Horsham Times (Vic. : 1882 - 1954), Tuesday 23 December 1919, page 4


The ? orsham times, Published Every Tuesday and Friday. 47th Year. TUESDAY, DEOCEBER 23, .1919. CHRISTMASTIDE. The first Christmas since the signiug of peace, and the second since the bessa-, tion of hostilities, will be celebrated on Thursday. Not since December of 1913 hias the season of peace and goodwill found us a nation and an Empire wholly at peace, and the old-fashioned Christmas has been until now but a memory. The coming season, however, will find most of the soldiers home again, old associations will be re-born around the festive°board, and the family circles in Australia will be more nearly complete than they have been for years. In every quarter of the Christian world the Day will be observed with that rever-. ence which is due to the Nazarene whose life example is the most ennobling given to us in a hil'tory that is rich in uplifting passages. Christmas is so old, so full of ancient charm, and makes such a strong appeal to the best that is within the human breast that it affords no scope for the expression of new ideas, except in the realm of fiction. And it was in that realm that Dickens, the master of Christmas storytellers, made Scrooge's nephew epcak these words: "There are many things from whichImight have derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare say, Christmas among the rest. But I ain sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come roundapart from the veneration due to its paered. name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from thatas a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of in the long calendar of the year when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below "them as if they really were passengers to. the grave,, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. Ani therefore, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silter in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it." These words breathe the true spirit of Christmas, and in that spirit we pass them on to our readers with our own compliments added.