English Literature, Vol. 1 (Classic Reprint)
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| Partner: | buecher.de |
| Hersteller: | Forgotten Books (Buchan, John) |
| Stand: | 2015-08-04 03:50:33 |
Produktbeschreibung
Excerpt from English Literature, Vol. 1 All of us, in whose lives books count for much, must now and then reflect upon the motive of our reading. I think that we shall conclude that the first and only motive is enjoyment; the only motive, for enjoyment, if it is properly interpreted, includes most things. What Goldsmith said of poetry is true of all good reading, it is "consecrated to pleasure." A narrow purpose of utility may be defensible in certain circumstances, but it is fatal to the perception of the true quality of literature. A book may be begun as a task, but unless it is finished as a delight we shall get little out of it. Education might well be defined as the process by which we enlarge our capacity for enjoyment and open out new avenues of pleasure. As children we begin with what acts as a stimulus to the fancy and widens our imaginative world. As we grow older other powers of the mind come into play, and we ask also for something which does not merely feed the fancy, but quickens and disciplines the intellect. The scientific interest awakens. We need not only to be entertained and beguiled, but to know and to understand. We seek truth of fact in history and science, and truth of another kind in the dim world of the philosophers. We desire to trace the processes of other minds. But in every kind of reading the first requirement is the power of enjoyment. I am very certain that unless a book is read with gusto it need never be read at all. To get value out of literature we must bring to it an alert and enjoying spirit. That is the personal side. If we inquire what is the purpose of literature in the widest sense, we shall decide that it is to "maximise" life, as the philosophers say. All of us have narrow fields of experience, and we are stunted souls if we remain within them. Literature enlarges our area both in space and time; it brings the past into the present and the wide world into our parish. Reading, said Bacon, makes a "full man," and a full man is one who has read himself into many spheres of experience alien to that in which he commonly dwells. He may live in a humdrum world, but in literature he can adventure in high places; he may move among commonplace folk, but books open to him the fellowship of the very great. Reading makes him at home in the world, and a member of a spacious commonwealth. It fits him for life, for it helps him to interpret it and to see it in just proportions. It also develops his powers of criticism and judgment. He will understand his neighbours better just because he has the freedom of so wide a world; he will face his own difficulties more courageously because he has met the like already in another sphere; he has accumulated wisdom behind him as a buttress to his own philosophy. I have known men of great abilities who were ineffective in their work just because their minds were so poorly furnished with such knowledge; instead of beginning where their predecessors had left off, they laboriously did again what had been done already. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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