This is a glorious time of year. Charles Dickens wrote, "I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round ... as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut up hearts freely ... And therefore ... though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it." Merry Christmas ... merry, merry Christmas!

Or, perhaps we should say, "Merry Xmas." After all, that is the greeting with which we are annually faced. We see it in department store windows. It is on the cards we receive. Nine glorious, gilded letters are strung, sagging in the middle across doorways and halls…