rprising discovery that
some of the titles which are recommended with the greatest enthusiasm
are not among the so-called classics on war. The well-read man need
not have more than a dozen books in his home, provided that they all
count with him, and he continues to pore over them and to ponder the
weight of what is said. On the other hand, the ignorant man is
frequently marked by his bookshelf stocked with titles, not one of
which suggests that he has any professional discernment.

The notebook habit is invaluable, nay, indispensable, to any young
officer who is ambitious to perfect himself as an instructor. Most men
who are distinguished for their thinking ability are inveterate
keepers of scrapbooks and of reference files where they have put
clippings and notes which jogged their own thoughts. This is not a
cheap device leading to the parroting of other men; the truth is that
the departure line toward original thinking by any man is established
by the mental energy which he acquires by imaginative observation of
other men's ideas.

To get back to the notebook, it should be loose-leaf and well-bound,
else it is not likely to be given permanent use. Whether it is kept at
home or the office is immaterial. What matters is that it be made a
receptacle for everything that one hears, reads or sees which may be
of possible future value in the preparation of classroom work. Books
can't be clipped; but short, decisive passages can be copied, and
longer ones can be made the subject of a reference item. Copying is
one way of fixing an idea in the memory. While on the subject of
books, it is all right to quote the classics and to be able to refer
to the great authorities on the science of war. But it is more
effective by far to read deeply into such writers as Clausewitz, Mahan
and Fuller, and to find some of their strongest but least-known
passages for one's self, than to rely on the more popular but
shop-worn quotations which are in general circulation. Such old
chestnuts as, "The moral is to the material as three to one," do not
refresh discourse.

Even so, the classics are only one small field worth cultivating.
Nearly every major speech by current military leadership contains a
passage or two well worth salting away. The writings of the
philosophers, the publications of the industrial world, the daily
press and the scientific journals are goldmines containing rich
nuggets of information and of choice expression worth stu