What is the argument made by this article? How does the author feel about Christmas and the way that it is practiced in the present (the piece was published in the London Pioneer on December 30, 1847)? Can we compare the sense of Christmas here to the scenes of Christmas that Scrooge sees in the company of the second spirit? Dickens's novella was published in December 1843 -- would readers have seen it as an "accurate" representation of Christmas at that time, or would they have imagined it to be back-dated (like Jane Eyre and Vanity Fair)? After reading this article, do you imagine a different reception for A Christmas Carol than you did before?
This article is obviously making a statement on how Christmas was practiced with much more whole-hearted spirit in 'bygone days' than it is presently. However, I think the comparison is not so much pointing out that the Christmas spirit itself has changed but that the Christmas spirit changes within individuals as they age. I interpret it this way because, though the first half of the article seems concerned with the 'wonderful way Christmas used to be celebrated' and the second half seems for the most part concerned with 'how poorly Christmas is celebrated now,' there is a section at the end of the longest paragraph in the second column that explores current children's views of Christmas: their joy is "pure and transparent" and the pantomime "brings the youthful hearts to their mouths" (while the author finds this pantomime boring and annoying and only watches it out of habitual Christmas spirit). Obviously, the perceptions of Christmas change within the observer and not in society as a whole. This correlates to Scrooge's second visitation in that the children of the poor family are overjoyed at the prospects of what Scrooge sees as a simple - and very nearly pitiful - Christmas dinner.
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