and inferior enquiries it is less necessary that the mind
should be perpetually awake and on the alert, than in the direct
office of composition. The situation is considerably similar of the
experimental philosopher, the man who by obstinate and unconquerable
application resolves to wrest from nature her secrets, and apply them
to the improvement of social life, or to the giving to the human mind
a wider range or a more elevated sphere. A great portion of this
employment consists more in the motion of the hands and the opportune
glance of the eye, than in the labour of the head, and allows to the
operator from time to time an interval of rest from the momentous
efforts of invention and discovery, and the careful deduction of
consequences in the points to be elucidated.

There is a distinction, sufficiently familiar to all persons who occupy
a portion of their time in reading, that is made between books of
instruction, and books of amusement. From the student of mathematics or
any of the higher departments of science, from the reader of books of
investigation and argument, an active attention is demanded. Even in the
perusal of the history of kingdoms and nations, or of certain
memorable periods of public affairs, we can scarcely proceed with any
satisfaction, unless in so far as we collect our thoughts, compare one
part of the narrative with another, and hold the mind in a state of
activity.

We are obliged to reason while we read, and in some degree to construct
a discourse of our own, at the same time that we follow the statements
of the author before us. Unless we do this, the sense and spirit of what
we read will be apt to slip from under our observation, and we shall by
and by discover that we are putting together words and sounds only,
when we purposed to store our minds with facts and reflections. We
apprehended not the sense of the writer even when his pages were under
our eye, and of consequence have nothing laid up in the memory after the
hour of reading is completed.

In works of amusement it is otherwise, and most especially in writings
of fiction. These are sought after with avidity by the idle, because
for the most part they are found to have the virtue of communicating
impressions to the reader, even while his mind remains in a state of
passiveness. He finds himself agreeably affected with fits of mirth or
of sorrow, and carries away the facts of the tale, at the same time that
he is not called upon f