Tazewell Republican. [volume] (Tazewell, Va.) 1892-1919, 1902-01-02
ONE NEW YEARS NIGHT.
A Dream That Warned This Young
Man to Turn from the
Paths of SIN.

On a certain New Years night, an
old man stood by the window, ana
Razed with long look of despair out
on the immovable, forever-sparkling
heavens, then down upon the white,
sinless earth, whereon at that mo-
ment no one was 50 cheerless' SO
sleepless as he. His own grave stood
near him; it was not decked with the
verdure of youth, but it was covered
with the SHOWS of ages. And this old
man had brought nothing with him
from the rich, teeming life of the
world, save errors, sins, and disease;
nothing but a worn body, rayless,
desolate soul, a bosom trimming with
remorse, and frosted old age filled
with regrets, writes William Mason
Turner, in New York Weekly.
The glad mornings of his youth
lowered around him on this cold win
ter night like fitting apparitions;
they carried him far back to that
early, rosy dawn, when his father
stood with him at the crossroads of
life-the right leading over sunny
pathways into a quiet, distant land
resplendent with golden harvests and
white-winged angels; but the left
road led down to the slums of vice,
far away to black cavern of drip
ping poisons and twisting adders.
Alas! the yipers hung around his
breastl the poison-drops were upon
his tongue! He knew where he was.
His brain reeling, and while unut-
terable terror filled his bosom, he
cried unto Heaven:
"Give me, oh! give me youth again!
Oh! father, place me again at the
crossroads of life that l may choose
another PATH"
But his father, like his own youth,
was of the Long Ago.
He saw over the black morass a
will-o'-wisp glittering hitler and
thither; then it disappeared in a
damp churchyard.
"How like! how like my days of fol-
lyl" he cried.
He saw star shoot from the heav-
ems, and, shimmering in it's fall, van
ish in the darkness of earth.
Like myself" he groaned from a
torn heart. And the serpent's tooth
of remorse dug down deeper. His
fiery fancy pointed to him the creep
ing night-wanderers on the roof; and
the spectral windmill raised its men
acing arms. Then one shape remain
ing in the CHASTITY charnel-house of
repentance and remorse, gradually
grew into his own image.
In the midst of his anguish, sudden
ly the music of the New Years night
foated upon the air; and it was the
silver Ginning of belfry bells. His
soul was stirred within him; he gazed
around the murky horizon, and over
the spreading earth. The memory Of
the friends of his youth came to him;
they were now honored teachers In
the world, and the glad fathers Of
children. Again he walled out:
Alas! like you, I, too, on this New
Years night, could have slumbered
with fearless eyes, if had only
chosen arightl Alasl my fond par
ents, I, too, could be happy had 1 but
needed your warnings and wishes Of
the New Years Eve!"
Then before his feverish memory
the heydey of his youth arose-even
as in the bleak charnel-house the
specter had taken his own image.
He could look no longer; he
yelled his eyes and agonized by his
sorrow a thousand hot tears streamed
down his furrowed face. Comfortless
and in abject misery he could only
murmur:
"Ohl youth, come again! Come
again!"
And it came again; for it was but
a horrible vision of sleep which had
passed before him on this cold New
Years Night. He was still in the hey
dey of his youth, and he thanked
Heaven that, still young and treading
the frail paths of vice, he had time
to turn away to the sun-lit avenue
which led to the land of harvests and
happiness.
Young reader, turn you with him,
If you stand in the path of sin. Be
warned by this dream, for the time
may arrive when you, too, may cry:
Come, oh! come again, sweet time of
youth"
And it will not come.