Those who read in such a spirit will tend to resort more and more
to large and wise and beautiful books, to press the sweetness out
of old familiar thoughts, to look more for warmth and loftiness of
feeling than for elaborate and artful expression. They will value
more and more books that speak to the soul, rather than books that
appeal to the ear and to the mind. They will realize that it is
through wisdom and force and nobility that books retain their hold
upon the hearts of men, and not by briskness and colour and
epigram. A mind thus stored may have little grasp of facts, little
garniture of paradox and jest; but it will be full of compassion
and hope, of gentleness and joy. . . .

Well, this thought has taken me a long way from the College
library, where the old books look somewhat pathetically from the
shelves, like aged dogs wondering why no one takes them for a walk.
Monuments of pathetic labour, tasks patiently fulfilled through
slow hours! But yet I am sure that a great deal of joy went to the
making of them, the joy of the old scholar who settled down soberly
among his papers, and heard the silvery bell above him tell out the
dear hours that, perhaps, he would have delayed if he could. Yes,
the old books are a tender-hearted and a joyful company; the days
slip past, the sunlight moves round the court, and steals warmly
for an hour or two into the deserted room. Life--delightful life--
spins merrily past; the perennial stream of youth flows on; and
perhaps the best that the old books can do for us is to bid us cast
back a wistful and loving thought into the past--a little gift of
love for the old labourers who wrote so diligently in the forgotten
hours, till the weary, failing hand laid down the familiar pen, and
soon lay silent in the dust.