Gallipolis journal. [volume] (Gallipolis, Ohio) 1837-1919, 1862-01-02
THE NEW YEAR.


"Ere our sheet shall have passed
from the press into the hands of our
readers, we shall have entered on g
new year. 1t is barely ninety degree.
from us at the present moment. Il
landed on the eastern extremity oil
Asia, on the list Of January, 1862,
just as we were rising from our break
fast in Edinburg on the 31st of De-
cember 1861; and it has been gliding
westward, towards US, in the character
of One O'Clock in the morning, ever
since. In a few hours more it will be
striding across the backwoods Of Amer
lea, in its seven league boots, and ca
reering over the Pacific in its canoe
And then, at some undefnable point,
not yet fixed by the philosopher, il
will find itself transformed from the
first into the second day of the year;
and thus il will continue to roll on round
and round like an Archimedes screw
picking up at every giration an addi-
tional unit, until the three hundred and
sixty-fVe shall be completed. The
past year has witnessed many curious
changes. as a dweller in time; the COM
ing year las already looked down on
many a curious scene, as journeyer
over space. 1t has seen Cochin China,
with all its unmapped islands, and the
ancient empire of Japan, with its cities
and provinces unknown TO Europe. 1t
has heard the roar OF busy popula-
tion amid the thousand streets OF Pc
kin, and the wild dash of the midnight
tides as they fret the rocks of the Indi-
an Archipelago. 1t has been already
with our friends in Hindostan; it has
been greeted, we doubt not, with the
voice Of prayer, as the slow, iron hand
of the city clock indicated its arrival to
the missionaries at Madras; it has
swept over the fever jungles of Che
Ganges, where the scaled crocodile
startles the thirsty tiger. as he stoops to
drink, and the exposed corpse of the
benighted Hindu floats drearily past
II has travelled over the land of pago-
das, and is now entering on the land Of
mosques. Anon it will see the moon
in her wane, casting the dark shadows
of columned Palmyra over the sands
of the desert; and the dim walls of Je-
rusalem looking out on silent and SOL
itary land. that has cast forth its in
terim tenants, and waits unappropria-
ted for the old predestined race, its
proper inhabitants.
"In two short hours it will be voyay-
ing along the cheerful Mediterranean,
greeting the rover in his galley among
the Isles of Greece, and the seaman in
bis barque embayed in the Adriatic.-
And then, after marking the red glare
of Etna reflected in the waves that
slumber around the moles of the Syra-
cuse-after glancing on the towers OF
the Seven-hilled City, and the hoary
SHOWS Of the AIps--after speeding over
France, over Flanders, over the waves
OF the German Seat will be with
ourselves; and the tall, ghostly tenants
Of Dun-Eden will re-echo the shouts
Of the High Street. Away, and away,
it will cross the broad Atlantic, and
visit watcher in the beacon towers on
the deep, and the immigrant in his log
hut, among the brown woods of the
West; it will see the fire Of the red
man numbering, with its CLEAN, tall
trunks and giant branches in some deep
glade OF the forest; and then mark, on
the far shores of the Pacific the rugged
bear stalking sullenly over the snow.
Away. and away, and the vast globe
shall be girdled by the zone of the new
born year. Many a broad plain shall
it have traversed that is still unbroken
from the waste-many moral wilder
ness on which the Sun of Righteousness
has not yet arisen. More than eighteen
and half centuries have elapsed since |
the shepherds first heard the midnight
song of Bethlehem-"Glory to God in
the highest. peace on earth, good will
to the children of men," and yet the
coming year shall pass. in its first visit,
over prisons and gibbets, and penal set
Elements, and battle fields, on which
the fostering dead meulder unburied.-I
1t will see the shotted gun, and the
spear, and the crease, and the murder
ing tomahawk--slaves in the huts, and
captives in ktheir dungeons. 1t will
look down on uncouth idols in their
temples : worshippers of the false
prophets in their mosques-the Papist
in his confessional-the Puseyite in his
stone allegorY--and on much idle and
bitter controversy among those holders
of the true faith whose proper work is
the conversion of the world. But the
years shall pass, and the change shall
come; the Sacrifice on Calvary was not
offered in vain, nor in vain bath the
adorable Saviour conquered, and as
cended to reign as King and Lord over
the nations. The kingdoms shall be-
come his kingdoms, the people his peo-
pie. The morning rises slowly and in
clouds. but the dawn has broken; and
it shall shine forth more and more, un-
til the twilight shadows shall have dis
persed. snd the sulphurous fogs shall
have dissipated. and all shall be peace
and gladness amid the blaze Of the per-
feet day."