The Second of the Three Spirits– (last gasp of stave three )
“A merry Christmas and a happy New Year to the old man, whatever he is!” said Scrooge’s nephew. “He wouldn’t take it from me but he may have it, nevertheless. Uncle Scrooge!”
Uncle Scrooge had imperceptibly become so gay and light of heart, that he would have pledged the unconscious company in return, and thanked them in an inaudible speech, if the Ghost had given him time. But the whole scene passed off in the breath of the last word spoken by his nephew and he and the Spirit were again upon their travels.
Much they saw and far they went and many homes they visited, but always with a happy end. The Spirit stood beside sickbeds and they were cheerful, on foreign lands and they were close at home; by struggling men and they were patient in their greater hope; by poverty and it was rich. In almshouse, hospital and jail, in miser’s every refuge where vain man in his little brief authority had not made fast the door and barred the Spirit out, he left his blessing and taught Scrooge his precepts.
It was a long night, if it were only a night but Scrooge had his doubts of this because the Christmas holidays appeared to be condensed into the space of time they passed together. It was strange, too, that while Scrooge remained unaltered in his outward form, the Ghost grew older, clearly older. Scrooge had observed this change but never spoke of it, until they left a children’s Twelfth Night party, when, looking at the Spirit as they stood together in an open place he noticed that its hair was gray.
“Are spirits’ lives so short?” asked Scrooge.
“My life upon this globe is very brief,” replied the Ghost, “It ends tonight.”
“Tonight!” cried Scrooge.
“Tonight at midnight. Hark. The time is drawing near.”
The chimes were ringing the three quarters past eleven at that moment.
“Forgive me if I am not justified in what I ask,” said Scrooge, looking intently at the Spirit’s robe, “but I see something strange and not belonging to yourself, protruding from your skirts. Is it a foot or a claw?”
“It might be a claw for the flesh there is upon it,” was the Spirit’s sorrowful reply. “Look here.”
From the foldings of its robe, it brought two children, wretched, abject, frightful, hideous, miserable. They knelt down at its feet and clung upon the outside of its garment.
“O Man! look here! Look, look, down here! exclaimed the Ghost.
They were a boy and girl. Yellow, meager, ragged, scowling, wolfish; but prostrate, too, in their humility. Where graceful youth should have filled their features out and touched them with its freshest tints, a stale and shriveled hand, like that of age, had pinched and twisted them, and pulled them into shreds. Where angels might have sat enthroned, devils lurked, and glared out menacing. No change, no degradation, no perversion of humanity, in any grade, through all the mysteries of wonderful creation, has monsters half so horrible and dreadful.
Scrooge started back, appalled. Having them shown to him in this way, he tried to say they were fine children but the words choked themselves, rather than be parties to a lie of such enormous magnitude.
“Spirit! Are they yours?” Scrooge could say no more.
“They are Man’s,” said the Spirit, looking down upon them. “And they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware of them both and all of their degree but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow, I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it!” cried the Spirit, stretching out its hand toward the city. “Slander those who tell it ye! Admit it for your factious purposes and make it worse! And bide the end!”
“Have they no refuge or resource?” cried Scrooge.
“Are there no prisons?” said the Spirit, turning on him for the last time with his own words. “Are there no workhouses?”
The bell struck twelve.
Scrooge looked about him for the Ghost and saw it not. As the last stroke ceased to vibrate, he remembered the prediction of old Jacob Marley and lifting up his eyes, beheld a solemn phantom, draped and hooded, coming, like a mist along the ground, toward him…
-excerpt of Charles Dickens timeless classic.
2 Peter 1, Job 36:12, Proverbs 9:10, Hosea 4:6
Charles Dickens 1842, at the time of the first publication of A Christmas Carol
May joys from Heaven bless the day
Making Christmas ?
I would urge everyone, however, to take a little bit of time out of this busy. busy, busy…to just stop for a few minutes and think and pray for those who are not as fortunate as we are and to make some provision for them. It’s never to late to extend the most important part of this entire season to those needy individuals. That is God’s love which we can share without great cost. You can get so caught up in all the details of what we all think makes this a wonderful holiday that we forget the most important part. God already effected the most important aspect of Christmas. He sent His only son, his emissary of love, to the world in the form of a tiny human being. We most need to get the message out and then believe it ourselves with every fiber of our being. The world is depending on you!!