What adds to the solemnity of the matter is, that no amends can be made in acts of the past. There they stand irrevocably, so far as we are concerned. The Lord may wash away every stain in his own precious blood, where persons come to him in a proper manner. But even this does not amend for the past. It takes away our guilt, and is a means of saving us. But the wrongs done remain wrong and will so remain for ever. Repentance changes not the wrong done. In the same way, the good neglected, during the year now closing, will so remain for ever. We can do good, it is true, the coming year; but that we could have done, and that it would have been our duty to have done, if we had done good all last year. Opportunities for doing good never return. Other opportunities may come, but they would have come if no previous opportunities had been neglected. You had an opportunity this year to have ministered to the wants of the poor widow, the orphan, the sick, the afflicted and distressed, but these opportunities are now gone, and gone forever. If neglected, there is no remedy; that neglect remains forever. We may repent, obtain forgiveness and do good in time to come, but all that good could have been done just as well had there been no previous neglect, and would have been more liable to have been done, for one delinquency opens the way for another and has a tendency to induce it. In closing the year, it is well enough for us to cast an eye back over the ground, not to amend the year now closing, for that is impossible, but to see where the delinquency has been, and determine that a similar delinquency shall not be found in the work of the coming year. In this way, we may profit by looking over the past. What, then has been entered to our account on the records of eternity? What have we done as a great religious body? What have we done as individual congregations, or communities? What have we done as families? What have we done as individuals? What have we done as teachers in the Sunday schools? What have we done as preachers of the gospel? What have we done as religious editors? Now is the time to review and see how the account stands before the Lord. If the Lord should call on us for our annual report, ARE WE READY? FINIS. JOHN BURNS, Publisher & Bookseller, 717 OLIVE STREET, ST. LOUIS, MO. Invites the attention of authors and others to his facilities for PUBLISHING _Books_, _Tracts_, _Pamphlets_, _Catalogues_, _Sermons_, _Programmes_, LETTER HEADS FOR PREACHERS, AND ANYTHING IN THE PRINTING LINE. Your orders are respectfully solicited for anything that may be wanted for your library. Publications of the Christian Church