SUNDAY, December 31.  At home.  I have traveled in the year that is just at its close 4,411 miles.  The year appears very short.  When I review its labors and toils I am forced to reflect upon the imperfection of my work.  I have never delivered a discourse that was satisfactory to me throughout.  I hardly ever fail to see some lack of thought right where I wanted to make the truth clear and impressive.  Often and often the reflections of my mind, as it were, hear a voice within saying:  “Why did you not put it this way?  Why did you not think of that very appropriate passage of Scripture, which would have fit the place so nicely, and have been so expressive?” I do not suppose that any one will see this little book while I live.  After I am gone it may he consigned to some dark closet, with the rest of its kind, as useless rubbish.  But should it ever fall into the hands of any minister of the Word who may be afflicted in his work with thoughts akin to those I have expressed in this review of the year, I beg him to be encouraged rather than discouraged by them.  I believe they are messages from the Lord, who constantly seeks our highest good and greatest usefulness.  Satan, if he could, would induce us to believe that we are all right, just what we should be; and in this way inflate us with a profound sense of our own importance, and in this pride of heart make us esteem ourselves greatly superior to all others.  How this feeling differs from that inculcated by Paul:  “Let each esteem another better than himself”!  How different, too, from the words of the meek and lowly Jesus:  “He that humbleth himself shall be exalted”!  These reviews and criticisms of our works and ways tend to make us more thoughtful and circumspect in the future.  We seek to have our lacks supplied, our wants relieved, and are induced thereby to apply our minds to the study of the Word with more vigor, looking at the same time to the Lord for the enlightening guidance of his Holy Spirit.  It now lacks just ten minutes of midnight.  I will retire with the retiring year, wishing to all a good-night, and joyful eyes to behold the dawn of the new year.

THURSDAY, February 22.  Hear the distant report of cannon in commemoration of the birth of George Washington, which is said to have occurred on the twenty-second day of February, 1732.  It is presumable that those who find pleasure in public demonstrations of this sort are moved by what they regard as patriotic feelings and principles.  Let their motives and enjoyments spring from what they may, they have a lawful right to celebrate the anniversary of his birth in any civil way they may choose.  But I have a somewhat higher conception of true patriotism than can be represented by the firing of guns which give forth nothing but meaningless sound.  I am glad, however, that these guns report harmless sound, and nothing more.  If some public speakers would do the same, it might be better both for them and their hearers.  My highest conception of patriotism