The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-12-25
A New Observance of Christmastide.

mas has been overdone till 1t became a tax so great that there has been re- bellion against it. In the cities letter carriers were overworked for two weeks. Mail packages due on Christi mas day many time could not be de- livered till a week afterward. Instead of being a season of joy to mail service employees Christmas time was the pe- riod of the year to which they looked forward with dread. Expressmen and their horses were worn out and on du ty all hours of the night. Even the ladies of the rich class, who could ob- tain whatever they desired for Christ mas presents, were frequently made III with the shopping and the heavy work of getting ready for the Christmas holidays
 Being so overdone, the gift giving custom partially fell to pieces by it's own weight. In fashionable quarters for the past year or two 1t has been proclaimed that 1t Is no longer good form to give presents to any but mem bers of ones own family and to depend ents.' Even elaborate and cumbersome Christmas cards have gone out of fash ion. A mere visiting card bearing good will and the good wishes of the season are a sufficient token that we have our friends and acquaintances in mind.
 The overdone Christmas gift custom had reached the point where it fostered greed Tn the vulgar minded. And it Is astonishing how many of the vulgar minded there are at Christmas time. Where they should have been grateful that anybody cared enough for them to give them any present at all the vul- gar minded grumbled because the gift was not valuable enough. Again. Christmas giving had come to be a matter of swap" If Mary gave Jane a pair of gloves one Christmas Jane felt bound next holiday season to give Mary something a little more valuable than Mary's gift had been or incur the sus- picion that she was a ''stngy thing" Oftentimes Jane could not really afford this so was obliged to do without something she herself needed very much in order to give Mary an article which probably Mary did not need at all.
 So it is well that the heavy old fashioned Christmas giving is going out But there is something that this poor human race in all the billions of years 1t has been In existence has neV- CT yet had enough of, something that, though 1t survive billion years more, it will never have too much of. That is pure good will and affection. Did you ever think how very little manifesto
  friendly interest there Is among the human race?
 Somehow-heaven knows how-an idea obtained especially among English speaking peoples, that expressions of affection in a family are weakminded, even silly. Fathers put out around themselves an atmosphere of sternness, mothers were cautioned against spoil ing their children by too much tender
 |. IxyI.@ @.N1 So it came about that just at the time when growing boys and girls most needed all the manifestations of tender ness their parents could bestow they were left without 1t. Members of fam lilies formed the habit of being brusque and blunt to one another, of snapping rudely at one another.
 So were extinguished the tender and affectionate thoughts which, some say. put out upon the other, take actual form in delicate and radiant flowers of kinds unknown in the sphere of exter- nals. There are those who say they have in rare visions seen these flowers floating about the heads of those who habitually send forth good will and affection to all mankind, known and unknown. Who knows whether 1t may not be so for the human race has only just begun its upward climb from the animal toward the lntellectual ana Splf- itual
 We celebrate Christmas because the Founder of the Christian religion was born on that day. The new departure in Christmas observance may well be- gin with the inauguration of the uni versal good will and harmony which that Founder above all things else en- Joined. It is ill fitting that the day which heralds peace on earth, good will to men, should be marred by one thought of anger, impatience or self ishness III fitting. indeed, is it that among a race destined for the loftiest development such thought should mar any day of the year. The golden age will be inaugurated on our planet when we obey the very greatest injunction of the Christmas born Teacher whom we vainly imagine we are following:
 "A new commandment I give unto vou. that ye love one another"
 KATHERINE BLADES.