"A tradition is a live thing, not a dead one."

A tradition is a live thing, not a dead one. Nay, a tradition is actually felt as a recent thing; not a remote one. A tradition is always modern; if it has not energy enough to be modern then it is not a tradition, it is that despicable thing, a document. I do not eat pies at Christmas because William the Conquerer did. I do it because my father did; he did it because his father did; and along that chain (I need hardly say) I can trace a clear pedigree to William the Conquerer. 

The tradition is not kept up because it is old. It is kept up because it is nice; it was only by persistently being nice, generation after generation, that it managed to get old. The New Year is not observed because it is an ancient observance, but because it is a new year. When I give children toys at Christmas it is not because Christmas is antique, but because it is still young. I am not an antiquarian. I am not digging up in my garden the bones of something that is dead. On the contrary, I am watering in my garden the roots of something that is still alive: a green Christmas tree that still bears fruit every year. Therefore I do not worry about the origins, since I experience the rush and richness of the life.

-December 24, 1910, Daily News