Frostburg mining journal., 1882-12-23
The Observance of the Day.

| It is meet that once q year we should celebrate
the greatest event in the history of mankind
the incarnation and birth of Jesus Christ. 1t
matters little whether He were born December
20, OF on some other day in some other month.
1t is the event we celebrate with gladness and
Thanksgiving, making ii an occasion of "foast-
ing and joy, and OF sending portions one to
another, and gifts to the poor" On Christmas
Day the poor and the rich, the lofty and the
lowly, the learned and the unlearned, may alike
rejoice together, meeting around the cradle Of
the one Lord of all, who is brother to the
lowliest and brother to the mightiest, through
whom We all say Our Father, which art in
Heaven
Remembering that He was poor, in His name
we give gifts to the poor; remembering that He
was "dcspised and rejected of men," we visit
the outcast, the prisoner and in His name
bestow not gifts alone, but kindly words and
sympathetic tears; remembering His dying
prayer, "Father, forgive them, they know not
what they do" in His name we forgive as we
pray to be forgiven in the petition He taught
us. In so far as we can do all this and do it,
are we privileged to call Him Brother Savior,
Friend.
In the midst of our festivities let us not forget
or permit our children to forget the occasion
OF our festivities. And as the day we celebrate
falls on Sabbath, we may have more than usual
leisure to recall the circumstances which sur
rounded and heralded the advent OF the
Savior.
Many an eye will be dimmed with tears
loved ones arc missed from the circle that
t1,a OIL
music no longer join in the festivebhorus. This
common grief, which sooner or later comes to
every heart, but binds us together in closer
bands of sympathy and affection. Remember
ing the dead, we are tenderer and more con-
siderate toward the living.
There may be among our readers those whose
children are suffocated with gifts of every sort,
and hence experience but little pleasure in re-
ceiving even the costliest presents. For such
the delight of bestowing on less favored children
what they can easily spare from their superfuity
will give fresh zest to life. This pleasure in
giving "grows by what it feeds on" The
blessedness of giving never diminishes, though
that Of receiving may cease almost entirely.
There are certainly among Qua readers those
whose children are not suffocated with gifts
of every sort. Happier by far are these than
the others. They have an appetite which makes
plain food agreeable they have wants that
assert themselves before they are anticipated,
they know the keenness of hunger and tho
keenness of qualification which comes only Of
hunger and its satisfaction.
There may be those among our readers on
whom poverty has laid an iron hand, who cannot
satisfy fully or even partially the demands Of
hunger and thirst, hunger for knowledge, thirst
that can only be qucnched by the waters of
Castalia. The Hand that denies is often the
loving Hand; is it not always the loving Hand?
"Ho spared not His own Son ~ and this was in
love; the "joy that was set before Him was
ample reward for all the pain.
Divine must be the plan which meets and
satisfies all the varied needs of the human race.
In Christ each man finds his brother. He
united and unites in Himself every condition OF
suffering and victorious humanity. With Him
we can equally suffer and rejoice, and this in
whatever circumstances we may be placed Is
cause for ioy