'TO THE PURE ALL THINGS ARE PURE'
'To the pure all things are pure'; not only meats and drinks, but all
kind of knowledge, whether of good or evil; the knowledge cannot defile,
nor consequently the books, if the will and conscience be not defiled.
For books are as meats and viands are, some of good, some of evil
substance; and yet God, in that unapocryphal vision, said without
exception, 'Rise, Peter, kill and eat'; leaving the choice to each man's
discretion. Wholesome meats to a vitiated stomach differ little or
nothing from unwholesome; and best books to a naughty mind are not
unapplicable to occasions of evil. Bad meats will scarce breed good
nourishment in the healthiest concoction; but herein the difference is
of bad books, that they to a discreet and judicious reader serve in many
respects to discover, to confute, to forewarn, and to illustrate.... If
it be true that a wise man, like a good refiner, can gather gold out of
the drossiest volume, and that a fool will be a fool with the best book,
yea, or without book, there is no reason that we should deprive a wise
man of any advantage to his wisdom, while we seek to restrain from a
fool that which being restrained will be no hindrance to his folly.--J.
MILTON. _Areopagitica._