THE YEAR OF MAN’S LIFE. 
. “Though we seem grieved at the shortness of life in general, we are 
wishing every period of it at an end. The minor longs to be at age • 
then to be a man of business ; then to make up an estate; then to arrive 
at honors ; then to retire.”— Addison. 
ffHE birth, life, and death of the year, and of the 
flowers, have often been used to illustrate the 
shortness of life, and the certainty of death ; for all 
must fade and die. The idea has been fitly described 
in the annexed quaint old poem, written by an un¬ 
known author, in 1653. 
JANUARY. 
The first five years then of man’s life, 
Compare to Januar ; 
In all that time but sturt and strife, 
He can but greet and roar ; 
So in the fields of flowers all bare, 
By reason of the frost: 
Keeping the ground both soft and sound, 
Yet none of them is lost. 
FEBRUARY. 
So to ten years I shall speak then, 
Of Februar but lack ; 
The child is meek and weak of spirit, 
Nothing can undertake. 
