such at least is my experience.

I quite agree, therefore, with Lord Iddesleigh as to the charm of
desultory reading, but the wider the field the more important that we
should benefit by the very best books in each class. Not that we need
confine ourselves to them, but that we should commence with them, and they
will certainly lead us on to others. There are of course some books which
we must read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest. But these are exceptions.
As regards by far the larger number, it is probably better to read them
quickly, dwelling only on the best and most important passages. In this
way, no doubt, we shall lose much, but we gain more by ranging over a
wider field. We may, in fact, I think, apply to reading Lord Brougham's
wise dictum as regards education, and say that it is well to read
everything of something, and something of everything. In this way only we
can ascertain the bent of our own tastes, for it is a general, though not
of course an invariable, rule, that we profit little by books which we do
not enjoy.

Every one, however, may suit himself. The variety is endless.

Not only does a library contain "infinite riches in a little room," [3]
but we may sit at home and yet be in all quarters of the earth. We may
travel round the world with Captain Cook or Darwin, with Kingsley or
Ruskin, who will show us much more perhaps than ever we should see for
ourselves. The world itself has no limits for us; Humboldt and Herschel
will carry us far away to the mysterious nebulae, beyond the sun and even
the stars: time has no more bounds than space; history stretches out
behind us, and geology will carry us back for millions of years before the
creation of man, even to the origin of the material Universe itself. Nor
are we limited to one plane of thought. Aristotle and Plato will transport