The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1915-12-30
THE ENDING YEAR.

Only few more hours and another year
will have passed into 1.-the great eternity
OF Cod another year with all its hopes
and ambitions, its realizations and disap-
pointments, its joys and its sorrows. At
the feet of God it will lie within brief spell,
and we who have watched it from its birth
grow into fuIlness Of its own have watch
ed it also as it relinquished its hold upon
the great present. In way years. SYM
bolical of life. 1t begins from nothing, as
it were, it rpens by degrees into full ex-
perience: it reaches its destined height and
then gradually, but with unrelenting sure
ness it enters upon its final stage, until in
the darkness and cold that always precedes
the dawn of new and wonderful day it
slips away to live only in memory's domain.
Side by side with many other years, happy
or unhappy according to our Individual
reckoning the present year now in its clos
ing hours will at II O'Clock tomorrow
night take its place and those OF US who
have shared the gifts it brought whatever
their nature must give them back to the
past from whence they came. To many
persons-and God grant their number is
large-the closing year has brought the
infinite blessings of hopes realized, affec-
tons won, health restored, and many ma
terial satisfactions; for others it opened
with sorrow and trouble or perhaps, as the
months rolled on, brought distress and dis
appointment, or yet again is closing now
amid the ruins of cherished hopes and the
wreck of happiness. Each year tells very
much the same story, perhaps not to each
individual because that would be too cruel
a fate; but time of gladness to one per-
Of ff,
day that dawns upon the ful6lment of one
mans ambitions witnesses the blasting of
another's hopes; the sun that gilds the
head of the fair young bride sends its slant
ing rays upon new made grave-over
and over again each succeeding year
touches the heights of happiness for some
and sounds the depths of misery for others.
Time must pass whether we measure it by
years or months or days, and it is only
when we are old enough to count year after
year in the treasure house of memory that
we begin to appreciate its real appeal.
We begin each new twelvemonth with
such high hopes that it is pity we cannot
always realize our wishes. 1t is true that
disappointment is the common lot of man,
but it is also true that happiness is his her
itage also, AID we are very much inclined
to allow one sad year to blot out the mem
cries of many joyous ones. We cannot
expect always to play in the sunshine OF
life; the shadows are oftener nearer al
hand than we imagine, and the only way
to enter them with any hope of a triumph
ant emergence is to accept them as inevi.
table and try to understand them as we dc
the light and brightness we deem so essen.
tial to our welfare. 1t is the only way by
which we are able to benefit by the expert.
ences they bring hard and unwelcome al
many of them may be, and the only way
by which we can live without wasting any
one of the days of each recurring year.
Tomorrow will be the last day of 1916
We stand with another mile stone on life'
highway behind US and gaze with confden
eyes into the future. The hour glas
dwindles without surcease to times drum
beat, that Sswells and subsidies as the new
year is born and passes on to its grave
Behind US are many spoiled yesterdays
lying in view, dismal and forbidding. Th
future is land wrapped in impenetrabl
mystery. Yet in spite of the logic of ex
perience, in spite of the illusions we hav
outlived, we instinctively obey some hid
den impulse in the dark foundation of GU
natures and hope that the new year wi
bring US another chance as it sets befor
US clean page. We are saved by nope
If our secret thoughts could be expose
to view we would see hope thick as buds i
their. sheaths, coied up and ready to gree
the sunlight when it comes. The sefsam
expectation that has inspired poets an
prophets to sing through the dark an
cloudy day of a good time coming bears u
along in anticipation of some brighter to
morrows and better fortune. The past
beyond our tears and laughter. But tn
future beckons coaxingly just because it
within our action and will. This very fat
stimulates afresh in US those recreativ
powers which can largely produce the for
tune we seek. The past is gone; the fu
ture is uncertain. Your only possession
the eternal present. Therefore, whateve
good thing you think you ought to do, d
it now.
Let all have happy New Year and Il
it mean much to every one.
L F. l. A. 4