Books, no less than their authors, are liable to get ragged, and to
experience that neglect and contempt which generally follows the outward
and visible signs of poverty. We do therefore most heartily commend the
man, who bestows on a tattered and shivering volume such decent and
comely apparel as may protect it from the insults of the vulgar, and the
more cutting slights of the fair. But if it be a rare book, 'the lone
survivor of a numerous race,' the one of its family that has escaped the
trunk-makers and pastry-cooks, we would counsel a little extravagance in
arranging it. Let no book perish, unless it be such an one as it is your
duty to throw into the fire. There is no such thing as a worthless book,
though there are some far worse than worthless; no book which is not
worth preserving, if its existence may be tolerated; as there are some
men whom it may be proper to hang, but none who should be suffered to
starve.
The binding of a book should always suit its complexion. Pages,
venerably yellow, should not be cased in military morocco, but in sober
brown russia. Glossy hot-pressed paper looks best in vellum. We have
sometimes seen a collection of old whitey-brown black-letter ballads,
&c., so gorgeously tricked out, that they remind us of the pious
liberality of the Catholics, who dress in silk and gold the images of
saints, part of whose saintship consisted in wearing rags and
hair-cloth. The costume of a volume should also be in keeping with its
subject, and with the character of its author. How absurd to see the
works of William Penn in flaming scarlet, and George Fox's Journal in
Bishop's purple! Theology should be solemnly gorgeous. History should be
ornamented after the antique or Gothic fashion. Works of science, as
plain as is consistent with dignity. Poetry, _simplex
munditiis_.--HARTLEY COLERIDGE. _Biographia Borealis: William Roscoe._
'TIS FOLLY TO BE WISE
Due attention to the inside of books, and due contempt for the outside,
is the proper relation between a man of sense and his books.--LORD
CHESTERFIELD. _Letters to his Son._