Pleasure of Reading.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 171, 25 September 1886, Page 2

Pleasure of Reading.

By Sir John Lubbock.

Or all the privileges we enjoy in this nineteenth century there is none, perhaps, for which we ought to be more thankful than the easier access to books. „ In the words of an old English song— < " Oh for a booke and a shadie nooke, Eyther in-a-doore or out ; With the green leaves whispering overhede, Or the street oryea all about ; v Where I male reade all at my ease, Both of the newe aud olde ; ' For ajollie goode booke whereon to looke, Is better to me than golde." The debt we owe to books is well expressed by R. de Bury, bishop of Durham, authbr of " Philobiblon," published in 1573, and the earliest English treatise on the delights of literature: "These are the masters who instruct us without rods and ferules, without hard words and anger, without clothes or money. If you approach them, they are not asleep : if investigating you interrogate them, they conceal nothing ; if you mistake them, they never grumble ; it you are ignorant, they cannot laugh at you." This feeling that books are real friends is constantly present to all who love reading. "1 have friends," caid Petrarch, "whose society is extremely agreeable to me ; ithey are Of all apee. and of every country. They have distinguished themeclv s both, in the cabinet and in the field, and obtained high honour for the knowledge of the eoienoes. it is easy to gain access to them, for they are always at my service, and I admit them to my company and dismiss them from it, whenever I nlease. They are never troublesome, but immediately answer every question I ask them. Some relate to mo the events of passed ages, while others reveal to me the secret of nature. Some teach me how to live, and others how to die. Some, by their vivacity, drive away my cares and exhilarate my spirits: while others Rive fortitude to my mind, and teach me the important lesson how to restrain my desirea, and to depend wholly og myself. They opento me, in short, the various aVPnuea of all the arts and sciences, and upon their information I may safely rely in all emergencies. In return for all their services they only ask me to accommodate them with a convenient chamber in some corner of my humble habitation, where they may reuo c in peaee.'fcr these f nsnds are more delighted by the trauquihty or retirement than with the tumults of sooiety." "He that loveth a hook," says Isaac Barrow, " «vill never want a faithful friend, a wholesome councillor, a cheerful companion, and an effectual comforter. By study, by reading, by thinking, one may innocently divert and pleasantly entertain himself, as in all weather?, so in all fortunes." Southey took rather a more melancholy view — "My days among the dead are pasa'd. Around me I behold Whero'e>- these ca9ual fyes are cast The mlw;htv minds of old ; My never-failing friends are they. With whom I cjii verse day by day." Imagine, in the words of Aikin — " that we had it inour power to call up the shade of the greatest and wisest men that ever c r isied and oblige them to converse with us on the moat interesting topics - whatan inestimable privilege should we think it!— how aUDeriortoall common eujoymenta ! But in a well-furnished library we, in fact, possess this power. We can quea tion Xonophon and Cteaar on their campaigns, make' Demosthenes and Cicero plead before U 3, join in the audiences of Socrates and Plato, and receive demonstrations from Euclid and Newton. In booke we have the choiceßt thoughts of the ablest men in their best drees." "Bopka," eaid Jeremy Collier, "are a guide in youth and an entertainment for age. They support us under solitude, and keep us from being a burthen to ourselves. They help us to forget the crossness of men and things ; compose our cares and our passions ; and lay our disappointments asleep. When we are weary of the living, w« may -repair to the dead, who have nothing of peevishness, pride, or design in their conversation." Cicero described a room without books as a body without a soul. But it is by no means necessary to be a philosopher to love reading Sir John Herschel tells an amusing anecdote illustrating the pleasure derived from a book, not assuredly of the 6r»t order. In a certain village' the blacksmith had got hold of Richardson's novel f { Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded," and ueed to sit on his anvil in th*; lone summer evenings and read it aioud to a large and attentive audience. It is by no means a short beok, but they fairly listened to it all. At length, when the happy turn of fortune arrived which brings the hero and heroine together, and sets them living long and happily according to the most approved rule 3 , the congregation were co delighted as to raise a great shout, and procuring the church keys, actually set the parish bells ringing." "The lover of reading," says Leis?h Hunt, *' will derive agreeable terrorf rom Sir B- rtram ' and the * Haunted Chamber ;' will as3ent with delighted reason to every sentence In 'Mrs Barbauld's JKpsay ;' will feel himself wandering into solitudes with * Gray :' Fhdke honest hands with * Bir Roger de Coverley ;' be ready to embrace 'Parson Adams.' and to chuck ' Pounce ' out of the window instead of tho hat; will travel with 'Marco Polo ' and ' Mun?o Park ;' stay at home with 'Thompson; retirn with 'Cowley^bs iadmtriou3 with 'Hurton: sympathising with ' Gray and Mrs Inchbald ;' laughing with (and at) 'Buncle;' melancholy and forlorn, and self-restored with the shipwrecked mariner of ' DeFoe. 1 " The delights of reading have been appreciated in many quarters where we might least expect it. Among the hardy Forsemen Runes were supposed , to be endowed with miraculous power. There is an Arabic proverb, that " a wise man's day is worth a fool's life," and though it rather perhaps reflects the spirit of the califs than of the eultans, that "the ink of science is more precious than the blood of martyrs." Confucius is said to have described himself as a man who "in hie eager pursuit of knowledge forgot his food, who in the joy of its attainment forgot his sorrows, and did not even perceive that old age was cominc on." 8 Yet, if this could be said by the Chinese and the Arabs, what language can be strong enough to express the gratitude we ought to feel tor the advantages we enjoy. We do not appreciate, I think, our good fortune in belonging to the nineteenth century. A hundred years ago many of the most delightful books were still uncreated. How much more interesting science has become especially, if I were to mention only one namt, through the genius of Darwin. Kenan has characterised this as a most amazing century ; I should rather have described it as most interesting ; presenting us with an endless vista •of absorbing problems, with infinite opportunities, with snore than the excitements, and less of the dangers, which surrounded our less fortunate ancestors. ' Reading, indeed^ is by no means necessarily study. Far from it. •• I put," says Mr Frederick Harrison— " I put the poetic and emotional side of literature as most needed for daily' use." „ In the prolugeto the " Legende of Goode Women,'' Chaucer says — "" "And ms tot mo, though that Ikonne but lyte, /.<>-- .1 Onbokrsfortorede Imedclrtc, < < ■ And to him give I f«Jyth and nil credence, ! ' And in myn herte have him in reverence; • ; So. hertely, that tber is atarfne nooa, : > ' < That fro my bokes mafeetn mb to gcon. Bntytbeeeldomeontheholydftf. " Bave, certynly when that themonttie of May Is comes,' and that I here the foules tynge, ' And that the floares gynnen for to sprstogei' \ StetweU mrbokej *nd my dctdclonV 1 •."«»*'

But I doubt whethenif he 1 f had enjdyeti our advantages, he cduTCPhave lf<B6ff &*B§fr' ;f * > tain of tearing himself away even in the month of May. Macaulay, who had all that wealthand fame, rank and talents could give, yet, we are. told, derived Mb greatest happiness from books. Mr Trevelyan, in his charming biography, says that— "Of the feelings whioh Macaulay entertained . towards the great minds of bygone ages it is not for anyone except himself to, speak. He has told ua how his debt to them was incalculable ; how they guided him JSO truth ; how they flUe£ bis mind with noble and graceful images ; how they stood by hint in all vicissitudes— comforters in sorrow, nurse* In sickness, companions in solitude, the old friends who are never seen with new faoes; Svhb are the same in wealth and in poverty, in glory, and in obscurity. Great as were the honours and possessions which Macaulay acquired by his pen, all who knew him were well aware that the titles and rewards whioh he gained by his own works were as nothing in the balance as compared with the pleasure he derived from the works of othera " There was no society in London co agreeable that Macaulay would have preferred it i at breakfast or at dinner to the company of Sterne, of Fielding, Horace Walpole, or Bqs* well. The love of reading which Gibbon declared be wonld not exchange for all the treasures of India was in fact " a main element of happiness in one of the happiest lives that it has ever fallen to the lot of the biographer to record." Moreover, books are now so cheap as to be within the reach of almost everyone. This was not always so. It is a quite recent blessing. Mr Ireland, to whose charming little "Book Lover's Enchiridion," in common with every lover of reading, I am greatly indebted, tells us that when a boy he was so delighted with " White's Natural History of Selborne," that in order to possess a copy of his own he actually copied out the whole work. Mary Lamb gives a pathetic description of a studious boy lingering at a bookstall :- " I saw a boy with eager eye Open a book upon a stall. And read, as he'd devour it all ; Which, when tho stall man did espy, Soon to tho boy I heard him call, 4 You, sir. you never buy a book, Tuerefore in one you shall not look.' The boy passed slowly on, and with a sigh Hejvyifched he never had been taught to read. Then of tho old churl's books he should have no need." Such snatches of literature have, indeed, a special and peculiar charm. This is, I believe, partly due to the very fact of their being brief. Many readers, I think, mies much of the pleasure of reading, by forcing themselves todwelltooloug and continuously on one subject. In a long railway journey, for instance, many persons take only a single book. The consequence is that, unless it is a stsry, after half an hour or an hour they {,re quite tired of it. Wheieas, if tbfcy hid two, or still better three, ou different subjects, and one of them being of an amusing character, they would probably find that by changing as soon as they felt at all weary, they would come back again and again to each with renewed zest, and hour after hour would pace pleasantly away. Everyone, of course, must judge for himself, but such at least iB my experience. I quite agree, therefore, with Lord Iddesleigb, as to the charm of desultory reading, but the wider the field the more important that we should benefit by the very best books in each class. Not that we need confine ourselves to them, but that we fhould commence with them, and they will certainly lead us on to others. There are of course some books which we muet read, mark, learn, and inwordly digest. But these are exceptfons. A3 regards by far the larger number, it is probably better to read them quickly, dwelling only on the bust and most imnortant papsages. In tbia way, no doubt, we shall lose much, but we gain more by fangiog over a wider field We may in tact, 1 think, apply to reading Lord Brougham's x\i=*e dictum as regards education, and say that it ia well to read everything of something, and something of everything. In this way only we can ascertain the bent of our own tastes, for it is a general, though not of course an invariable rule, that we profit little by books which we do not enjoy. Our difficulty now is what to select. We must be caretul what we read, and not, like the sailors of Ulysses, take bags of wind for sacks of treasure — not only, lest we should even now fall into the error of the Greeke. and suppose that language and definitions can be instruments of investigation as well as of thought, but lest, as too often happens, we ehould waste time over trash. There are many books to which one may apply in the sarcastic sense, the ambiguous rema-k said to have been made to an unfortunate author, '• I will lose no time in reading your book." It is wonderful, indeed, how much innocent happiness) we thoughtlessly throw away. An Eastern proverb says that cal amities sent by heaven may be avoided, bat from those we bring on ourselves there is no escape. Time is often said to be money, but it ia more, for it is life itself. Yet how many there are who would cling desperately to life, and yet think nothing of wasting time ! " For who knows most, him loss of time most grieves." '•I remember," says Hillard, "a satirical poem, in which the devil is represented as fishing for men. and adapting his bait to the tastes and temperaments of bis prey ; but the idlers were the easiest victims, for they swallowed even the naked hook." 'Ask of the wise," says Schiller, in Lord Sherbrooke'e translation, "the moments we forego Eternity iteelf caonot retrive." Chesterfield's " Letters to his Son," with |a great deal that is worldly and cynical, contain certainly much good advice. "Every moment/ for instance, he says, " which you now lose is so much character and advantage loBt ; as, on the other hand, every moment you now employ usefully, its bo much time wisely laid out at prodigious interest," "Do what you will, ' he elsewhere observes, " only do something." " Know the true" value of time ; snatch, seize, and enjoy every moment of it." Is not happiness indeed a duty, as well as self-denial? It has been well said that some of our teachera err, perhaps, in that " they dwell on the duty of self denial, but exhibit not the duty of delight. " We must, however, be ungrateful indeed if we cannot appreciate the wonderful and beautiful world in which we live. Moreover, how can we better make others happy than by being cheerful and happy ourselves ? j Few, indeed, attain the philosophy of Hegel, who is said tto' have calmly fibished his ••Phatnomenologie ,dea G^eiates," at Jena, on October 14,, 1806, not knowing anything whatever of the battle that was raging round him. ' Most men, however, may at will make of thi3 world either a palace or a prison, and there are few more effective and ' more generally available /souicea of happjtaees than the wise use .of books. ,• - ■ i'< ' ," a Many, I believe, 'are deterred from attempting what ate, called stiff, bbpku' for fear they should not understand -them;, but, •8 Hobbes said, there! are few who need complain of the narrowness, 1 of tb;eir' mfii as,, !|f only they wotijd do tijiieir. best' w|th them. ! •» In reading, however, : it ii most > important < i to select 'Subjects Itrwhich'one ititfrfteijes'ted.

I a-eme&ber iyearefjago [consulting ttWfrtfnffd^fetii&Vfffii cofirM of study. He asked me what interested me most, and advised me to choose that subject. This indeed applies to, the work of life generally. f iI am sometimes disposed to think that the great readers of the next generation will be, not our lawyers and doctors, shop'keepera and manufacturers,, but the labourer a"hd mechanic' Does not this seem' natural? The forbaer work mainly with their heads : when their daily .duties are over the. brain is often exhausted, and of their leisure time must much be devoted to air and exercise. The labourer or mechanic, on the contrary, besides working often for much shorter hours, have in their work-time taken sufficient bodily exercise, and could therefore give any leisure they might have to reading and study. They have not .done so as yet, it is true ; but thie has been for obvious reaeona. Now, however, in .the firstrpluce, they recieve an excellent education in elementary schools, and have more easy access to the best books. Ruakin has observed he does not wonder at what|menjBuffer, but he often wonders at , what they lose. We suffer much, no doubt, from the faults of others, but we lose much more by our own. It is one thing, however, to own a library; it is another to use it wisely. Every one of us may say with Proctor — " All round the room my Bilent servants wait— My friends in every season, bright and dim, Angels and seraphim Come down and murmur to me, awoetand low And spirits of the skies all come and go Karly and late." Yet too often they wait in vain. I have often been astonished how little'care people devote to the selection of what they read Books we know are almost innumerable-; our hours for reading are, alas ! very few. And yet many people read almost by hazard. They will take any book they chance to find in a room at a friend's house ;they-'w ill buy a novel at a railway-stall if it has ah attractive title ; indeed, I believe in some cases even the binding affects- 'the choice. The selection is, no doubt, far from easy. I have often wished come one would recommend a list of a hundred good books. If we had such li«te drawn up by a few good guieds they would be most useful. I have indeed sometimes heard it said that in reading everyone must choose for himself, but thiß reminds mo of tho recommendation not to go into the water till you can swim.—" Contemporary Review."