'It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the
Father hath put in His own power.'--ACTS i. 7.

The New Testament gives little encouragement to a sentimental view of
life. Its writers had too much to do, and too much besides to think
about, for undue occupation with pensive remembrances or imaginative
forecastings. They bid us remember as a stimulus to thanksgiving and
a ground of hope. They bid us look forward, but not along the low
levels of earth and its changes. One great future is to draw all our
longings and to fix our eyes, as the tender hues of the dawn kindle
infinite yearnings in the soul of the gazer. What may come is all
hidden; we can make vague guesses, but reach nothing more certain.
Mist and cloud conceal the path in front of the portion which we are
actually traversing, but when it climbs, it comes out clear from the
fogs that hang about the flats. We can track it winding up to the
throne of Christ. Nothing is certain, but the coming of the Lord and
'our gathering together to Him.'

The words of this text in their original meaning point only to the
ignorance of the time of the end which Christ had been foretelling.
But they may allow of a much wider application, and their lessons are
in entire consonance with the whole tone of Scripture in regard to
the future. We are standing now at the beginning of a New Year, and
the influence of the season is felt in some degree by us all. Not for
the sake of repressing any wise forecasting which has for its object
our preparation for probable duties and exigencies; not for the
purpose of repressing that trustful anticipation which, building on
our past time and on God's eternity, fronts the future with calm
confidence; not for the sake of discouraging that pensive and
softened mood which if it does nothing more, at least delivers us for