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Speaker 1: Keeping Christmas by Henry van Dyke. It is a good

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thing to observe Christmas Day. The mere marking of times

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and seasons, when men agree to stop work and make

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merry together, is a wise and wholesome custom. It helps

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one to feel the supremacy of the common life over

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the individual life. It reminds a man to set his

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own little watch now and then by the great clock

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of humanity, which runs on Sun time. But there is

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a better thing than the observance of Christmas Day, and

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that is keeping Christmas. Are you willing to forget what

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you have done for other people, and to remember what

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other people have done for you, To ignore what the

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world owes you, and to think what you owe the world.

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To put your rights in the background, and your duties

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in the middle distance, and your chances to do a

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little more than your duty in the foreground. To see

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that your fellow men are just as real as you are,

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and try to look behind their faces to their hearts

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hungry for joy, to own that probably the only good

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reason for your existence is not what you are going

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to get out of life, but what you are going

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to give to life. To close your book of complaints

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against the management of the universe, and look around you

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for a place where you can so a few seeds

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of happiness. Are you willing to do these things even

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for a day, then you can keep Christmas. Are you

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willing to stoop down and consider the needs and the

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desires of little children, To remember the weakness and loneliness

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of people who are growing old. To stop asking how

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much your friends love you, and ask yourself whether you

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love them enough. To bear in mind the things that

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other people have to bear on their hearts. To try

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to understand what those who live in the same house

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with you really want, without waiting for them to tell you.

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To trim your lamp so that it will give more

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light and less smoke, and to carry it in front

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so that your shadow will fall behind you. To make

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a grave for your ugly thoughts and a garden for

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your kindly feelings with the gate open. Are you willing

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to do these things even for a day, then you

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can keep Christmas. Are you willing to believe that love

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is the strongest thing in the world, stronger than hate,

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stronger than evil, stronger than death, And that the blessed

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life which began in Bethlehem nineteen hundred years ago is

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the image and brightness of the eternal love. Then you

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can keep Christmas. And if you keep it for a day,

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why not always. But you can never keep it alone.

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End of Keeping Christmas by Henry van Dyke