THE TWO CHRISTMAS CELEBRATIONS,

A.D. I. and MDCCCLV.


A Christmas Story for MDCCCLVI.

By Theodore Parker,

Minister of the 28th Congregational Society of Boston.





Two Christmas Celebrations.


A great many years ago, Augustus Caesar, then Emperor of Rome, ordered
his mighty realm to be taxed; and so, in Judea, it is said, men went
to the towns where their families belonged, to be registered for
assessment. From Nazareth, a little town in the north of Judea, to
Bethlehem, another little but more famous town in the south, there went
one Joseph, the carpenter, and his wife Mary,--obscure and poor people,
both of them, as the story goes. At Bethlehem they lodged in a stable;
for there were many persons in the town, and the tavern was full. Then
and there a little boy was born, the son of this Joseph and Mary; they
named him JEHOSHUA, a common Hebrew name, which we commonly call Joshua;
but, in his case, we pronounce it JESUS. They laid him in the crib of
the cattle, which was his first cradle. That was the first Christmas,