the Lord, to bring about the period when the kingdoms of this world shall become the kingdoms of God and of his Christ when apostacy, and heresy, and infidelity shall be withered from every land, and when the banner of the cross shall be unfurled over regions now slumbering in all the degradation of paganism and idolatry. The Christian, then, has no cause for despondency-he may, indeed, perceive that

the truth is in many places evil spoken of he may perceive crime and error increasing rather than diminishing he may perceive the pretended wise ones of the earth mocking the counsel of the devoted servants of the Lord: bnt amidst all this, Jehovah can make the wrath of man to praise him-he reigns over all; and whilst the politician may endeavour to trace the probable effects of certain legislative enactments and national movements, and lose himself in the shadowy mystecism of his own speculations, the student of the Bible, the believing servant of God, can look up with confidence to his Creator, as having in his hand the fate of nations, and wielding with the arm of omnipotence the eternal destinies of the countless millions of his intelligent creation. Though we should behold the most unpropitious events taking place around us, though we should have to lament that Popery, and Infidelity, and recreant Protestantism have entered into an unholy league against the interests of evangelical Christianity-still the voice of faith whispers to us, be not terrified, the cause of Christ is the cause of the omnipotent, and it must prevail. Whatever changes, therefore, may take place in our own land, or in the nations around us, no matter how they may menace the prosperity and welfare of the church of Christ; whatever combinations of powers may for a time arrest the progress of evangelical Christianity, and threaten it with ruin and overthrow; whatever wars may be waged against those who maintain their allegiance firm and unshaken to the Lord of hosts-all these events can be looked upon with placidity by the believer; for though he may deplore the evils of the prevalence of error and the carnage and devastation of war, he knows that the cause to which the warmest and holiest affections of his heart are devoted, is secure. When we look, then, to the future, and when our anticipations of it are clouded with the forebodings of melancholy, our prayer should be, in the stillness of the devout submission of the heart," thy will be done in earth' as it is in heaven;" "for thou, O Lord, doest according to thy will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth."

Another thing which must strike us in reviewing the present aspect of society, is the extensive spread of knowledge throughout almost every ramification of the community. We rejoice in its extension, we regard it as the handmaid of Christianity; but like every blessing of a gracious providence, it may be abused. Its progress has been hailed by some as bringing in its train the blessings of liberty, and the emanci

pation of the human mind from the thraldom of superstition. But we fear that in many instances error, and scepticism, and infidelity have been disseminated alongst with it. If the knowledge which is being spread throughout the world instil not into the mind of man the sentiments of devotion and pietyif it be not made subservient to the interests of religion-if it assist not in making those who attain it better men and better Christians, it deserves not the name-it is worthless-it is foolish. It is like the destructive winds of the east which breathe upon the beauty and loveliness of nature, and in a moment they are withered and destroyed; it sends forth its pestilential contagion, and moral principle, and social distinctions, and religion, and liberty are blighted before it. This is no imaginary monster conjured up to terrify and affright us-it is no ideal case, whose existence is only problematical--it has occurred in our own days; and we have only to direct our readers to revolutionized France* for a proof of its realized existence. When that country might have become the centre of the free political system of the world, when it had annihilated the power of the oppressor, then was the first bud of liberty blighted as it burst forth-then did a race of men arise, whose despotism was more appaling, and whose cruelty was more bloody and diabolical than any atrocities which civilized Europe had ever before witnessed; men whose knowledge was such as I have described; men who felt not and who owned not the power of moral principle, who enshrined the image of their own polluted reason in the place of the divinity; men who converted France into a shambles, and her people into the victims of their butcheries-and what did they leave behind? Did they leave liberty, happiness, or religion? No! All had fled the desecrated soil, and the genius of freedom and the spirit of pure religion were constrained to weep over and bedew with their tears the desolated land. Such are the effects of vain, infidel knowledge upon a nation, and we need not stop to point out all its dire consequences to individuals. It is only like muscular power to the banditti; it renders its possessor a greater scourge to society. But the question may be asked-do we therefore condemn true knowledge, or would we cramp the exertions of man, when directed to its attainment? No, we would not; we look upon the attainment of true knowledge as one of the greatest sources of earthly hap

* We allude to the period following the revolution of 1798.

piness to man, as the noblest support of pure and undefiled religion, and as the surest and most powerful weapon with which to guard a nation's happiness and independence. We mean a knowledge which is compatible with, and founded upon, the revelation of God: give us this in the man who is engaged in the avocations of the world, and he will perform all his social and moral duties with zeal and with integrity; give us this in the Christian, and we dread not the weapons of the sceptic or the infidel. The spread of true knowledge never has, and never can injure the doctrines of the Gospel. We would rejoice to see every man's mind stored with knowledge; but we would rejoice still more to see that based upon the truths of the Bible, and regulated by its doctrines and its laws.

In casting a glance over the events of the year which is now near a close, we have one cause of gladness-we allude to the mitigation of that pestilence which has lately afflicted and terrified our land. It has perhaps now fulfilled its commission, it has smitten the thousands to whom it was sent, the Lord has stayed his hand, and the voice of wailing and of sorrow has been hushed. But has the effect which such an awful warning was calculated to produce really taken place? Have we with heartfelt humility and contrition humbled ourselves before our God? have our voices been uplifted in thanksgiving that we have not been numbered amongst its victims? have we turned from the evil of our ways? and have we with sorrow for our sins sought the salvation of the Lord? Has each one of us humbled himself at the foot of the cross of Christ, and exclaimed, in all the fervour of the deepest devotion, Lord be merciful to me a sinner? Alas! but too few of us have acted thus. We have again returned with stout hearts to our worldly avocations, the voice of Jehovah in the pestilence is now to us like a dream, we have forgotten its warning, and we are again the thoughtless, careless creatures that we were before. What a mercy is it that we are still left in the land of the living ?-that we have still an opportunity remaining to us of studying the things that belong to our everlasting peace. If, then, our hearts have not yet been humbled, let us call upon the Lord for his Spirit to renew them, and implore of him that he would lead us in the path of righteousness, even for his own name's sake. At the commencement of this year we heard of the ravages of Cholera amongst others, and we dreaded its approach-it came upon us, and many have fallen before it as it pursued its fitful but