The Old Year and the New

The Old Year and the New

The old year's dead! The new year's born!
The night has passed! Has come the morn!
Another link in life's long chain
Is rounded out in human pain!

"Ring out the old! Ring in the new!

"Ring out the false! Ring in the true!"

'Tis easier said by far than done;
The battle lost, the battle won, -
The hopes all crushed like withered flowers, -
The joys that thrilled the fleeting hours, -

Can we forget the year now dead, -

What we have done, what we have said?

No! No! Of good, of evil too, -
The dreams all fled, the dreams all true, -
The hopes fulfilled, the vanished hopes, -
They will abide, while memory gropes

Among the idols of the soul

O'er which oblivion cannot roll!

We greet the new year with a smile,
Forgetting not the old the while.

Unattributed

4:15, p. 2

1891.01.03