THE HOLY NIGHT. Correggio.
TheBOOK of
Christmas
With an
Introduction
by
Hamilton W
Mabie
and an
Accompaniment of
Drawings by
George Wharton
Edwards
New York
The Macmillan
Company
1909
Copyright, 1909,
By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.
Set up and electrotyped. Published October, 1909
Norwood Press
J. S. Cushing Co.—Berwick & Smith Co.
Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.
[Pg v]
INTRODUCTION
CAROLS are still sung in almost numberless churches,lights glow on altars bound and wreathed with spruceand holly, trees are set up in innumerable homes, and mobsof merry children sing and dance around them, stockingstake on grotesque shapes and hang gaping with treasuresfor early marauders on Christmas morning, and hosts ofmen and women keep the day in their hearts in all peaceand piety.
The festival, dear to the heart of sixty generations,has survived the commercial uses which it has been compelledto serve; the weariness of buying and selling in thevast bazaar of nations, stocked with all manner of thingswhich stimulate the offerings of friendship; the wide-spreadsense of irony which success without happinessbreeds; the indifference of feeling and satiety of emotionfostered by great prosperity without that grace of culturewhich subdues wealth to the finer uses of life. It has survivedthe cynical spirit that distrusts sentiment and sneersat emotion as weaknesses which have no place in a scientificage and among men and women who know life. It hassurvived that preoccupation with affairs which leaveslittle time for feelings, and that resolute determination tomake men good which leaves scant room for efforts to makethem happy.
[Pg vi]
But even in this age of hard-headed practical sagacityand hard-minded goodness ruthlessly bent on doing theLord's work by the methods of a police magistrate, Christmascarols are still sung; and the organization of virtuein numberless societies with presidents and secretaries, and,above all, with treasurers, has not dimmed the glow of thelove which bears fruit in a forest of Christmas trees, withmobs of merry children shouting around them.
The plain truth is that the world is not half so heartlessas it pretends to be. In its desire to wear that air of wearyomniscience which is supposed to bear witness to a wideexperience of life it often pooh-poohs appeals which makeits well-regulated heart beat with painful irregularity.There is as much hypocrisy in the scornful as in the sentimental;and the worldly-wise man often sniffles behind thehandkerchief with which he pretends to stifle a sneeze. Wepretend to have become too wise to be moved by lighted candlesor stirred by children's voices singing of angels andshepherds; but in our heart of hearts the old story is dear tous, and we are e