The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1886-03-27
1s."s.- la''a', Scientific. b','o'i'''.
An Original WING Feature.
AND BOOK READING.

Philadelphia Record.
IN recent address at the Working
mems College in London Sir John LuL-
book furnished a list of what he thought
were the best hundred books which a
workingman could read. and nearly all
the men in Great Britain have since then,
to use an old saying, added stone to
the cairn' by criticising the list and cor
rectlng, adding to or by taking from if.
An eminent English statesmen cnce pub
licly expressed the hope that tt e day
would come when every workingman in
the country would be able to read and
understand Bacon; to which some one
who had not much literary taste rather
fippantly remarked that he would rather
see the time when every man was able
to buy bacon. Ia looking over Sir John
Lubbock's list the first thought which
strikes us is that he would like to con-
vert the workingman into badly ar
ranged encyclopedia, and give him, as
the Pal Nal gazette ably puts it, "a
railway ride through human culture,
with tenminutes stoppage at all the
principal stations" The American work.
man has more leisure and is possessed of
more Intelligence thar the English work
man, and yet We venture to say that one.
half of the works i'll the list in question
would be sealed books to him, and that
not one out of ten people of cultivated
taste and leisure have read them.
The value of such lists consists chiefly
IN the fact that they serve to show the
intellectual sympathies of those who
prepare them. Sir John Lubbock, for
example, only places Hume among En-
glish historians, emitting Macau,ay,
Green, Freeman aud McCarthy-the lat
ter OF whom has written so instructively
of our own times. He gives long ar
ray of classes on which tradition and au
thority have placed a literary value that
they do not possess. He excludes Ten
nyson's "Idylls of the King" and to fill
up this gap. Mr.. Ruskin recommends
Malory's "Morte d'Arthur;'' while in
philosophy the latter strikes out Emer-
son, and would have all of Carlyle; Lord
Coleridge would add" Fieldburg's works
to fiction, and exclude Charles Kingsley;
Sir John Lubbock has forgotten that
Charles Lamb ever lived, and Ruskin
would blot out even Thackery. 1t is
useless, however, to multiply examples.
Enough have been given to show how
much these would be guides, philoso-
piers aud friends differ in mental char
acter, and of what little practical use
courses of reading would be if carried
ont according to all of their suggestions.
catalogue of the travelling library
of the explorer Stanley, recently fur
nished by that gentleman, is thoroughly
characteristic of the man. He took with
him the Bible, Shakespeare, Homer and
Virgil, several diction aries, a number of
novels and a selection of the best English
poets. AS one obstruction after another
rose up before him he had to throw his
books away, until only the Bible was
left. Whether this illustrates the doc
trine of the survival of the fttest it is
not necessary to inquire; but the incident
shows how unforeseen influences will
often war against us in our selection of
books. 1t may be true-nay, undoubt-
edly is-that many of us need to be
guided in this selection; but we ought at
the same time to exercise our own judg-
ment and consider what will best suit the
particular bent of our own thought and
sympathies. If we are simply to have
library of one hundred books why cum
Der it with works on philosophy or eco
nomics, from which we can only gain in
formation of some special kind? What
the majority of people read for now is
recreation. and outside of that those who
have but little time to spare should be
contented if they make themselves &C.
quainted with enough of the history of
the past to understand the causes which
have led up to changes in government,
to the overthrow of old dynasties, and
to the blossoming of fuller and nobler
civilization. Let them keep abreast of
popular science and the latest discov-
cries, without making the mistake of try
ing to educate themselves beyond their
wits. II put" said Frederic Harrison,
''the poetic and emotional side of litera-
ture as the most needed for daily use."
McCaulay's 'Lays of Ancient Rome
will give you better idea of the land of
the Caesars than can the ponderous
tones of Glbbon; you will learn more
from Morley's "Palissy, the Potter"
than from whole history of ceramics;
and SCOTS "Ivanhoe' will impress the
salient features of the age of which it
treats more strongly on the mental Wis
sion than could Hume or Macaulay.
Ouida recently remarked that she read
nothing but the reviews; and Balzac, we
believe, it was who said when he wished
to read new book he sat down and
com munities who read the most, and
! read indscrimihately, who show the
greatest intelligence or prove the strong
est factors in the worlds progress. There
are no more intelligent people than the
peasantry of the Scottish lowlands: and
yet the Bible, the Scottish Worthless, :"
"Burns," and weekly newspaper which
is passed from house to house, are, per-
chance, their only reading. But the
stories of endurance and self sacrifice, of
faithfulness even unto death, Of rugged
virtue, honor and fearlessness, which
they have drunk in day by day have been
to them an inspiration. And so in the
far North, where legends of the old sea
kings still iinger, the tales of deeds of
daring handed down from father to son
have cast these people in a more heroic
mold than if they had toyed with the
"Decomeron" of Boccaccio, or read the
sonnets of Petrarch in land where the
southern sun lights the smiling waves
and the vine clad hills. There is no need,
t erefole. that the man who tolls and
suffers should skim the pages Of book
after book and try to possess himself of
superficial omniscience by reading
"books of all sorts, folios, quartos,
large and small sorts" The newspaper