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there is a Santa Claus Editorial Page, New York Sun, 1897 Editor: Francis P. Church
Dear Editor---
I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends
say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, "If you
see it in The Sun, it's so." Please tell me
the truth, is there a Santa Claus?
Virginia O'Hanlon
Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the
scepticism of a sceptical age. They do not believe except they see. They
think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds.
All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this
great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as
compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence
capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and
generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your
life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there
were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias.
There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make
tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and
sight. The external light with which childhood fills the world would be
extinguished.
Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You
might get your papa to have men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas eve
to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down,
what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that
there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that
neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the
lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can
conceive of imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the
world.
You tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but
there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor
even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear
apart. Only faith, poetry, love romance, can push aside that curtain and view
and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah,
Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.
No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives and lives forever. A thousand years from
now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make
glad the heart of childhood. |
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