y
that 'a lifetime will hardly suffice to know, as they ought to be known,
these great masterpieces of man's genius,'[21] yet these great classics
should form the nucleus of our library, and to them we may add the other
famous and approved books of the world as opportunities occur.

It is not without diffidence that I venture to approach this important
question as to what we should read. Perhaps there is nothing more
irritating to the real book-lover than to be told, usually by some
well-meaning person, that he or she should read this or that. In nine
cases out of ten the book or author recommended is one that we can safely
afford to neglect. It is one of the commonest of human failings to
imagine that a book which pleases us must necessarily please all others
too, and we recommend it blindly to the first friend we come across,
regardless of age, disposition, intellectual capacity, opportunity,
surroundings, or even sex. It never even occurs to us to consider these
matters, these vital qualities upon which the whole question of like or
dislike depends.

'To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under
heaven'; and again, 'A wise man's heart discerneth both time and
judgment,' wrote the Preacher of Judah. Yet mindful though we be of these
ancient words of wisdom, how rarely do we apply them to our everyday
reading! If we be in the mood for reading we pick up any book at random;
if it please us at the moment, we continue to read it. If it be
distasteful to us, we put it aside immediately. Possibly we recollect,
next time that our eyes light upon a volume so discarded, that it was
once displeasing, and we never take it up again. So, it may be urged, our
mind exercises the power of selection for us: we can only absorb at any
given time the class of literary food for which our mind then happens to
be hungry.

But the truth is far otherwise. If we take up and read a book at random,
in nine cases out of ten we continue to read it simply because it entails
no mental effort. We do not have to think of what we are reading; our
eyes gallop over sentence after sentence, and so long as the language is
colloquial and the facts are bald, all is well, and we can go on and on.
It is not only the body that, unchecked, is inclined to be slothful.
Unless we have as complete a control over our minds as we have over our
limbs, it is quite impossible that our reading shall benefit us to its
full extent.

There is anot