is in them. We remember the satirist who remarked that to love one's
self is the beginning of a lifelong romance. We know this lifelong
romance will resume its sway; we shall lose our tempers, be obstinate,
peevish and crank. We shall fidget and fume while waiting our turn in
the barber's chair; we shall argue and muddle and mope. And yet, for a
few hours, what a happy vision that was! And we turn, on Christmas Eve,
to pages which those who speak our tongue immortally associate with the
season--the pages of Charles Dickens. Love of humanity endures as long
as the thing it loves, and those pages are packed as full of it as a
pound cake is full of fruit. A pound cake will keep moist three years; a
sponge cake is dry in three days.

And now humanity has its most beautiful and most appropriate Christmas
gift--Peace. The Magi of Versailles and Washington having unwound for us
the tissue paper and red ribbon (or red tape) from this greatest of all
gifts, let us in days to come measure up to what has been born through
such anguish and horror. If war is illness and peace is health, let us
remember also that health is not merely a blessing to be received intact
once and for all. It is not a substance but a condition, to be
maintained only by sound régime, self-discipline and simplicity. Let the
Wise Men not be too wise; let them remember those other Wise Men who,
after their long journey and their sage surmisings, found only a Child.
On this evening it serves us nothing to pile up filing cases and rolltop
desks toward the stars, for in our city square the Star itself has
fallen, and shines upon the Tree.




CHRISTMAS CARDS