"We are saved by hope." Multitudes may embitter their new year by undue reflections over opportunities neglected and lost in the past and denied in the present.
Professor Agassiz tells of a friend who sold his farm in Pennsylvania for $5,000 to invest it in Dakota, and after losing all in the new home returned to find the German who purchased the homestead had found oil and great wealth in a swamp which he had tried to drain off.

An old gentleman recently told of his refusal in 1840 to accept as payment of a small note a lot on a corner in Chicago now worth a million dollars, and he shed bitter tears over the loss of property he never owned.
When Ali Hafed heard of the diamonds in India he sold his estate and went forth to seek his fortune.

His successor, watering his camel in the garden, saw the gleam of gems in the white sand and discovered the Golconda mines.

Had Ali Hafed had eyes to see his would have been boundless treasure at home instead of poverty, starvation and death.
These and similar legends stand for the opportunities that have gone forever.

How many neglected their opportunities for education; how they knocked unbidden at every door and no man opened.