Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1886-12-24
THE DAYAND ITS SIGNIFICANCE.

Friday Morning. December "a, 1886.
THE DA Y AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE.
Tomorrow the great event of the age,
the birth Of the Prince of Peace, will be
celebrated over the length and breadth of
Christendom.
"0f all sounds OF all BELLS" as Charles
Lamb thought, the music "nearest bordering
upon Heaven" is that which rings out the
old and rings in the new year, but surely
the gentle stammerer might have made an
exception in favor of the chimes which steal
out on the still air Of a Christmas morning
in Renaissance of the morning when the
"stars sang together" looking down upon
Bethlehem and the plains of Galilee.
If the New Year has an overshadowing
significance it is that Lamb found in it sug-
gestiens of regret for the past, of apprehen
sion for the future. of that sentimentality
which inspired the Latin poet to write his
beautiful ode to the "Fleeting Years;
"The years they glide by and are lost to me.
The New Year is for Time, and it was
thus that the English essayist considered it,
following the bent of his own genius, but
following directly into the thoughts which
moved the best minds OF the old phiosoph-
ical classic world down into the deepest
dep.hs-the thoughts of SO much lost from
life with the advent of an anniversary Of a
so much nearer approach to the eternal ex-
lie Of the boat" A gentler, lovelier heather
than Charles Lamb never breathed, but no
anniversary ever came TO him without bring
ing with it thoughts Of decay and the things
unspcakablc OF the grave. Though "As |
am thou soonest must be" of the epitaph in
the country churchyard Infatuated him unit
he was almost ready to shake clenched
hand toward what one OF his great English
successors in literature calls "the brazen
sky" SO he kept New Year as a Pagan an.
niyersary with subdued melancholy and
gentle, ALMOST divine, despair. Though his
view OF the New Year may by ns means be
taken as the typical Of that which prevails,
it does represent fairly the spirit of the best
"'N puaSSs saOubhsS VI ehS tithOo ahNceSuCht
TO the event which established the great
Christian anniversary of the 25th of Decem-
Der. That best we may see in the writings
Of classic authors almost contemporaneou
with the birth of Jesus.
We celebrate Christmas not for time, not
Tor death, but for life. 1t is the day OF
Christ, a day for man, for all that is best in
him TO show itself in honor of the birth of
Christ. 1t il the one day in the year when
We unconsciously lay aside what might
keep us from assent to His mysterious com
mand that 1--WE must become as little chill
dren." We see that little children best OBJ
serve this day, and we keep it with them in
their spirit as far as we may, enjoying life
in all the fullness of better epicurianism
than any philosophy ever gave, living for
the day without fear, without gloom, with.
out dread
Without the child of Bethlehem there
would have been no Christmas, and with
out the children Christmas might have gone
down to the sea Of utiltarianism and mate.
rialsm dragging with it to hopeless oblivion
New Year and all the sunny intermediate
days now SO dear and precious to the old
and the young. And not until children
shall have gone out Of fashion and their
places shall have been filled by the prema-
ture young ladies and gentlemen whom
fashionable mothers are now manufacturing
from nursery plants, will this happy holi
day season perish--degenerate into hollow
and heartless formality.
The Christian world will have Its Christ.
mas. Modern philosophy and the higher
critics may do what they can in the way of
smashing our beliefs and destroying histori-
cal facts and systems into myths, but Christ
mas will survive the havoc. The world
may give up many things, but it will never
surrender this blessed holiday 1t is Gu.
trenched in the hearts of hundred million
children, and ten times that many philoso.
pliers and critics, with all the kings horses
and all the kings men to help Them cannot
dislodge it. lfChristmas were the anniver-
sary OF great and bloody battle, if it were
the birthday of a mighty warrior, or patriot,
or reformer, or humanitarian, if it were the
anniversary OF the exhibition of any one of
what we call the heroic virtues, or even of
all Of them put together, it would have
passed out of mems minds long ago. But
because it is not one Of these, but the birth
day Of One, who was not warrior, nor
patriot, nor statesman, nor orator, nor poet,
nor philosopher, nor humanitarian, but
supernatural exemplar Of the unheroic vir-
tues, meekness, gentleness, love and good
ness-this is the secret Of its everlasting hold
upon human affections. The sweet choral
strain Of its first commemoration-"
10 God in the highest, on earth peace, good
will 10 men" implies mans first and last
duty, the first aud greatest commandment
and the one next to il, and in these signs IL
has conquered all that part Of the world we
call Chrlstsndom.