obliged to be commonplace. The thoughts of men are marching in ever
moving procession towards the Light, and as each one emerges from the
darkness it catches on its forehead a ray which transforms it. It is
these that are to be discussed when we talk about books, and not the
mere acts of the actors therein. What, as a matter of conversation,
is the suicide of Dido, compared with the fine lines in which she so
touchingly summarizes what her life would have been had the false
AEneas never seen her? I lately heard two exceptionally intelligent
young people discussing the novel--Put Yourself in His Place--which
though a very second rate work was written with a very first rate
purpose. Their criticism and discussion was confined wholly to the
action of the characters and they seemed to have thought the purpose
of no account compared with the plot and love-making. And it is not
young people alone who are given to this skimming process. I have known
people who really deserved the title of readers, to find their chief
if not their only criticism in the decision of how well this or that
character was drawn, and what surprises the plot contained; while as
to the thoughts, good or bad, old or novel, the critics seemed to be
oblivious. If we expect really to improve ourselves by books--still
I am speaking of fiction--we should try to remember and afterwards
discuss the thoughts they contained and which we found in the mouths
of the characters or in the comments of the author. There has never
been in my recollection a time when the fiction of the day was more
completely abreast of the advancing thought of the world, or in which
it teemed with more new and practical views logically connected with
passing events and new situations. It is when, closing the book, we
take away with us those seeds and subject them to the attrition of
discussion, which wears off the pollen, that we arrive at, possibly,
a new and valuable thought which may deserve the name of knowledge.