Christmas in Royal Surrey Gardens, London, 1857

Dec21

Sermon delivered on Sabbath Morning, December 20, 1857, by the Rev. C.H. Spurgeon at the Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens:

And oh, if thou hast anything on thy conscience, anything that prevents thy having peace of mind, keep thy Christmas in thy chamber, praying to God to give thee peace; for it is peace on earth, mind, peace in thyself, peace with thyself, peace with thy fellow men, peace with thy God. And do not think thou hast well celebrated that day till thou canst say,
“O God,
’With the world, myself, and thee
I ere I sleep at peace will be. ”
And when the Lord Jesus has become your peace, remember, there is another thing, good will towards men. Do not try to keep Christmas without keeping good will towards men. You are a gentleman, and have servants. Well, try and set their chimneys on fire with a large piece of good, substantial beef for them. If you are men of wealth, you have poor in your neighborhood. Find something wherewith to clothe the naked, and feed the hungry, and make glad the mourner. Remember, it is good will towards men. Try, if you can, to show them good will at this special season; and if you will do that, the poor will say with me, that indeed they wish there were six Christmases in the year.
Let each one of us go from this place determined, that if we are angry all the year round, this next week shall be an exception; that if we have snarled at everybody last year, this Christmas time we will strive to be kindly affectionate to others; and if we have lived all this year at enmity with God, I pray that by his Spirit he may this week give us peace with him; and then, indeed, my brother, it will be the merriest Christmas we ever had in all our lives. You are going home to your father and mother, young men; many of you are going from your shops to your homes. You remember what I preached on last Christmas time. Go home to thy friends, and tell them what the Lord hath done for thy soul, and that will make a blessed round of stories at the Christmas fire. If you will each of you tell your parents how the Lord met with you in the house of prayer; how, when you left home, you were a gay, wild blade, but have now come back to love your mother’s God, and read your father’s Bible. Oh, what a happy Christmas that will make! What more shall I say? May God give you peace with yourselves; may he give you good will towards all your friends, your enemies, and your neighbors; and may he give you grace to give glory to God in the highest. I will say no more, except at the close of this sermon to wish every one of you, when the day shall come, the happiest Christmas you ever had in your lives.

Read the entire sermon.

The words in italics are my particular prayer for a certain young man I know this Christmas. Will you pray them with me for that prodigal whose name is known already to the waiting, loving and forgiving Father?

Christmas in New York, 1776

Dec19

“The holly-bits were tied with pine branches and set on the sills of the street-facing windows. Glass bowls of red berries were set on small tables in the drawing room, library, and the front parlor. Madam had two soldiers hang a ball of mistletoe in the front hall. This provided great merriment amongst the men and some blushing on the part of their wives.

I had never seen a house decorated with tree branches to celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus, but it did pretty up the place. The best was when Madam told us to hang dried rosemary throughout; that cut right through the lingering stench of boots and belching.

In keeping with tradition, I was to have Christmas Day free from work. I pondered hard on what I should do with so many hours for myself. Christmas at home had meant eating Momma’s bread pudding with maple syrup and nutmeg, and reading the Gospel of Matthew out loud while Ruth played on Momma’s lap. I was miles away from celebrating like that. I tried to bury the remembery, but it kept floating to the top of my mind like a cork in a stormy sea, and foolish tears spilled over.”
~Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson

I tried to read Laurie Halse Anderson’s much acclaimed novel about a slave girl’s life during the American Revolution several months ago, but I couldn’t get interested in it at the time. Now I’m reading it again, and it’s going much better this time. I keep being reminded of the Octavian Nothing books and of how slaves at the time of the Revolution couldn’t really get help from anyone. The American rebels, with all their talk of “liberty” and “all men are created equal,” really meant only white men deserve liberty and are created equal, and the British didn’t abolish the slave trade in the empire until 1807. They didn’t abolish slavery itself in the British Empire until the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833. Neither the Continental Army nor His Majesty’s British forces wanted to do anything about slavery, other than use escaped slaves from the the enemy’s households to fight against the other side.

As I said about Octavian Nothing, I believe Chains is more appropriate for older children and for young adult reading. I wouldn’t give it to anyone under the age of 12, at least, since it portrays slavery in all its horrors and brutality. However, for young people who want a compelling picture of what slavery was like in story form, Chains is a good choice and a bit easier to understand than Octavian Nothing.

Semicolon review of the two volumes of The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing by M.T. Anderson.

Bloggers on Chains:
The Reading Zone: “Isabel’s voice rings true to the times, without being overwhelming. The book reads like a story set in 1776 without being dry or difficult to understand. In historical fiction that is extremely important. If kids feel overwhelmed by dialogue, accents, or vernacular it is that much harder to get them to read and enjoy the book.”

Librarilly Blonde: “We see what Revolutionary War New York looked like through Isabel’s simple yet vivid descriptions of everyday life. Isabel herself is neither maudlin nor emotionally detached from both the good and the bad things that happen to her. She’s a heroine who doesn’t see herself as heroic; she only does what she believes is right.”

Book Nut: “Anderson doesn’t write down to the reader; the book is quite brutal at times. That’s not to say the book is harsh. Rather, interspersed with all the brutality are moments of absolute poignancy. The book just about ripped my heart in two at parts.”

Last Minute Gift?

Dec18

I’d suggest an Amazon or Barnes and Noble gift card. Yes, if you click on the Amazon graphic and then proceed to buy something, I get a miniscule associate’s fee. No, I don’t get anything from B&N. Either gift card would be a perfectly delightful Christmas gift as far as I’m concerned. I love bookstores!

Christmas Poem by G.K. Chesterton

Dec18

There fared a mother driven forth
Out of an inn to roam;
In the place where she was homeless
All men are at home.
The crazy stable close at hand,
With shaking timber and shifting sand,
Grew a stronger thing to abide and stand
Than the square stones of Rome.

For men are homesick in their homes,
And strangers under the sun,
And they lay their heads in a foreign land
Whenever the day is done.

Here we have battle and blazing eyes,
And chance and honour and high surprise,
But our homes are under miraculous skies
Where the yule tale was begun.

A child in a foul stable,
Where the beasts feed and foam;
Only where He was homeless
Are you and I at home;
We have hands that fashion and heads that know,
But our hearts we lost—how long ago!
In a place no chart nor ship can show
Under the sky’s dome.

This world is wild as an old wife’s tale,
And strange the plain things are,
The earth is enough and the air is enough
For our wonder and our war;
But our rest is as far as the fire-drake swings
And our peace is put in impossible things
Where clashed and thundered unthinkable wings
Round an incredible star.

To an open house in the evening
Home shall all men come,
To an older place than Eden
And a taller town than Rome.
To the end of the way of the wandering star,
To the things that cannot be and that are,
To the place where God was homeless
And all men are at home.

The $10 Challenge

Dec18


I read about the $10 Challenge and then linked to it here. Then, I thought my family should do this: take $10 and find someone in need to whom to give the money. Then, I had an expensive thought. What if I gave ten dollars to each of my eight children, ages 24 down to 8, and asked them to give away their ten dollar bill before Christmas to someone who could use a Christmas blessing? Ummm, 8 x 10 is more than ten dollars. Everything ends up costing a lot more than it seems it will at first when you multiply by eight—or even ten (including Engineer Husband and me, too). Oh, well, it would be a good Christmas experiment.

I kept waiting and waiting until I could get everyone together at the same time. This feat is difficult when you have three twenty-somethings, two teens, and a twelve year old, all with active social and work lives. I ended up having six out of the eight here when I told them about the $10 Challenge. The other two would just have to hear about it later. I gave out the tens, and everyone’s eyes lit up. Then, I told them that the deal was that they had to give it away. First, some of them tried trading ten dollar bills: “You give me yours, and I’ll give you mine.” I told them that there were no rules, but that trading money was against the rules. I also suggested that they pray and ask God to show them the person or group to whom they should give their money.

So, now each of my children (except the two missing links) has a ten dollar bill to give away. We’ll see what they do with it.

I told them they had to report back on Christmas morning.

The Book of Nonsense by David Michael Slater

Dec17

Mr. Slater’s book was one of the Cybils nominees last year, and I started reading it. But I couldn’t really get too interested, for some reason. And I never got far enough along in the book to pick up on the “Biblical themes” that this article in Publisher’s Weekly references.

It seems that in the sequel to The Book of Nonsense, The Book of Knowledge, published this year, the twin protagonists “follow clues to the original Garden of Eden and discover that the record of primordial events recorded in Genesis may not tell the whole story.” And this re-writing of Genesis has stirred up a sort of tempest in teapot, with some bloggers and journalists drawing attention to the (bad) theology presented in the books, at least according to Publisher’s Weekly, although no links are provided to any blog furor.

Sounds like a bunch of nonsense to me.

Presenting Lenore: “The Book of Nonsense pulsates with action, intrigue and magic, but also offers quieter scenes that give insight into the twins’ characters and motivations.”

Word for Teens: “The name of this book is The Book of Nonsense, and that’s exactly what it is: nonsense! There were so many point of view changes that I got whiplash trying to keep up! In addition, the first half of the book made about no sense until the last three chapters of the book. Towards the end, the book does start to get interesting, but this is definitely not one of my favorites.”

A Bookworm’s World: “This tale has all the necessary elements to capture and hold a child’s attention. A battle between good and evil, danger, mysteries and lots of questions to keep them guessing until the end. The only thing I took exception to was the reference to God in regards to a mysterious book detailing a language called the First Tongue.”

There you have it. Varying opinions, but the controversy aspect highlighted in the Publisher’s Weekly article seems overblown and may even be an attempt to stir up up some kind of brouhaha in order to increase sales.

Christmas at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, 1903

Dec17

Western Union telegram, December 17, 1903, sent to Bishop Milton Wright in Ohio:

Success four flights thursday morning
all against twenty one mile wind started from Level with engine power alone
average speed through air thirty one miles
longest 57 seconds
inform Press
home Christmas.
Orevelle Wright

“This historic telegram was sent from the Kitty Hawk weather station to the weather station at Norfolk, Virginia, then relayed by telephone to the local Western Union office. During transmission, two errors were made: 59 seconds became 57 seconds, and Orville’s name was misspelled.”
~From The Wright Brothers: How They Invented the Airplane by Russell Freedman.

Christmas in Nebraska, 1893

Dec17

“Up in the Negro church one Christmas the congregation were singing the “Peace on Earth.” When the plaintive music stopped an old gray-haired Negro in a frock coat and wearing two pairs of glasses arose and began reading the old, old story of the men who were watching their flocks by night and of the babe who was born in the city of David. He became very excited as he read, and his voice trembled and he unconsciously put the words to measure and chanted them slowly. When he finished he looked up at the ceiling with eager misty eyes as though he could see the light of the heavenly messenger shining in upon him. It is a beautiful story, this of the holiest and purest childhood on earth, beautiful even to those who cannot understand it, as dreams are sweet to men without hope. After all, if we cannot hear the carol and see the heavenly messenger, it is because our ears are deaf and our eyes are blind, not that we turn willfully away from love or beauty. No one is antagonistic by preference. Almost any of us who doubt would give the little we know or hope to know to go down upon our knees among the lowly and experience a great faith or a great conviction.”
~WIlla Cather in The Nebraska State Journal, December 17, 1893.

Jane Austen on Christmas

Dec16

Jane Austen was born on December 16, 1775.

Mr. Elton: “This is quite the season indeed for friendly meetings. At Christmas everybody invites their friends about them, and people think little of even the worst weather. I was snowed up at a friend’s house once for a week. Nothing could be pleasanter. I went for only one night, and could not get away till that very day se’nnight.”
Emma, volume 1, chapter 13

Caroline Bingley: “When my brother left us yesterday, he imagined that the business which took him to London might be concluded in three or four days; but as we are certain it cannot be so, and at the same time convinced that when Charles gets to town he will be in no hurry to leave it again, we have determined on following him thither, that he may not be obliged to spend his vacant hours in a comfortless hotel. Many of my acquaintances are already there for the winter; I wish that I could hear that you, my dearest friend, had any intention of making one of the crowd– but of that I despair. I sincerely hope your Christmas in Hertfordshire may abound in the gaieties which that season generally brings, and that your beaux will be so numerous as to prevent your feeling the loss of the three of whom we shall deprive you.”
Pride and Prejudice, chapter 21

“I thank you for your long letter, which I will endeavour to deserve by writing the rest of this as closely as possible. I am full of joy at much of your information; that you should have been to a ball, and have danced at it, and supped with the Prince, and that you should meditate the purchase of a new muslin gown, are delightful circumstances. I am determined to buy a handsome one whenever I can, and I am so tired and ashamed of half my present stock, that I even blush at the sight of the wardrobe which contains them. But I will not be much longer libelled by the possession of my coarse spot; I shall turn it into a petticoat very soon. I wish you a merry Christmas, but no compliments of the season.”
Letter to Cassandra from Jane Austen, December 25, 1798.

I am sorry my mother has been suffering, and am afraid this exquisite weather is too good to agree with her. I enjoy it all over me, from top to toe, from right to left, longitudinally, perpendicularly, diagonally; and I cannot but selfishly hope we are to have it last till Christmas — nice, unwholesome, unseasonable, relaxing, close, muggy weather.
Letter to Cassandra from Jane Austen, December 2, 1815.

And here are links to a few book reviews if you’re in an Austen-ish mood:

In the Steps of Jane Austen by Anne-Marie Edwards. Reviewed by Fleur-Fisher, a Cornish bookworm.
Jane Austen: A Biography by Carol Shields. Reviewed at Rebecca Reads.
Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict by Laurie Viera Rigler. Reviewed by Jayne at Dear Author.
Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict by Laurie Viera RIgler. Reviewed at Booking Mama.
Jane Austen Ruined My Life by Beth Patillo. Reviewed by Lisa at 5 Minutes for Books.
Jane Austen: A Life by Claire Tomalin. Reviewed by JenClair at A Garden Carried in My Pocket.

Christmas and Seasonal Links

Dec14

Who wrote The Night Before Christmas? I knew there was some dispute over the authorship of this traditional Christmas poem, but I didn’t know The Rest of the Story, as Paul Harvey would have said.

Dear Congress, Please go home for Christmas. Now. Please. Sincerely, The Anchoress (and me and lots of us).

Christmas Change and the $10 Challenge: won’t you consider tucking $10 into your pocket or billfold or purse just for the express purpose of blessing somebody else this Christmas?

Or here’s another idea for blessing others at Christmas: For the Man Who Hated Christmas