Whenever people write about Christmas, yoyu findd them talking of it somethingb that is holding on as a survival from former times, on the point of being extinguished.

And a generation later, the old-time Christmas we are dreaming about is the Christmas of the very times when our parents were lamenting its passing.

And that is not a bad thing, if it makes us feel that it is precious, and that we need to take care of it.

Chesterton wrote a story/essay about that once, It ends up with Charles Dickens bursting into the scene and seeing Father Christmas:

"Good Lord!" he cried out; "it can't be you! It isn't you! I came to ask where your grave was."

"I'm not dead yet, Mr Dickens" said the old gentleman, with a feeble smile; "but I'm dying," he hastened to add reassuringly.

"But dash it all, you were dying in my time" said Mr Chales Dickens with animation; "and you don't look a day older."

"I've felt like this for a long time" said Father Christmas.

Mr Dickens turned his back and put his head out of the door into the darkness.

"Dick" he roared at the tope of his voice; "he's still alive."

Another shadow darkened the doorway, And a much larger and more full-blooded gentleman in an enormous pewriwig came in, fanning his flushed face with a military hat of the cut of Queen Anne. He carried his head well back like a soldier, and his hot face had even a look of arrogance, which was suddenly contradicted by his eyes, which were literally as humble as a dog's. His sword made a great clatter, as if the shop was too small for it.

"Indeed" said Sir Richard Steele, "'tis a most prodigious matter, for the man was dying when we wrote about Sir Roger de Coverley and his Christmas Day."

My senses were growing dimmer, and the room darker. It seemed to be full of newcomers.

"It hath ever been understood", said a burly man, who carried his head humorously and obstinately a little on one side - I think he was Ben Jonson - "It hath ever been understood, consule Jacobo, under our King James and her late Majesty, that such good and hearty customs were fallen sick and like to pass from the world. This grey beard was surely no lustier when I knew him than now."

And I also thought I heard a green-clad man, like Robin Hood, say in some mixed Norman French, "But I saw the man dying."

"I have felt like this a long time," said Ftaher Christmas, in his feeble way again.

Mr Charles Dickens sudddenly leant across to him.

"Since when?" he asked. "Since you were born?"

"Yes," said the bold mman, and sank shaking into a chair. "I have been always dying."

Mr Dicks took off his hat with a flourish like a man calling a mob to rise.

"I understand it now", he cried, "You will never die."