New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1880-11-21
RECOLLECTIONS OF A READER
BY CHARLES r. CONGDON.
CHILDREN,S ROCKS.

CHILDREN'S BOOKS.
rnR BOOKS OF FRANKLiNs BoYHooD-DR ISAAC
wArIs-nIs WRITINGS FOR cHI1DREN-Books
PROPER FOR NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS. oP
BooKs-rHE NRw-ENGLAND PRIMER.
Nothing can be pleasanter than some account
of what boys read IN their boyh0od. 1 know
hardly ANYTHING more delightful than that pas
sage in Franklin's autobiography in which he
saws sFrom child | was fond OF reading,
and all the little money that came into my
hands was ever laid out in books" | fear
that the boy Franklin's first collection would
hardly have pleased the modern photographer.
Ii was of "John Bunyan's works in separate
little volumes" But Franklin was not boy
to settle down into Solid love OF bis first &C.
QUESTION. He sold Bunyan, having probably
had enough of him. and sold him that he might
buy AR Burtons Historical COLLECTIONS"
these were chapman's books and cheap, forty
OF fifty volumes in all 1t VIII at once pe seen
that Franklin was not true biphogtapnlSSr.
he had been he would hardly have soid that
chapmans copy of Bunyan.' tor which col,
lector to-day would be glad to give great deaf
of money. My own copy OF Bunyan goes
considerably further back than what Franklin
calls separate little volumes. Nis one OF nose
cottage copies. printed tor the poor, long while
before John Bunyan became the pet OF literary
people and when his immortal work was still
issued for the reading OF peasants who could
slider it princeps; | have studied carefully
with the hope that my shabby little edition
might once have been In the possession OF Sir
Matthew Sykes but as the title-page was
gone, and alas there was 10 colOphOn, Lave
been obliged to remain content that my copy
should continue in a maze of doubt, finding
"a pleasure In showing 1t to people who know
nothing at all about the matter. They all Say
that il looks very old. Undoubtedly 1t does
and that is abb ut oil they know about IL: very
few know anything about books in this year
of grace 1880. Let US go back to what
Franklin calls his bookish inclination"
"The Historical Collections of X. Bur
ton which Copper long after was ANXIOUS
to recover were hardly enough for the little
Franklin, 1t is almost sufficient to make one
contented with his own little lot of books, TO
think OF Franklin, quite weaIy OF his fathers
meagre library, consisting chiefly Oh DoUks In
polemical divinity The Doctor Afterwards
regretted that at a time When he had such
thiist TOR knowledge, more proper books had
not fallen in his way. For the father of Ben
iamin had resolved, long before, that as I" the
1.-THE OF his sons" he should be devoted to the
Church. We may curiously conjecture what
sermons he would have preached II he had ever
come TO vag his head in pulpit of his own.
reading boy nowadays has books almost pitched
into his lap. Think OF the little Franklin looking,
with his wide and eager eyes, out o, that tal2w
chambers shop, and wondering who OF all who
went by had books to lend and who would lend
them Does anybody now have such an eager
about the boy Franklin without falling in love
with him ? Consider him taking a fancy to
poetry" and composing occasional ballads
one or two of which sold wonderfully. When
think OF all the books which were at my ser.
wee when was a boy, am quite ashamed that
they should have done so little for me-. had
the whole Spectator-Franklin had only IAN
odd volume, and 1t was the third" l lad
hundred volumes to his one. | was not com
PEELED to pore over De Foes Essay on Pro-
jects," nor over DR.. Mathers Essays to do
Good" AS We lock at these autobographc
pages, written with candor so exquisite that
praise would be lost upon them, we blush for
opportunities which have been lost. Do boys
so think and study now7 Has there been an end
of this juvenile appetizer For the boys OF to-
day the cOmpOStOrs are working; for them
the presses are running and the binders are
busy authors are puzzng their brains to know
what will please the little ones but where
are the little Franklins? Our children read,
but what comes OF their readlDg7 They grow,
but what will como OF then growlngf They
talk, but who cares to listen to their talking
They will become taller in stature, but shall
we yearn much to hear what they have to say,
after they are higher
Perhaps the best books for children are those
which they do not completely understand. 1t
Is something to set these little 10 Won
dering. 1t is a great deal for them to under
stand t. at they do not understand exactly.
Why, as we cater for these young people,
should not piQue then limited knowledge
and take them, in what we offer them at an ex-
citing disadvantage Ihave great respect for
those who in the last century evolved tOleI-
able notion OF what was needed by the young
reader. Who was there before DR.. Isaac Watts
who really wrote down to their capacity Be-
fore his time they shared the intellectual feast
with their eldels. should be much obliged to
any investigator of tie past who will tell me |
what there was in English literature for chill |
dren, apart from the merely traditional, before |
the time of that venerable man. he is nothing, to
us at least, as preacher; we sing his hymns, but
the modern hymnologists do not hesitate to |
alter and spoil them; what attei research, can
we find better than those tender and deeply re.
ligOUs verses which he wrote for infants and |
which the infants of to-day whisper 10y the |
bed side before they confidently drift INTO the |
mystery of sleep? If one is charmed by their |
simplicity. which is really like the simplicity |
of Wordsworth, he will be likely to look tar |
back over great reaches OF English literature,
and wonder why there should have been moth
ing like them, before or even SINGER The book
man will remember the mandy -pamby OF
Ambrose Phillips, which was the best which
could be done for or OF the yonkers i'll his day
but what ale these to DR.. Watts's Z" Divine
Songs, attempted in Easy Language for the use
of Chlldren'l They were printed in 1926
more than a century and half ago, yet the
small ones like them o-day as the small ones
liked them i'll the long yesterday, and for the
same reason. j query sometimes If Shake
speare could have written for children as Dr.
Watts did. He was not only alone III his own
time aud long afterwards, but in certain
sense he remains alone to this day. He died in
174S. should like to know what there was
written for children in his time, and long after
he was dead, which, with favor of rare
genius, 30 touches the juvenile heart. lie saw
the intimate connection of childhood and
Christianity. He cOmpiehended the exquisite
relation between maternity and infancy. And,
more than all, be was able, learned as he was,
to speak and sing to the infants in a language
which they could understand. There was fine
genius in bis juueniiia worth oil the lest which
he did.
About the time at which began to read it
was discovered that new books might he written
Tor children. There were primers before, and
,rthmetics and grammars. but almost every