With this end in view, large use has been made, as before, of citations from the best authorities, old and new, so that the work is a sort of treasury of wise thoughts on books and reading. "Here then,"-in the words of 2 Maccabees, xxxiii.,—“ we will begin the narration; let this be enough by way of a preface; for it is a foolish thing to make a long prologue and to be short in the story itself." DARTMOUTH COLLEGE, September 1, 1905. The Choice of Books THE MOTIVE OF READING F making many books there is no end," said the wise man of three thousand years ago; and he added the equally true statement that "much study" that is, much reading-" is a weariness of the flesh." A fourteenth century commentator, in considering this text, drew the conclusion that no books may rightly be read save "the bokis of hooli scripture," and "other bokis, that ben nedeful to the understonding of hooli scripture." Modern readers, reared outside the close atmosphere of mediæval cloisters, are of course not so narrow in their interpretation of this text; but all will agree that a wise choice must be made from the great stores of literature that the ages have accumulated, from the days of papyrus scrolls and birchbark writings to these times, when scarcely any country town is without its library. we must It has been estimated-of course by a rough system of guesswork-that the total number of volumes in the world is more than three billion, or two per capita. Mr. Gladstone once said that bow our heads to the inevitable: the day of encyclopædic learning has gone by A vast, even a bewildering prospect is before us, for evil or for good; but for good, unless it be our own fault, far more than evil." Indeed, this venerable book-lover felt that he would like to do something to "prevent the population of Great Britain from being extruded, some centuries hence, into the surrounding waters by the exorbitant dimensions of their own libraries." Reversing the figure, Felix Adler likens book-making and periodical-making to a flood: "The present condition in literature is like that which prevailed, or is said according to the Bible to have prevailed, on earth immediately after Noah entered the ark. A deluge has set in. It rains and rains books and reviews and magazines and pamphlets; and then there are the newspapers. The flood rises higher and higher. It comes into our houses, empties itself on our bookshelves and loads our tables. We are up to our necks in it, and in alarm we cry that we shall drown! |