The Project Gutenberg eBook, Library of the World's Best Literature,
Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1, Edited by Charles Dudley Warner

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Title: Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1

Editor: Charles Dudley Warner

Release Date: May 17, 2004 [eBook #12369]

Language: English

Character set encoding: US-ASCII

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LIBRARY OF THE WORLD'S BEST LITERATURE, ANCIENT AND MODERN, VOL. I

CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER

EDITOR

HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE
LUCIA GILBERT RUNKLE
GEORGE HENRY WARNER

ASSOCIATE EDITORS

Connoisseur Edition

PREFACE

The plan of this Work is simple, and yet it is novel. In its distinctive
features it differs from any compilation that has yet been made. Its
main purpose is to present to American households a mass of good
reading. But it goes much beyond this. For in selecting this reading it
draws upon all literatures of all time and of every race, and thus
becomes a conspectus of the thought and intellectual evolution of man
from the beginning. Another and scarcely less important purpose is the
interpretation of this literature in essays by scholars and authors
competent to speak with authority.

The title, "A Library of the World's Best Literature," is strictly
descriptive. It means that what is offered to the reader is taken from
the best authors, and is fairly representative of the best literature
and of all literatures. It may be important historically, or because at
one time it expressed the thought and feeling of a nation, or because it
has the character of universality, or because the readers of to-day will
find it instructive, entertaining, or amusing. The Work aims to suit a