The Circumcision of Christ

A happy, happy Christmas! and
A merry bright New Year!
How sweet the kind old greetings sound
To every heart and ear:

No matter how care-burdened, and
No matter how deprest,
A something in their welcome makes
Them dear to every breast.

We heard them in our childhood, when
With spirits light and gay
We dreamt not that life's joyfulness
Could ever pass away;

And tho' long years of carefulness
Have sobered many a heart,
A joy still lingers round them, which
Can never quite depart: —

Nor ever shall — if Christian-like
We count the rolling years,
Not as removing joys from us,
But sins, and cares, and tears:

And upward onward bearing us,
To that bright land, and blest,
Where i the wicked cease from troubling, and
The weary are at rest.'

No year can open gloomily
For him whose heart doth yearn,
Above all hopes and cares on earth,
To see his Lord's return:

As stars their light, and mists their shade,
Lay down before the day, ,
So joys and griefs of earth, in Heav'n's
Calm sunshine, fade away.

My soul! wouldst thou with happiness
The opening year begin?
Come kneel by Jesu's cradle-bed,
And count the cost of sin!

His tears were wept to dry thine eyes,
His grief was for thy gain,
The octave of thy song of joy
Was His first cry of pain.

Thence let the year its colouring
Of sober duty take,
Rise up, go forth, do everything
For thy dear Saviour's sake;

And 'mid the world's temptation
Remember for thy good,
On New Year's Day the infant Christ
First shed His ' precious blood.'