Books and Culture | Page 6

Hamilton Wright Mabie
what
Shakespeare was at heart, and of his significance in the history of the
human soul. It is this deeper knowledge, however, which is essential
for culture; for culture is such an appropriation of knowledge that it
becomes a part of ourselves. It is no longer something added by the

memory; it is something possessed by the soul. A pedant is formed by
his memory; a man of culture is formed by the habit of meditation, and
by the constant use of the imagination. An alert and curious man goes
through the world taking note of all that passes under his eyes, and
collects a great mass of information, which is in no sense incorporated
into his own mind, but remains a definite territory outside his own
nature, which he has annexed. A man of receptive mind and heart, on
the other hand, meditating on what he sees, and getting at its meaning
by the divining-rod of the imagination, discovers the law behind the
phenomena, the truth behind the fact, the vital force which flows
through all things, and gives them their significance. The first man
gains information; the second gains culture. The pedant pours out an
endless succession of facts with a monotonous uniformity of emphasis,
and exhausts while he instructs; the man of culture gives us a few facts,
luminous in their relation to one another, and freshens and stimulates
by bringing us into contact with ideas and with life.
To get at the heart of books we must live with and in them; we must
make them our constant companions; we must turn them over and over
in thought, slowly penetrating their innermost meaning; and when we
possess their thought we must work it into our own thought. The
reading of a real book ought to be an event in one's history; it ought to
enlarge the vision, deepen the base of conviction, and add to the reader
whatever knowledge, insight, beauty, and power it contains. It is
possible to spend years of study on what may be called the externals of
the "Divine Comedy," and remain unaffected in nature by this contact
with one of the masterpieces of the spirit of man as well as of the art of
literature. It is also possible to so absorb Dante's thought and so
saturate one's self with the life of the poem as to add to one's individual
capital of thought and experience all that the poet discerned in that deep
heart of his and wrought out of that intense and tragic experience. But
this permanent and personal possession can be acquired by those alone
who brood over the poem and recreate it within themselves by the play
of the imagination upon it. A visitor was shown into Mr. Lowell's room
one evening not many years ago, and found him barricaded behind
rows of open books; they covered the table and were spread out on the
floor in an irregular but magic circle. "Still studying Dante?" said the

intruder into the workshop of as true a man of culture as we have
known on this continent. "Yes," was the prompt reply; "always
studying Dante."
A man's intellectual character is determined by what he habitually
thinks about. The mind cannot always be consciously directed to
definite ends; it has hours of relaxation. There are many hours in the
life of the most strenuous and arduous man when the mind goes its own
way and thinks its own thoughts. These times of relaxation, when the
mind follows its own bent, are perhaps the most fruitful and significant
periods in a rich and noble intellectual life. The real nature, the deeper
instincts of the man, come out in these moments, as essential
refinement and genuine breeding are revealed when the man is off
guard and acts and speaks instinctively. It is possible to be mentally
active and intellectually poor and sterile; to drive the mind along
certain courses of work, but to have no deep life of thought behind
these calculated activities. The life of the mind is rich and fruitful only
when thought, released from specific tasks, flies at once to great themes
as its natural objects of interest and love, its natural sources of
refreshment and strength. Under all our definite activities there runs a
stream of meditation; and the character of that meditation determines
our wealth or our poverty, our productiveness or our sterility.
This instinctive action of the mind; although largely unconscious, is by
no means irresponsible; it may be directed and controlled; it may be
turned, by such control, into a Pactolian stream, enriching us while we
rest and ennobling us while we play. For the mind may be trained to
meditate on great themes instead of giving itself up to idle reverie;
when it is released from
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