On The Art of Reading | Page 9

antiquity had adjudged the first place of genius and glory,' I submit
with all respect that he talks nonsense. Like the stranger in the temple
of the sea-god, invited to admire the many votive garments of those
preserved out of shipwreck, I ask 'at ubi sunt vestimenta eorum qui post
vota nuncupata perierunt?'-- or in other words 'Where are the trousers
of the drowned?' 'What about the "Sthenoboea" of Euripides, the
"Revellers" of Ameipsias-- to which, as a matter of simple fact, what
you call the suffrage of antiquity did adjudge the first prize, above
Aristophanes' best?'
But of course he is equally right to this extent, that the fire consumed a
vast deal of rubbish: solid tons more than any man could swallow,--let
be, digest--'read, mark, learn and inwardly digest.' And that was in A.D.
642, whereas we have arrived at 1916. Where would our voracious
Alexandrian be to-day, with all the literature of the Middle Ages added
to his feast and on top of that all the printed books of 450 years?
'Reading,' says Bacon, 'maketh a Full Man.' Yes, indeed!
Now I am glad that sentence of Bacon falls pat here, because it gives
me, turning to his famous Essay "Of Studies", the reinforcement of his
great name for the very argument which I am directing against the

fallacy of those teachers who would have you use 'manuals' as anything
else than guides to your own reading or perspectives in which the
authors are set out in the comparative eminence by which they claim
priority of study or indicate the proportions of a literary period. Some
of these manuals are written by men of knowledge so encyclopaedic
that (if it go with critical judgment) for these purposes they may be
trusted. But to require you, at your stage of reading, to have even the
minor names by heart is a perversity of folly. For later studies it seems
to me a more pardonable mistake, but yet a mistake, to hope that by the
employ of separate specialists you can get even in 15 or 20 volumes a
perspective, a proportionate description, of what English Literature
really is. But worst of all is that Examiner, who--aware that you must
please him, to get a good degree, and being just as straight and
industrious as anyone else--assumes that in two years you have become
expert in knowledge that beats a lifetime, and, brought up against the
practical impossibility of this assumption, questions you--not on a little
selected first-hand knowledge--but on massed information which at the
best can be but derivative and second-hand.
Now hear Bacon.
Studies serve for Delight--
(Mark it,--he puts delight first)
Studies serve for Delight, for Ornament, and for Ability. Their Chiefe
use for Delight, is in Privatenesse and Retiring[1]; for Ornament, is in
Discourse; and for Ability, is in the Judgement and Disposition of
Businesse.... To spend too much Time in Studies is Sloth; to use them
too much for Ornament is Affectation; to make judgement wholly by
their Rules is the Humour of a Scholler. They perfect Nature, and are
perfected by Experience: for Naturall Abilities are like Naturall Plants,
they need Proyning by Study. And Studies themselves doe give forth
Directions too much at Large, unless they be bounded in by experience.
Again, he says:
Some Bookes are to be Tasted, Others to be Swallowed, and Some Few

to be Chewed and Digested: that is, some Bookes are to be read onely
in Parts; Others to be read but not Curiously; and some Few are to be
read wholly, and with Diligence and Attention. Some Bookes also may
be read by Deputy, and Extracts made of them by Others. But that
would be onely in the lesse important Arguments, and the Meaner Sort
of Bookes: else distilled Bookes are like Common distilled Waters,
Flashy Things.
So you see, Gentlemen, while pleading before you that Reading is an
Art--that its best purpose is not to accumulate Knowledge but to
produce, to educate, such-and-such a man--that 'tis a folly to bite off
more than you can assimilate--and that with it, as with every other art,
the difficulty and the discipline lie in selecting out of vast material,
what is fit, fine, applicable--I have the great Francis Bacon himself
towering behind my shoulder for patron.
Some would push the argument further than--here and now, at any
rate--I choose to do, or perhaps would at all care to do. For example,
Philip Gilbert Hamerton, whom I quoted to you three weeks ago,
instances in his book "The Intellectual Life" an accomplished French
cook who, in discussing his art, comprised the whole secret of it under
two heads--the knowledge of the mutual influences of ingredients, and
the judicious management of heat:
Amongst the dishes for which my friend had a