BROAD COUNSELS
I have now set down what appear to me to be the necessary
considerations, recommendations, exhortations, and dehortations in aid
of this delicate and arduous enterprise of forming the literary taste.
I have dealt with the theory of literature, with the psychology of the
author, and--quite as important--with the psychology of the reader.
I have tried to explain the author to the reader and the reader to
himself. To go into further detail would be to exceed my original
intention, with no hope of ever bringing the constantly-enlarging
scheme to a logical conclusion. My aim is not to provide a map, but a
compass--two very different instruments. In the way of general advice
it remains for me only to put before you three counsels which apply
more broadly than any I have yet offered to the business of reading.
You have within yourself a touchstone by which finally you can, and
you must, test every book that your brain is capable of comprehending.
Does the book seem to you to be sincere and true? If it does, then you
need not worry about your immediate feelings, or the possible future
consequences of the book. You will ultimately like the book, and you
will be justified in liking it. Honesty, in literature as in life,
is the quality that counts first and counts last. But beware of your
immediate feelings. Truth is not always pleasant. The first glimpse
of truth is, indeed, usually so disconcerting as to be positively
unpleasant, and our impulse is to tell it to go away, for we will have
no truck with it. If a book arouses your genuine contempt, you may
dismiss it from your mind. Take heed, however, lest you confuse
contempt with anger. If a book really moves you to anger, the chances
are that it is a good book. Most good books have begun by causing
anger which disguised itself as contempt. Demanding honesty from your
authors, you must see that you render it yourself. And to be honest
with oneself is not so simple as it appears. One's sensations and
one's sentiments must be examined with detachment. When you have
violently flung down a book, listen whether you can hear a faint voice
saying within you: "It's true, though!" And if you catch the whisper,
better yield to it as quickly as you can. For sooner or later the
voice will win. Similarly, when you are hugging a book, keep your
ear cocked for the secret warning: "Yes, but it isn't true." For bad
books, by flattering you, by caressing, by appealing to the weak or
the base in you, will often persuade you what fine and splendid books
they are. (Of course, I use the word "true" in a wide and essential
significance. I do not necessarily mean true to literal fact; I
mean true to the plane of experience in which the book moves. The
truthfulness of _Ivanhoe_, for example, cannot be estimated by
the same standards as the truthfulness of Stubbs's _Constitutional
History_.) In reading a book, a sincere questioning of oneself, "Is it
true?" and a loyal abiding by the answer, will help more surely than
any other process of ratiocination to form the taste. I will not
assert that this question and answer are all-sufficient. A true book
is not always great. But a great book is never untrue.
My second counsel is: In your reading you must have in view some
definite aim--some aim other than the wish to derive pleasure. I
conceive that to give pleasure is the highest end of any work of art,
because the pleasure procured from any art is tonic, and transforms
the life into which it enters. But the maximum of pleasure can only
be obtained by regular effort, and regular effort implies the
organisation of that effort. Open-air walking is a glorious exercise;
it is the walking itself which is glorious. Nevertheless, when setting
out for walking exercise, the sane man generally has a subsidiary aim
in view. He says to himself either that he will reach a given point,
or that he will progress at a given speed for a given distance, or
that he will remain on his feet for a given time. He organises his
effort, partly in order that he may combine some other advantage with
the advantage of walking, but principally in order to be sure that
the effort shall be an adequate effort. The same with reading. Your
paramount aim in poring over literature is to enjoy, but you will not
fully achieve that aim unless you have also a subsidiary aim which
necessitates the measurement of your energy. Your subsidiary aim may
be æsthetic, moral, political, religious, scientific, erudite; you
may devote yourself to a man, a topic, an epoch, a nation, a branch of
literature, an idea--you have the widest latitude in the choice of
an objective; but a definite objective you must have. In my earlier
remarks as to method in reading, I advocated, without insisting on,
regular hours for study. But I both advocate and insist on the fixing
of a date for the accomplishment of an allotted task. As an instance,
it is not enough to say: "I will inform myself completely as to the
Lake School." It is necessary to say: "I will inform myself completely
as to the Lake School before I am a year older." Without this
precautionary steeling of the resolution the risk of a humiliating
collapse into futility is enormously magnified.
My third counsel is: Buy a library. It is obvious that you cannot
read unless you have books. I began by urging the constant purchase
of books--any books of approved quality, without reference to their
immediate bearing upon your particular case. The moment has now come
to inform you plainly that a bookman is, amongst other things, a man
who possesses many books. A man who does not possess many books is
not a bookman. For years literary authorities have been favouring
the literary public with wondrously selected lists of "the best
books"--the best novels, the best histories, the best poems, the best
works of philosophy--or the hundred best or the fifty best of all
sorts. The fatal disadvantage of such lists is that they leave out
large quantities of literature which is admittedly first-class. The
bookman cannot content himself with a selected library. He wants, as a
minimum, a library reasonably complete in all departments. With such a
basis acquired, he can afterwards wander into those special byways
of book-buying which happen to suit his special predilections. Every
Englishman who is interested in any branch of his native literature,
and who respects himself, ought to own a comprehensive and inclusive
library of English literature, in comely and adequate editions. You
may suppose that this counsel is a counsel of perfection. It is
not. Mark Pattison laid down a rule that he who desired the name
of book-lover must spend five per cent. of his income on books. The
proposal does not seem extravagant, but even on a smaller percentage
than five the average reader of these pages may become the owner, in
a comparatively short space of time, of a reasonably complete English
library, by which I mean a library containing the complete works
of the supreme geniuses, representative important works of all the
first-class men in all departments, and specimen works of all the
men of the second rank whose reputation is really a living reputation
to-day. The scheme for a library, which I now present, begins before
Chaucer and ends with George Gissing, and I am fairly sure that the
majority of people will be startled at the total inexpensiveness of
it. So far as I am aware, no such scheme has ever been printed before.