THE PURPOSE OF READING

BY JOHN MACY


Why do we read books is one of those vast questions that need no
answer. As well ask, Why ought we to be good? or, Why do we believe in
a God? The whole universe of wisdom answers. To attempt an answer in a
single article would be like turning a spyglass for a moment toward the
stars. We take the great simple things for granted, like the air we
breathe. In a country that holds popular education to be the foundation
of all its liberties and fortunes, we do not find many people who need
to be argued into the belief that the reading of books is good for us;
even people who do not read much acknowledge vaguely that they ought to
read more.

There are, to be sure, men of rough worldly wisdom, even endowed with
spiritual insight, who distrust "book learning" and fall back on the
obvious truth that experience of life is the great teacher. Such
persons are in a measure justified in their conviction by the number of
unwise human beings who have read much but to no purpose.

The bookful blockhead, ignorantly read,
With loads of learned lumber in his head

is a living argument against mere reading. But we can meet such
argument by pointing out that the blockhead who cannot learn from books
cannot learn much from life, either. That sometimes useful citizen whom
it is fashionable to call a Philistine, and who calls himself a