Merry Christmas! May God bless us, every one.

I often comment about Scrooge's nephew, Fred. Out of the dreary fog, Fred bursts into the icy counting house cheerfully crying, "A merry Christmas, Uncle! God save you!" 

Unlike Scrooge, who "carried his own low temperature always about him," Fred exudes the warmth of his own bright heart. The "piercing, searching, biting cold" of outdoors couldn't affect him; "he had so heated himself with rapid walking in the fog and frost that he was all in a glow; his face was ruddy and handsome; his eyes sparkled, and his breath smoked." 

I believe we all should be more like Fred, who, more than any other character in the story, really gets the spirit of Christmas right. In his own words,

"I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round--apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that--as a good time: a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time."  

I implore us all to remember his most famous speech and apply it to ourselves: 

"What right have [we] to be dismal? What reason have [we] to be morose? [We're] rich enough."

MERRY CHRISTMAS!