Book knowledge

“ But this is merely a matter of learned curiosity; our knowledge or want of knowledge, our belief or disbelief in the explanation when given us, has nothing to do with our use of the term book; we use it because others—those with whom it is our lot to have to do in life—also use it, because we can communicate with them by means of it. ”

“ It is its variety, its unobtrusive scholarship, its wide range of knowledge, the easy grace and blithe modulation of its phrasing, the gentle kindly temper, shrewd insight, and lively sensibility of the writer that contrive to make it a book to be read with delight and studied with profit. ”

“ The latter, it leads to the gates of all valuable knowledge—philanthropic, ethical, and religious; for it brings them to the study of man, wonderfully and fearfully made—the proper study of man through all time—the open book, in which are the records of time and eternity. ”

“ There are not, however, many references to book study; and such as we find are chiefly directed to the one aim of painful and laborious examination, first, of an author's meaning, and next of the goodness of his arguments. Two or three sentences will give the clue. "Those who have read of everything, are thought to understand everything too; but it is not always so. Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge; it is thinking makes what we read ours. ”

“ Every page of every book was a peep-hole into the realm of knowledge. His hunger fed upon what he read, and increased. ”

“ Thus we hope to teach mythology not as a study, but as a relaxation from study; to give our work the charm of a story-book, yet by means of it to impart a knowledge of an important branch of education. ”

“ For, though the book moves throughout in the big world, and not in an academic groove, it still always moves intellectually. It asks a certain acquaintance with literature and history and the life of the human mind. ”

“ The wonder of the book is its superior intelligence. In the menstruum of this man's wit, the past and the present ages, and their religions, politics and modes of thinking, are dissolved into archetypes and ideas. ”

“ As a tree is judged by its fruits, so is literature judged not by theory but by the effect which it produces on human life; and the judgment is first personal, then general. If a book has power to awaken in you a lively sense of pleasure or a profound emotion of sympathy; if it quickens your love of beauty or truth or goodness ”

“ Literature may also be called the all-seeing eye of the world, whose glance penetrates into the deepest recesses of the human spirit. A book—so simple a thing and so familiar—is, essentially, one of the great and mysterious wonders of the world. ”

“ You appear to have studied the matter superficially, and nevertheless you imagine that you can understand a book which has been the guide of past and present generations, when you for a moment withdraw from your lusts and appetites, and glance over its contents as if you were reading a historical work or some poetical composition. ”

“ If your books are wisely selected and properly studied, they will enlighten your minds, improve your hearts, and establish your character. To acquire useful information, to improve the mind in knowledge and the heart in goodness, to become qualified to perform with honor and usefulness the duties of life, and prepare for immortality beyond the grave, are the great objects which ought to be kept in view in reading. ”

“ The result is that those who care about books can differentiate them at a glance. They know [Pg 169] what is the approved style and line for biography and history, for poetry and fiction, for sermons, for gift-books, and so ad infinitum. The ‘Life’ of So-and-so, and the ‘Annals’ of Such-and-such, are unmistakeable; they have respectability written on every corner and angle of them. The dull brown or the dull green is sufficiently obvious to everyone. ”

“ But the book exhibits what is infinitely more precious than the deepest learning, more desirable than the most amusing treasury of adventure, a fearless, honest spirit, a resolution to tell the truth however strange the truth may appear to the world. ”

“ Circumstances of various kinds, and particularly ill-health, have thus put me, although a writer, into the position of a reader; and have made me ask myself, as I collected these fragments of my former studies, what can the study of history, particularly of the history of art and of other manifestations of past conditions of soul, do for us in the present?
All knowledge is bound to be useful. ”

“ In that fountain of knowledge the world will have command of vast stores of intellectual treasure—History, Poetry, the Drama, Philosophy, Fiction—which will continue to fascinate, to appal, to instruct, so long as books are read and the crimes, the virtues, the calamities and follies of mankind are subjects of human interest. ”

“ It is a salutary discipline to consider the vast number of books that are written, the fair hopes with which their authors see them published, and the fate which awaits them. What chance is there that any book will make its way among that multitude? ”

“ These aim to preserve or to systematize the discoveries of men; they appeal chiefly to the intellect and they are known as the literature of knowledge. There remains another large class of writings, sometimes called the literature of power, consisting of poems, plays, essays, stories of every kind, to which we go treasure-hunting for happiness or counsel, for noble thoughts or fine feelings, for rest of body or exercise of spirit,—for almost everything, in fine, except information. ”

“ So do literary guide-books in the shape of library-catalogues and bibliographies, tell of these steady and respectable mansions of literature. No one speaks ill of them, or even proclaims his ignorance of their nature, and your "man who knows everything" will profess some familiarity with them, the more readily that the verity of his pretensions is not likely to be tested. ”

“ Having determined this question, let your reading all centre upon that topic of study which you have made your own,—let it be Literature, Science, History, Art, or any of the innumerable subdivisions of these subjects. In other words, choose a specialty, and follow it with an eye single to it alone.
Says Frederic Harrison: “Every book that we take up without a purpose is an opportunity lost of taking up a book with a purpose ”

“ They would have literature recognized as the reflection of life, idealized, it may be, but therefore stronger reflection. As life is the occupation that all of us, no matter what our special vocation may be, must engage in together, a study that throws light on it is indispensable. Here is a great opportunity for the story. Every genuine story, sense or nonsense, is a glimpse of life, which will early give guiding knowledge and experience. ”

“ The book itself, in fact, is little else than a mass of 'suggestions,' humane, unprejudiced, guided by the truest feeling for the facts of human nature, but disconnected, tentative, dubious, and interrogative to such a degree that the reader fairly craves a sharp-cut and decisive formula, even a false one, to give emphasis and relief to the style. ”

“ What a presumption was it to set down to make a book of those wonders of nature that display the wisdom of their author? Had his book been as big as the whole world, he would not have exhausted his subject; and no sooner do we enter into the minutiae of things than the greatest wonder of all escapes us;—that is, the harmony and connection of the whole. ”

“ If you would know how to make yourself master of any book that you read, form the habit, if the book is your own, of making notes with a pencil in the margin of the pages; but if the book is not your property, or in any case, take a sheet of paper and write at the end of every chapter questions on the matter discussed, and the answer to such questions will probably bring out the author’s meaning so fully that you will have absorbed the book and made it your own; for, as an eminent American author has said, “thought is the property of whoever can entertain it.” ”

“ In the following list I shall endeavor to name only the truly great and time-abiding books,—books to be used not simply as tools, but for the “building up of a lofty character,” the turning of the soul inward upon itself, concentrating its forces, and fitting it for greater and stronger achievements. They embody the best thoughts of the best thinkers; and almost any one of them, if properly read78 and “energized upon,” will furnish food for study, and meditation, and mind-growth, enough for the best of us. ”

“ If you do not think much of the Souls, what position is the book to occupy in respectable literature? If the author has written what is absolutely true from personal observation, the book cannot be lightly treated. ”

“ Aphorism or maxim, let us remember that this wisdom of life is the true salt of literature; that those books, at least in prose, are most nourishing which are most richly stored with it; and that it is one of the main objects, apart from the mere acquisition of knowledge, which men ought to seek in the reading of books. ”

“ To acquire knowledge by reading is to defy time and space, persons and circumstances, at least, in our day of many and inexpensive books. Through books facts live, principles operate, justice acts, the light of philosophy gleams, wit flashes, God speaks. ”

“ Books minister to our knowledge, to our guidance, and to our delight, by their truth, their uprightness, and their art. ”

“ Curious it is also to see the gaping wonderment with which those, whose wisdom is from books, regard those who happen to have any power or capacity of thought without the assistance of books. Gentle reader, when you are next requested to write some wise sentence in a lady’s album, write the following: “books are more indebted to wisdom, than wisdom is to books.” ”

“ And the result of these inquiries cannot fail to be beneficial, both to the writer of fiction and to the reader of fiction. To the story-teller himself they will serve as a stimulus and a guide, calling attention to the technic of his craft and broadening his knowledge of the principles of his art. To the idle reader even they ought to be helpful, because they will force him to think about the novels he may read and because they [pg xxiii] will lead him to be more exacting, to insist more on veracity in the portrayal of life and to demand more care in the method of presentation. ”

“ But the beginner will do well to aid himself in understanding the book by means of independent information about the man. He will thus at once relate the book to something human, and strengthen in his mind the essential notion of the connection between literature and life. ”

“ How often has the cursory reading of a book, which irresistibly carries one with it, exercised the greatest influence on a man's whole life, and produced at once a decisive effect, which neither a second perusal nor earnest reflection can either strengthen or modify. ”

“ And books, again, of very moderate value, written by men of one-sided intellect or founded on somewhat shallow theories, may, by virtue of some special quality, or as embodying some potent idea, attain to a permanent place in the world of letters. ”

“ When readers take up from instinctive appetite, or wise incitement, the best books about flowers or birds, minerals or trees, an art, a science, a research, they come to joys in new knowledge, in judgments informed and corrected, unknown to the tipplers and topers whose staple is the novel, good, bad and indifferent. ”

“ As regards the particular consideration, when people see a book, and know that its author is skilled in the branch of science of which it treats, and is thoroughly versed therein, they judge its merits more fairly and apply themselves more seriously to read and remember it, so that both author and reader are better satisfied. ”

“ With the world's book-shelves loaded with fascinating and inspired books—the very manna sent down from heaven to feed your souls—you are forced to read a [Pg 27] hideous imposture called a school book, written by a man who cannot write; a book from which no human being can learn anything; a book which, though you may decipher it, you cannot in any fruitful sense read, though the enforced attempt will make you loathe the sight of a book all the rest of your life. ”

“ In the second place, the critic should be expected to bring his own understanding of the subject matter of the book to bear upon the problem of enlightening the readers’ understanding, that at the end the reader may decide whether the work is worth his particular while. ”

“ Books not merely—and perhaps not chiefly—as vehicles of learning or knowledge, but books as books, books as entities, books as beautiful things, books as historical antiquities, books as repositories of memorable associations. ”

“ In what spirit dost thou lead them to the first study—the book of nature? Dost thou spread it before them as a book of God, that they may see its great wonders, learn its great lessons, perceive its great symbols, learn its great poesy, and inhale its great sublime worship,—not comprehending all at once, but gathering them in, for future thought and future perception? ”

“ The reader has a right to ask not only that what he finds in the book shall be at once true and clearly stated, but that it shall consist, on the whole, of the most important and useful of all the things which might have been selected from the well-nigh infinite mass of true things that are known. ”

“ By literature they seem to recognize only novels and poetry; never, as a rule, the books in which are recorded the world's history; the facts of life as seen by successive observers; the technique, history and special advantages of every trade, process or profession; the wisdom of the world's best men; in short, the only permanent records of what has already been accomplished by human beings in every department of life. ”

“ Their hold upon later attention will depend upon their lasting merit.
The permanent interest and value of a book are precisely those qualities which have been specified as making it literature. As time goes on all temporary importance fails. ”