becomes transfigured with a new meaning and joy. In such a spirit go hence to this year's employments. Do them with God. One other phase of human experience remains to be touched upon at this time. The Lord Himself hath said by the mouth of Solomon: "He that spareth the rod hateth the child," and He is too wise a Father to think of training His children without discipline. It is by sending them trials that He leads them to bethink themselves and to return when they have been backsliding, develops them in character, and prepares them for the discharge of arduous and important duties. Whatever we may regard this method of dealing with us, this is His method, and it will be no different with the incoming year. What shape that trial will take, this none can say in advance; it may bring sickness to ourselves or to our near and dear ones; pain of body, feverish tossing, restless nights, weary days; it may bring reverses in fortune; the position we thought so secure may pass into the hands of another; our income may decrease, trade languish, accidents and expenses multiply; it may be that the grim visitor will invade our homes, a casket, little or large, be placed into our rooms to remind us that in the midst of life we are in death. God alone, who knows the future, knows. And when these ordeals occur, it is well to keep before us a few things. In the first place, we must recognize that, however strange and unwelcome these experiences are, 'tis He who sends them, and gives them just because He deals with us as His children. Discipline is a privilege that a father reserves for His own children. One does not get himself to correct the faults of all the young people in the neighborhood. You direct your efforts along that line to your own, and only because of your affectionate interest in them do you visit them with correction. Even so it is with God, and when we are suffering from His hands, instead of thinking that He has forgotten us, we ought to see in the chastisement a new evidence of His continued regard for us. The trials sent us, my dear hearers, are the tokens of a heavenly Father's affection, and happy art thou if in life's salutary discipline you have learned to look up and say, "Thy will be done."