Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1874-12-24
Who is Santa Claus?

To the little ones this would seem a
very foolish question iLdeed--aS il
everybody did not know who Santa
Claus is! And most certainly, you had
better not put it to that experienced
and downright philosopher of eleven
last June, who has, somehow or other,
left the pure faith of childhood and
now laughs like and infdel-a mere
Voltaire-a perfect Mephistopheles-
| when the thing is mentioned, and cries
out, 'Ah! know who Santa Claus Isl!
There he is-pOinting an irreverent
finger in the direction of the oldest per-
son in the room--one never hitherto
suspected of comming down the chim-
ney On cold winters night in Decem-
Der, wearing a long beard and bring
ing a lot of things for the children on
his back or under his arm. "a ,...-
Turning away, then, fromthis, infant
terrible who plumes himself on not
being such baby nOw,' we would
Off6r the query to the 'grown-ups'-
the little dolls dressmaker calls them
who knows that every question of
the folklore is of curious importance,
since there is hardly anything of that
sort, however childish, in the world,
which is not derived from ideas or GUS
toms of remote antiquity. Santa Claus
is an interesting archaism-carrying
the mind agreeably back ward to those
charm for the critical Investigations or
poetic reveries of men. This cheerful
Christmas legend was quite new thing
to most of us few years ago-tO those
at least, who got their ideas of such
hi fy.<r An TO- e
language. Santa Claus has come-as
everybody is aware, from Germany to
the New World; and the curiosity of
this matter is that in thus coming over
the sea, he underwent a certain re-
markable kind of transformations
sort of sea-change. He was once hon
Ored in Deutchland or Germany (for
both these names have exactly the
same meaning in the Celtic), as child,
a fact which none of the German critics
or philologers have condescended to
notice, at least in any distinguishable
way.
Santa Claus was one of the oldest
ideas of the Celtic West in Pagan times
as he was of the Pagan East before. In
Christian times he was still regarded
with religious reverence, sitting, as he
had sat for ages in Egypt and elsewhere
in the arms of his mother. Santa Claus
Was, in fact, the child Jesus in the mid
die ages, and throughout that period |
the festive creed of Germany and all |
Celtic Europe was that he visited all I
family dwellings of good Christians on |
the eve of his anniversary, and brought |
with him gifts and blessings for the |
children. This beautiful tradition is
still to be found lingering in Germany
though Santa Claus does not seem to be
specially connected with it by name.
The truth of this original beliefs plain
ly enough indicated by the word
Clause which, in the Gothic or anci-
ant German, means Child and Son.
Santa Claus formerly meant the Holy
Child.
tits not very difficult to see how the
change of mems religious beliefs three
)r four hundred years ago changed the
character of the legend. Those who
mad put away Catholic sentiment in re-
igion, and wished to have their own
)f a more dignified sort, thought it too
'ude and simple thing to make that
Holy Child bring knick-knacks and
,weetmeats to the children down the
chimney, and so, by degrees; altered
he old idea, making it a genial, secu-
ar fancy in the person of a benevolent
md jolly old man, such as the Germans
md Others have welcomed for many
and we in this country
nave generally recognized of late years.
He is such CHEEKY and felicitous old
ancy, that nobody would ever have
thought of challenging him in any re-
'pect, but for the great mistake, so long
ago committed of sending him about
he world with that tell-tale Claus PIN
ned on his back, as it were. He really
should, himself, have remembered,
with the rest of his recOllections, that
MS name is interpreted in Schiller or
BuXhorn 1--WE forget which), and should
have chosen another.
This statement, supported, as it is,
by the old Christian traditions clinging
round the present seasol. of the year,
will commend itself, perhaps, to the
critics of old customs and old language.
But the rest of mankind don't see it.
and, in reply to that Gothic lexion,
exclaim, in the words of Giles Scrog-
gins ghost, That's no rule!' Santa
Claus will still be the old man with the
beard and the frosty ace-'frosty, but
kindly And, indeed. very properly.
The popular instinct--that is, in these,
Dur modern times--was right in set
ting that image of the Child aside. 1t
belonged to "a far profounder sentiment
than that of mere household game,