Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1894-01-05
A Happy New Year.

But this say, brethren, the time Is
sh1rt.-1. Corinthians, vii, %.
III years are not alike in value 10 the
race or the individual; neither are all days.
There are black days and white days,
weeks that are burdensome and weeks that
are like merry chime OF
bells, months that Eunole
with the thunder of defeat and months that
resound with the shouts of victory.
There is no monotopy in time. Ii
varies as does the landscape. In one
period it is as level as Western prairie,
with no special experiences to mark Its
passage; in another changes come anu
events occur which make the weeks re-
semble the leghanies-mountain heights
gathered together like great company OF
giants whose shining helmets are visible
though you have travelled far away and
stand on your horizon line; in still another
some day or week with its wondrous hap
penings rises from the plain of memory
like veritable Mont Blanc, aud though
seventy years be counted in your calendar
ven still see its summit and say, THAT
was the hour when my new life began"
1t may mark great catastrophe or an un-
speakable happiness, but there it stands
in gloom or grandeur, and when you are
about to close your eyes in the last sleep
they will rest on that event which made
you other than what you were.
In our boyhood time walks, IN middle
life it ambles and in old age it pants In
breathless haste to reach the goal and
have done with Us. A day is week to
the child, and week is but day to the
aged. In our halcyon youth, when we
live on dreams, we wish the time away
and like an impetuous rider spur the days
to greater speed. We have such treasure
of them that we are spendthriit and long
to reach the future, which beekons US to
high achiev ement. But at the other end
of life. when the number Of weeks in our
Golfers runs low and to replenish is I'M
possible, we use them with increasing
economy If not with parsimony. We be-
grudge the expenditure of time, for there
| is much to be done and only few en-
feebled years left in which to do it.
| And yet, what matters it, after allf W
90. but the world remains. We are not
necessary, for no one is indispensable TO
progress. If we are missed for while we
are greatly privileged. Though we have
stood at the helm and guided the ship OF
| State through many storm, another and
perhaps sturdier hand will take the wheel
when death bids US retire. Great men are
never waiting, and however proud the
position we hold there is some one waiting
it may be without being conscious that
he is the coming hero, for the opportunity
has not yet come to him-there is always
some one waiting to fill it with larger
plan OF wiser counsel.
Nature disdains the assertion that her
resources are exhausted. She can make
giant at moments notice whenever the
emergency requires. There are Bismarcks
and Gladstones and Lincolns and Grants in
every nook and cor1er of the universe
| When the CONFUSION comes the leader
comes with it. And no matter how great
the CONFUSION, some leader Is found who
can master it.
If that be so, we may take heart in the
midst of our New Year greetings. The
months may speed as they will; the day.
may come and go like lightning flashes
age may creep on space, and youth hasten
to middle life; November blasts may chill
and December SHOWS cover the sod like q
shroud-it matters little. There will be
other years and other climes, and the work
we leave unfinished will be brought tc
completion after the grass has grown OIL
our graves.
So bright hope must give us good cheer
and it throwsa heartiness, if, indeed, it
throws also pathos, into the wish with
which friend meets friend.-"A happy New
Year to you, here or elsewhere"