The Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR P.M. Resurrexi. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 24, 1881.

Thames Star, Volume XII, Issue 4054, 24 December 1881, Page 2

The Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR P.M. Resurrexi. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 24, 1881.

Anotheb year has almost run its course, and once again Christmastide, with all its time-honored and pleasant associations, is with us. We hare been spared to again join in the festivities of the season, to meet again old friends, to gather round the well laid table, and to greet each other with the cheerful and pleasant words," I wish you a merry Christmas." As A community we hare cause to be grateful, for on the whole things have been well with us. We should have liked a greater share of prosperity, greater activity in our mart« r larger yields of the precious metal, and aa increase in our population, but while we hare not adranced as we could have wished we hare not retrograded. We can with pleasure wish our readers a " Happy Chmstmas." We hare said that on the whole things hare

gone well with us, yet some circumstances have no doubl occurred that many now wish had not eventuated. Words have been said that might have remained unsaid, deeds have been done that were better left uudone, and in mauy instances to the neglect of more worthy objects. Yet now at this season it is the duty of all to let by-gones be by-gones, and with the old year bury its offences.

Ye who have acoru'd each other Or injured Iriund or brother, In Ibis fast- fading yeur ; Ye who, by word or deed, Have tuado a kiau heart bleed, Come, gather here! Let sinu'd ugainst, and sinning, Forget their strife's beginning, Ami joiu in friendship now ; lie links no longer broken, ■ Be sweet forgiveness spoken Untlt r the Holly Bough. It is a happy thing for us that once a year there comes a time when.we can bury all our offences. And we can do this with the more grace because the season is one specially dedicated to thanksgiving. The thankfulness and the forgiving can only come together. They are, so to speak, inseparable companions. A man cannot be thankful if he bear any malice in his heart. The leaven of malevolence destroys his joy. He is not at peace either with himself or the world. As a people we have too few festivals. In our fierce and eager race for wealth we have ceased to have certain halting places. All the saints days have gone oat of oar calender, and Christmas, and Good Friday alone remain to the Anglo-Saxon race of all the many festivals our forefathers used to hold. Christmas comes at a happy time, at all events, for us. The festival gives us the chance of shaking hands all round. The wretched pride which keeps good men too often apart can at this season be .decorously put on one side, and the bitter* ness of the heart can be buried while most men hold carnival-

Ring out the old, ring in the new, Sing, happy bells, across the snow: The year it going, let him go; Ring out the false, ring in the true. Ring out a slowly dying cauße, And ancient forms of party strife; ■ Ring in the nobler modes of life, With sweeter manners, purer laws. Ring out false pride in place and blood, The civic slander and the spite; Bing in the love of truth and right, RiDg in the common love of good. R;ng in the valiant man and free, The larger heart, tke kindlier hand; Bing out the darkness of the land, Ring in the Christ that is to bo.