Smyrna times., 1872-07-31
Novel Reading.

The novel has become for good Cr for evil,
the daily food nt tn" civilized world. 1t is given
20 the yougest childhood in Mother Goose and u
other cxtravagant aud grotesque Inventions ?
1t is pacrd in the hands of older childhood q
and youth through the dlStrihu ing agencies of 8
hundred thousand publishing houses and t
Sunday School libraries, and prepared for the }
eyes OF the adult world by every magazine and
weekly newspaper that finds its way into
Christian homes. Among all peoples and all
| sorts OF people, of every uge and OF every
religious and social school, it is the only
universally accepted form of literature. His
! tory, poetry. philosophy, SCIENCE social ethics
and religion are accepted respectively by
classes of readers larger or smaller; but the
novel Is read hy multitudes among all these
classes, ard lay the great multitude OuSde of
them, who rarely look into anything else. The |
serial novel Is now an invariable comp unent of
the magazine in America and England; the |
French JeutttetOA has been SO long established |
as to be regarded as a necessary element in the
newspaper; while in Germany, the land of
scholars and philosophers and scientific explor
erS, the story teIlrrS are among the most
ingenious and prolific in the world
1t all comes of the interes: which the human
! mind takes in human life. If hi,tory and
biography are less read than the novel, it is
because the life found in them is less interest
> ing or in a less interesting form. The details
q fsr more engaging to ordinary minds than the
proceedings of parliaments and the intercourse
of nations FROM these latter the life of the
!, great masses is far removed. The men and
y women whom one meets at a social gathering.
y and the dramatic by-play and personal ex
- percnce OF such an occasion, will absorb a
i multitude Of minds far beyond the proceedings
sr of Board OF Arbitration that holds in its
hands the relations of two great nations and
'0 possibly the peace of the world
ei The daily life Of the people Is not in politics
or philosophy, or r. ligious discussion. They
~ y eat and drink, they buy and sell, they loose
iig aud gain, they love and hate, they plot anC
~ ~ counterplot; their lives are filled with doubt
'i' aud fears and hopes, and reallzatiorS or dSap
le- pointments Of hope; and when they read, the!
er choose to read of these 1t is in these ex
70 periences that all classes meet on common
% ground, and this is the ground of the move
* In truth, the novel is social history, persons
y; Biography, religion morals, and philosophy
vi realized or idealized, all in one. Nay, more
l'l- it is the only >ora history We have. If tn
ny social history o he last hundred years i
cS. England aud America has not been written i
'uS the novels of the last fifty, it has not bee
VI written at all. In the proportion that thes
uIe W nnvel~ have been accepted and successful hay
W their plots, characters, spirit, properties an
lcs' belongings been taken from real lite. There
y q no form of literature in which the people hay
bccu DuIO IHcAbIhub uetcItulIlcu u ud'
S"' truthiulness than in that of fiction. HistOr
'ia under the foul Influence OF partlzanShip. b
often won success by lying. but fiction neve
Under the Inspirations ut idralty, it ha> pr
sented 10 Us some of the very purest forms
truth which We pO>s,s>.
arS, So universally accepted Is the novel that
the has become on of the tavnritr instruments
wen reform. Ii "a great wrong Is to br rghted,
2 as sen Iment>, convictions anG -ff0rtS of I
:. people directed against j. through
of means OF IA novel. 1t is mi- hitter to this e
one. than conventions, speeches, editorials a
ue popular r,belliOns. If social Iniquity is to
,hite uncovered that it may be cured, the pen OF
men novelist is the power employed. The adv
turer, the drunkard, the libertne, the devO
10TH of fashion and folly, are all punctured aud
,hty paled by the same instrument, and held up
pom the condemnation or contempt of the wn
wPen AT the same time, We are compelled to IOOE
aid our novels rather than to our histories
thus bograp phies for our finest and purest i1ea
rs Of tions of human character and hum4n sOciC
asSed There iA nothing more real and nothing m
being inspiring in all history and cognate lt'
tn on ture, than the characters which fiction,
thus the hands of its masters, has presented to
world.
ing it There was time when the church
ready afraid of the novel; and it is not to be der
,er is that there are bad nOvels-novels which ou
means not to be read, and which are read sin
edges because there are people as bad as the no
terial are; but the church itself is now the L
ap OF industrious producer OF the novel. IL Is 10
anged next to impossible to induce child to
b, and anything but stories and therefore the she
cuts OF our Sunday School libraries are full OF t
aped. These stories might be better, yet they
,utton dOuhtedly contain the best presentation
before religious truth that has been made to
infante mind The pictures of character
Ills of life that are to be found in mutitud
Etfla fhaco bookc foil ~ nil OIL AiraotiOn
are inspiration to those for whom they are paiI
Of the Among much that is silly and prepOsterous
. holes dlsspating, there is an abundance tha
them wholesome and suprcmey valuable. Rell
n. A novels, too, have become large and toel
tches distinct class Of books of very wide accept
tatiOn and usefulness in the hands of men and wO
r, and The church, least of all estates, perhaps,
now ,fford to dispense with the novel, bee
ed by it is found that the novel will be produced
fit the universally consumed
plishes The trash that is poured out by certain
hOugh tiOns of the press will continue to be prodl
rapid we suppose, while il finds a market.
collars regret il that such stuff can find market
ade up tasts will be crude and morals low in this
magic, perfect world Tor some time to come. L.,
The be comiorted in the fact that sensuality
them that tn is education indirect if not dire
or the cnarse art, and that there will naturally
out of this large eating of trash u desir
expen more solid food A long look at the y
ade of WearleS, and then the eye asks Tor blue
Olored we look back upon our own experience
ing is shall doubtless find that we demand a
in the different novel now from that which tort
fs and satisfied or fhcnated us, and that we ours
70 pro- have passed through process of develop
rms which helps US to pronounce as trash
that formerly pleased us. Let us hope fo
world that which we have realized for
Iexican selves. Scraoner sJ0r August.
9Th, of -----s--------
Is sud The following note written to her s
cy now mate by girl who had been absent Sc
uetica Sa,a Al a,uoo4