On the Return of the New Year.

God's vast existence ne'er decays, His age doth never grow, Past, present, future, in his sight, Are one eternal NOW. Man measures out his fleeting state By motions in the skies, And like his own frail vesture, wears With every hour that flies. Successive moments make one day, Successive days one year; The moments past shall ne'er return, Though seasons like appear. Still a new spring shall bless the earth, And a new harvest rise, But the last year shall ne'er again Revisit mortal eyes. Old Time, with his keen-pointed scythe, Consumes the life of man; Our period's less'ning from the hour Our beings first began. Each year fulfills some new event Heaven long decreed before, Removes unnumbered lives away, And gives unnumber'd more. Soon shall the appointed angel stand O'er earth, and air, and sea, And swear by him that ever lives, That time no more shall be. Then shall the league of nature cease, The sun forsake his way, And years and ages lose their name, In one eternal day.