THE CLOSE OF THE YEAR.--The year is closing on us--and the change
suggests reflections, which, if rather melancholy, may nevertheless be
profitable. We acknowledge that the divisions of time are rather
arbitrary--and therefore may vary, as they do vary, in different parts
of the world. But whenever we arrive at one of these important epochs,
whatever that may be, and wherever it constitutes a point in the
popular calendar, we have passed one period of our life, and have so
much the less to spend.

If we _feel_ the rapidity of time's march in our ordinary festivity,
and regret the approaching dissolution of the pleasant assembly, by
how much the more do we feel if we pause to think that we are
approaching the time when all our associations in life must cease, and
we be remembered--not known--and that remembrance day by day growing
less and less distinct, as new objects occupy the public eye, or new
associations are taken up by those we leave. Nor would we "jump the
life to come," by neglecting to make our approximation to that an
occasion for such a solicitude as would lead to a preparation.

But we would not have all those reflections gloomy. We would not cloud
the close of the year, nor the evening of life with moroseness, as if
all were vanity that we had enjoyed, and all were vexation of spirit
that was left. Such a use of the season would be a poor return for all
the good things which Providence has wrought in our behalf. We know at
this season of the year that the mountain summits are covered with
snow, and in some places the drooping sides are whitened with the
treasures of the clouds, but even these things, chilling as they may
appear, are good in their season, and the beauteous covering of the
hill-tops may glisten with the reflected rays of the sun, and seem to
enjoy the visiter that has descended upon them. All the trees that
yield their leaves to the season have for weeks been bare, ready to
receive the weight of snow which might fall upon them, and teaching
man that preparation is necessary to meet the evils of life and
sustain its burthens. Here and there a few evergreens retain their
foliage, and appear doubly beautiful amid the waste that is around
them.

But it is not alone for their beauty that these objects are worthy of
consideration--they teach also. They are full of instruction. Every
leaf that glistens with winter's frost, or is crushed dry and rustling
beneath our feet, has its lesson--it is w