The Lake County star. [volume] (Chase, Mich.) 1873-current, 1874-05-28

Some distinguished writers have laid
down very simple principle for the
guidance of ordinary readers. Read,
they have said, good books and good
books alone. Be familiar with the great
masters of thought, and preserve your
mind from the trash of the circulating
library. The motives which prompt the
advice are only too palpable.n In days
when large proportion Of the population
is more or less capable of reading, it is
melancholy to see that the effect is in
one respect the very reverse of what
might have been hoped. The greatest
writer's, though they may have positively
q larger audience, have relatively a small
er audience than ever. Their works are
pushed aside by masses of ephemeral lit
erature, and even when read they are
read with little attention. The mind
becomes demoralized by the habit of de-
sultory and superficial study; and a man
who reads at gallop, expects that Shake
speare will yield up his secret as readily
as the last new novelist. The greatest
men are distinguished from the little men
in nothing more than this, that the tenth
or twentieth reading of their books is
more fruitful than the first; whereas
modern reader is far too impatient to
give more than one audience to the most
venerable of teachers. Nothing is more
natural, therefore, than to denounce as a
facilitating practice all study of inferior
authors. Life is shorter than ever in
proportion to what has to be crowded in
to it, and our minds are not larger. We
should, therefore, lay down immovable
IN Inv 10
tracing influences. The time we dawdle
away over the valueless parts of news
papers would enable us to become famil-
lar with the thoughts of the wisest and
best of men. If a man had to choose
whether few months hence he would be
familiar with the ms and outs of the
Tichborne case, or have made careful
study of all the Greek dramatists, no
reasonable being could hesitate. In one
case he would simply have enjoyed
questionable amusement which leaves no
traces behind it, in the other his imagi-
nation would have been stored with a
perpetual source of delight. Yet hardly
anybody has sufficient foresight and res
olution to sacrifice the temporary excite
ment in consideration of the permanent
advantage. The case, indeed, is up to a
certain point too plain to admit of argu-
ment. Every body should have an inner
circle of friends amongst books, to which
none but the really great writer's should
be admitted. So far as reading is not
mere pastime, but part of the system
attic cultivation of the faculties, it is only
valuable in proportion as it implies close
and intimate knowledge. No poetry is
really worth reading unless it is worth
learning by heart. A man may say that
he has read Shakespeare's sonnets, if he
has glanced through them as he glances
through leading article; but he has not
read them in any profitable sense, until
they have fascinated his imagination and
sunk into his memory. Really great
books, in short, must be assimilated, and
they scarcely begin to produce their true
influence, until we know them so well
that actual reference becomes almost
superfuous. 1t is clearly desirable that
every man should have thoroughly alb
sorbed some of the masterpieces of liter
allure, as a true believer absorbs book
of religious devotion. If the task could
be accomplished only by the sacrifice of
all the inferior work; perhaps it would
be desirable to make the sacrifice. --,Satu-
day Reriep.