The Washington times., 1901-12-19
PRIVATE DALZELL
ON GOOD READING.
THE VALUE CT STANDARD WORKS
Apueai for oId-Timc Training OF the
Youthful Mind by Means
of tho ClaSSics-IE-
norancc betrayed.


OF one book" was never taken too
literally, but was generally applied to
profound readers OF few and good books
For one. l am not sure that l am old
| fogyish enough to be mistaken In the
| opinion that our young people are not as
well up in standard literature as were
their fathers and grRndiathers.
Two recent national tests. one by the
great universities. and the other by the
churches and theologiaus, ELECTED an
swers that would make cat laugh. They
showed lamentablc ignorance, both OF the
Bible and OF general literature. ana that
among not the poor and unlettcrcd
masses. but among the college undergrad
yates and communicates of the churches.
They answered such questions as:
Name seven piays OF Shakespeare"
where is the character Iago' found?''
what is the name OF the prophet whose
gourd wiihered?"
Name the four cvanCelists," etc.
Yes; they attempted toanswer them, but
vast majority Of the answers were alb
surdly wrong.
The fault is ia the lack of wide and
various. and may say careful, reading OF
the Bible and the standard books of the
world, so accessible to all classes of peo-
pie. Time was when it was considered
positively disgiaceful for young persons
not to be familiar with all the great
works in the language.
Are we making the mistake that we'll
endowed colleges, monumental piles OF
iron and granite. carved and built up INTO
architectural dreams. will take away from
our youth the necessity of long, steady.
silent reading o. all the great authors,
living and dead? Are We making the
equally foolish mistake OF suppos!ng that
reading is a lost art, and the modern
library with its million volumes is to
take its place?
The Only Way.
Reading. reading. is the only way to
get knowledge. In vain docs modern
wealth or inventive genius try to find
substitute for the old-fashioned reading
Of the old books-all in vain: the old way
is the only way, and all other ways are
proved frauds and failures.
In Ohio, when was boy, going to the
log cal In schools and village academy.
knew very few students or teachers who
had not some Latin and Greek, and some
acquaintance with the "humanities, as
then taught, and fewer who had not, in
the long winter nights, by the light of the
tallow dip. or more often by the light OF
the fire Of me logs piled up on the hearth
sat in the midst o. the family circle, and
by furna. read thro -gh and talked over all
the leading histories, poems, philosophers
and scieuces tlcn eXtant. and never yet
and never to be surpassed In any stage OF
coming literatures.
A boy or girl then blushed TO be
caught mapping on any event or name
. sdrag tph NJ ~
numerous. from all the great authors
we're stored away in memory. True there
was some reading Of novels. like the Wa
verley series but none OF the cheap and
nasty stun that so occupies the young
people OF the present day.
Then we had the Ohio State Library,
with its circulating library in every town
and township OF the State, and the very
choicest literature easily and freely ac-
cessible to all OF money nobody had
much, and such a thing as large IL
brary was known TO not one family in
thousand then. 1t was the one book, the
good book well read from preface TO
finis, and almost memorized before an
other was taken out.
Hayes and Garfield.
have heard both Presidents Hayes
an, Garfield. twQ OF the best-read men I
ever knew, say they owed more by far to
this circulating library than to all the
schools and colleges they ever attended
and both were profound scholars.
That library came along Just as they
became Of reading age, and In their pow
erty and thirst for knowledge supplied to
them the opportunity TO read the great
authors OF all ages and climes. just when
they would make the best and most last
ing impression on their youthful minds.
Garheld's wide and various circuit OF
reading, as extended as that ''prodigious
circuit" described by Coleridge. began
away back in the days when he was a
farm boy and country schoolmaster, de-
yeuFing these mighty books, and
while his companions slept.
Toiiing upward in the night"
So he read Locke, Buckle. Hume, Ma
caulay, Plutarch. Goethe, Shakespeare,
Milton. and the Bible. and many books of
that kind ten or fifteen years before he
took his seat in Congress, and while still
a boy In his teens and, TO speak plainly,
in rags.
The same was true Of most OF the
Young people OF hat day in Chic. They
were readers and thinkers, and the world
shall never see the,r peers.
There is no royal road TO knowledge; 1t
is reached By reading, and reading good
and chronological order of succession in
the wide circuit of language and litera
ture that must be followed increasingly,
untiringly, day and night, for at least
twenty years without a break, or no great
fund of knowledge can ever be attained.
There is no other way.
There is no substitute for reading. The
way 10 learn is to read.
Knowledge Not Contagious.
Young people cannot catch knowledge
as they do the measles. IT cannot be in
hailed except from the printed page 1t
cannot be gathered alone from college
halls, though endowed with millions and
filled with learned professors-nevcr but
in one way, by the silent, protracted, re-
peated viglls over the printed books.
wisely chosen in their order from among
the very best works extant in all the
world and in all the ages.
DO you know what the young people
call Bolingbroke, Emerson. Ruskin, Irv-
ing Montesquieu, Blackstone. Bacon, the
Bible. Shakespeare. Milton. ct i'd omne?
Why. they pass them by for the epheme-
raj magazine, newspaper. or foolish novel,
which waste time. perycrt taste, dwarf
the reason. wither the memory, and fill
the mind with empty nothingS. They call
the good old books we studied when we
were boys dry and uninteresting." And
well may they, iUr the best reason in the
world; for they have so perverted their
taste and Judgment with idle reading
worse than no reading, that they have no
capacity left to read or understand the
good book.
do not deprecate the perusal OF
Good For Fad Teeth
Not Bad For GOOD Teeth