ature. The purpose at hand is
not only to seek great ideas for their own sake but to make careful
note of the manner in which they are expressed. So doing, one
unconsciously invigorates his own powers and adopts techniques which
the masters have used to great advantage.

To paraphrase what a distinguished journalist once said on this
subject in a speech to young writers: "For an officer it is in the
first place a shame to be ignorant--ignorant, as not a few are, of
history and geography: and in the second place, it is a pity that any
officer should lack a vigor in writing which can be produced through
imitation of vigorous writers."

As to what is best worth seeking, a man can not go wrong by "falling
in love" with the works of a relatively limited number of authors who
kindle him personally. It is all right to widen the field
occasionally, for diversion, for contrast, for sharpening style, and
for balancing of ideas, but strength comes of finding a main line and
holding to it. No man can read a book with sympathetic understanding
without taking from it something that makes him more complex and more
potent.

The main test is in this: if you read a book and feel stirred by it,
even though alternately you strongly agree with certain of its
passages and warmly contend against others, something new has been
added. The writer is making you see things. Your own powers of
observation are being made more acute. All good writers are in a sense
hitch-hikers. While going along for the ride, and enjoying the essence
of some highly developed mind, they are not loath to study the
technique by which some other man develops his driving power, and to
make note of his strong words and best phrases for possible future
use.

It is a good habit to underscore passages in books which have
contributed something vital to one's own thought--always provided that
the books have not been borrowed.

Without mentioning names, we can take a cue from a man who some years
ago entered one of the services while still a youth. He had had little
formal education, but he began an earnest study of military
literature, and the search for knowledge whetted his thirst to join
the company of those who could speak to the world because they had
something to say. He read such books as were at hand, and clipped
pieces from magazines and newspapers which had particularly appealed
to him, for one reason or another. Whenever he saw a new word, he
wrote it down a