Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-12-21

dren to lie. No, he was teaching them
to tell the truth. Telling the truth Is q
great art--the greatest of all arts-and
fiction Is one of the greatest of the arts.
You can understand me when / ask
If there was ever any little fact boy
such as Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry
Finn. OF course not. They are real
and they are true because the great
| master artist took a thousand-yes, a
billion-boys and he put in fact here
and left out fact there until finally
| he got the true boy that would find q
companion in the heart of all boys in
all homes everywhere. And Booth
Harrington and William Allen White
and Thomas Bailey Aldrich and Thomas
Hughes and Robert Louis Stevenson and
all the great master creators of the true
and real boys of the world have done
the same thing. And We can say the
same of the great creators of the little
| girls of literature. These children of
| fiction live and breathe and are vital
solely because they are works of art
| just in proportion as they are works of
art. Why, the characters of Shakespeare
and Thackeray and Dickens and Scott
are more real, more true than the kings
and prime ministers of England.
Santa Is JoviaI Spirit.
Santa Claus is true, and modern psy-
chology has proved that he is true, be-
cause he is one of the mightiest artistic
creations that have grown out of the
passions, hopes. loves and longings for
| happiness of the whole human race.
Jesus represents the deeper religious
meanings and values of Christmas, but
Santa gives it its gayety, its Tilt and
friendlinesS and jollity because he comes
madly driving his reindeer through the
skies, shouting and laughing and scat
tering the infectious magic of his own
happiness throughout the hearts OF all
And Is it just because he is for all
mankind and is no respecter Of persons
that he Is, as / have said. one of the
great creators of the spirit that makes
democracy possible. The gods and saw
iorS of every race have been the gods and
Saviors of poor people. They have been
the creations of poor people. Democracy
itself is the social expression of the
longings of the poor to be rich. When
We speak of human equality, it is never
the rich who wish to be equal to the
poor, but the poor who wish to be equal
to the rich. And nearly everybody is
poor and always will be. Science some
time may provide us all with food
clothing and shelter, but most every
body will still be poor, because some
VIII nave more imam OJnerS.
But there is one day when this is all
reversed at least for the little child. He
sees the little boy and girl in the next
block all the year with their horses and
automobiles and, poor child, he feels
poor But ahl on Christmas Eye, until
his little tired head goes to sleep and
then on through his dreams, he doesn't
have horses or automobiles. but some
thing far finer, something the very
richest children can't buy with their
money! man with reindeer and
wonderful sleigh is coming right out of
the very skies just to bring presents To
him and to make his heart proud and
glad.
And you realists who propose to tell
the child that all that beautiful dream
is unreal-you yourselves have not I'M
derstood the psychological foundations
Of reality or how the child becomes
oriented in a real world. And you have
chosen just the one time in the world
when there Is more danger than ever
that our lives will become mechanical,
and when We live In apartment houses
and ride in machines and the old folk
life, with its song and hardshiDs, Its
warm human relations. its fireside and
its poetry are In danger Of passing
away forever.
Fancy Produces Point Of View.
At this point I should urge you to
read little book written by that wise
understander of childhood. Dr. Leta
Hollingworth, on 1.-THE Psychology of
the Adolescent," and see how the child,
out of its dreams, its fairy tales, its re-
ligiouS combinations, its tribal cere-
monials, its baptisms and the like,
gradually grasps practical world. how
1t achieves" as Mrs. Hollingworth says,
"a point Of view," how it gradually I'M
derstands the nature and limits of its
own selfhood and yet keeps its illusions,
cut of which ultimately it builds a new
and solder world OF life's ideals.
For ideals, my realist friends, are the
things men live by and love by and
die by. And If you would see the real
significance and psychological service
OF the myths, fairy stories and legends
of the race in giving to the child finally
a solid grasp of its realities and an
emotional basis for it's ideals you would
see 1t as your duty not to shock the
child's faith-the deepest and most
priceless thing within it-by some day
suddenly. brutally, realistically" tell
ing it There is no such thing as
Santa Claus"
You idol breakers always take a Joy
and pride IN doing that But it is be-
cause you are such poor psychologists
II you saw deeper into the mental
structures of the child's mind, you
would gradually transform his concept
of Santa Claus as an actual person
similar to father and mother and Uncle
George into vastly larger concept
the concept of Santa Claus not as a
person, but as a personality, a great
imaginative and artistic personiflcation
of many OF the noblest and most pre-
cious things in human nature.
Ideals Needed to Face World.
It is by this skillful, gentle, under
standing use of this great Kris Kringle
legend that in some form has grown up
in the heart of every race because it
fulfilled need as insistent and peren-
NAL as the heartbeat of the race itself,
that you will most wisely teach that
tiny bundle of feelings and sensations
that Is born as your babe by and by to
build consistent and logical Selfhood
that Will safely, securely and happily
challenge an imperfect world with high
ideals.
So. my dear children, be sure to meet
me bright and early Christmas morning
right around the Christmas tree. and
promise you / will be there with nv
red-top boots and bow and arrow. and
we Will just give these mechanistic
realistic. matter of-fact, unpoetical.
hard-hearted people who propose to kill
dear old Santa Claus such a scare that
they viii never dare to show their
practical" heads and their cruel faces
again.