book I

knew, and by reason of the matter therein contained most agreeing with my young age. For of King Arthur, of Lancelot du Lake, of Amadis, of Huon of Bordeaux, and such idle time-consuming and wit-besotting trash of books wherein youth doth commonly amuse itself, I was not so much as acquainted with their names, and to this day know not their bodies, nor what they contain, so exact was my discipline. Whereby I became more careless to study my other prescript lessons. And well did it fall out for my purpose that I had to deal with a very discreet master, who out of his judgement could with such dexterity wink at and second my untowardliness, and such other faults that were in me. For by that means I read over Virgil's _Aeneas_, Terence, Plautus, and other Italian comedies, allured thereunto by the pleasantness of their several subjects: Had he been so foolishly-severe, or so severely froward as to cross this course of mine, I think, verily, I had never brought anything from the college but the hate and contempt of books, as doth the greatest part of our nobility. Such was his discretion, and so warily did he behave himself, that he saw and would not see: he would foster and increase my longing: suffering me but by stealth and by snatches to glut myself with those books, holding ever a gentle hand over me, concerning other regular studies.--MONTAIGNE.

JOHNSON'S EARLY READING

Sir, in my early years I read very hard. It is a sad reflection, but a true one, that I knew almost as much at eighteen as I do now [then aged fifty-four]. My judgement, to be sure, was not so good; but I had all the facts. I remember very well, when I was at Oxford, an old gentleman said to me, 'Young man, ply your book diligently now and acquire a stock of knowledge; for when years come upon you, you will find that poring upon books will be but an irksome task.'--S. JOHNSON. (Boswell's _Life_.)

GIBBON'S EARLY READING

The perusal of the Roman classics was at once my exercise and reward. Dr. Middleton's _History_, which I then appreciated above its true value, naturally directed me to the writings of Cicero. The most perfect editions, that of Olivet, which may adorn the shelves of the rich, that of Ernesti, which should lie on the table of the learned, were not within my reach. For the familiar epistles I used the text and English commentary of Bishop Ross; but my general edition was that of Verburgius, published at Amsterdam in two large volumes in folio, with an indifferent choice of various notes.... Cicero in Latin, and Xenophon in Greek, are indeed the two ancients whom I would first propose to a liberal scholar....

In the infancy of my reason I turned over, as an idle amusement, the most serious and important treatise: in its maturity, the most trifling performance could exercise my taste or judgement; and more than once I have been led by a novel into a deep and instructive train of thinking.--E. GIBBON. _Autobiography._

A BIRTH OF INTELLECT

When only eleven years old, with three pence in my pocket--my whole fortune--I perceived, at Richmond, in a bookseller's window, a little book, marked 'Price Three pence'--Swift's _Tale of a Tub_. Its odd title excited my curiosity; I bought it in place of my supper. So impatient was I to examine it, that I got over into a field at the upper corner of Kew Gardens, and sat down to read, on the shady side of a haystack. The book was so different from anything I had read before--it was something so new to my mind, that, though I could not at all understand some parts of it, still it delighted me beyond measure, and produced, what I have always considered, a sort of birth of intellect. I read on till it was dark, without any thought of supper or bed. When I could see no longer, I put it into my pocket, and fell asleep beside the stack, till the birds awaked me in the morning; and then I started off, still reading my little book. I could relish nothing beside; I carried it about with me wherever I went, till, when about twenty years old, I lost it in a box that fell overboard in the Bay of Fundy.--W. COBBETT.

WORDSWORTH'S EARLY READING

A precious treasure had I long possessed, A little yellow, canvas-covered book, A slender abstract of the Arabian Tales; And, from companions in a new abode, When first I learnt, that this dear prize of mine Was but a block hewn from a mighty quarry-- That there were four large volumes, laden all With kindred matter, 'twas to me, in truth, A promise scarcely earthly. Instantly, With one not richer than myself, I made A covenant that each should lay aside The moneys he possessed, and hoard up more, Till our joint savings had amassed enough To make this book our own. Through several months, In spite of all temptations, we preserved Religiously that vow; but firmness failed, Nor were we ever masters of our wish.

And when thereafter to my father's house The holidays returned me, there to find That golden store of books which I had left, What joy was mine! How often in the course Of those glad respites, though a soft west wind Ruffled the waters to the angler's wish, For a whole day together, have I lain Down by thy side, O Derwent! murmuring stream, On the hot stones, and in the glaring sun, And there have read, devouring as I read, Defrauding the day's glory, desperate! Till with a sudden bound of smart reproach, Such as an idler deals with in his shame, I to the sport betook myself again.

A gracious spirit o'er this earth presides, And o'er the heart of man: invisibly It comes, to works of unreproved delight, And tendency benign, directing those Who care not, know not, think not what they do. The tales that charm away the wakeful night In Araby, romances; legends penned For solace by dim light of monkish lamps; Fictions, for ladies of their love, devised By youthful squires; adventures endless, spun By the dismantled warrior in old age, Out of the bowels of those very schemes In which his youth did first extravagate; These spread like day, and something in the shape Of these will live till man shall be no more.

Dumb yearnings, hidden appetites, are ours, And _they must_ have their food. Our childhood sits, Our simple childhood, sits upon a throne That hath more power than all the elements. I guess not what this tells of Being past, Nor what it augurs of the life to come; But so it is, and, in that dubious hour, That twilight when we first begin to see This dawning earth, to recognise, expect, And, in the long probation that ensues, The time of trial, ere we learn to live In reconcilement with our stinted powers; To endure this state of meagre vassalage, Unwilling to forgo, confess, submit, Uneasy and unsettled, yoke-fellows To custom, mettlesome, and not yet tamed And humbled down;--oh! then we feel, we feel, We know where we have friends. Ye dreamers, then, Forgers of daring tales! we bless you then, Impostors, drivellers, dotards, as the ape Philosophy will call you: _then_ we feel With what, and how great might ye are in league, Who make our wish, our power, our thought a deed, An empire, a possession,--ye whom time And seasons serve; all Faculties to whom Earth crouches, the elements are potter's clay, Space like a heaven filled up with northern lights, Here, nowhere, there, and everywhere at once.

W. WORDSWORTH. _The Prelude._

OLD-FASHIONED VERSE

In verse alone I ran not wild When I was hardly more than child, Contented with the native lay Of Pope or Prior, Swift or Gay, Or Goldsmith, or that graver bard Who led me to the lone churchyard. Then listened I to Spenser's strain, Till Chaucer's Canterbury train Came trooping past, and carried me In more congenial company. Soon my soul was hurried o'er This bright scene: the 'solemn roar' Of organ, under Milton's hand, Struck me mute: he bade me stand Where none other ambled near.... I obeyed, with love and fear.

W. S. LANDOR.

LEIGH HUNT'S EARLY READING

Cowley says that even when he was 'a very young boy at school, instead of his running about on holidays, and playing with his fellows, he was wont to steal from them and walk into the fields, either alone with a book, or with some one companion, if he could find one of the same temper'. When I was at school, I had no fields to run into, or I should certainly have gone there; and I must own to having played a great deal; but then I drew my sports as much as possible out of books, playing at Trojan wars, chivalrous encounters with coal-staves, and even at religious mysteries. When I was not at these games I was either reading in a corner, or walking round the cloisters with a book under one arm and my friend linked with the other, or with my thoughts. It has since been my fate to realize all the romantic notions I had of a friend at that time.--J. H. LEIGH HUNT. _My Books._

A KINDLY TIE

Then, above all, we had Walter Scott, the kindly, the generous, the pure--the companion of what countless delightful hours; the purveyor of how much happiness; the friend whom we recall as the constant benefactor of our youth! How well I remember the type and the brownish paper of the old duodecimo _Tales of My Landlord_!... Oh! for a half-holiday, and a quiet corner, and one of those books again! Those books, and perhaps those eyes with which we read them; and, it may be, the brains behind the eyes! It may be the tart was good; but how fresh the appetite was!... The boy critic loves the story; grown up, he loves the author who wrote the story. Hence the kindly tie is established between writer and reader, and lasts pretty nearly for life.--W. M. THACKERAY. _Roundabout Papers._

CHARLES DICKENS'S EARLY READING

My father had left a small collection of books in a little room upstairs, to which I had access (for it adjoined my own), and which nobody else in our house ever troubled. From that blessed little room, Roderick Random, Peregrine Pickle, Humphrey Clinker, Tom Jones, the Vicar of Wakefield, Don Quixote, Gil Blas, and Robinson Crusoe, came out, a glorious host, to keep me company. They kept alive my fancy, and my hope of something beyond that place and time,--they, and the Arabian Nights, and the Tales of the Genii--and did me no harm; for whatever harm was in some of them was not there for me; _I_ knew nothing of it. It is astonishing to me now, how I found time, in the midst of my porings and blunderings over heavier themes, to read those books as I did. It is curious to me how I could ever have consoled myself under my small troubles (which were great troubles to me), by impersonating my favourite characters in them--as I did--and by putting Mr. and Miss Murdstone into all the bad ones--which I did too. I have been Tom Jones (a child's Tom Jones, a harmless creature) for a week together. I have sustained my own idea of Roderick Random for a month at a stretch, I verily believe. I had a greedy relish for a few volumes of Voyages and Travels--I forget what, now--that were on those shelves; and for days and days I can remember to have gone about my region of our house, armed with the centrepiece out of an old set of boot-trees--the perfect realization of Captain Somebody, of the Royal British Navy, in danger of being beset by savages, and resolved to sell his life at a great price. The Captain never lost dignity, from having his ears boxed with the Latin grammar. I did; but the Captain was a Captain and a hero, in despite of all the grammars of all the languages in the world, dead or alive.

This was my only and my constant comfort. When I think of it, the picture always rises in my mind, of a summer evening, the boys at play in the churchyard, and I sitting on my bed, reading as if for life. Every barn in the neighbourhood, every stone in the church, and every foot of the churchyard, had some association of its own, in my mind, connected with these books, and stood for some locality made famous in them.--C. DICKENS. _David Copperfield._

THE VISIONARY GLEAM

Books have in a great measure lost their power over me; nor can I revive the same interest in them as formerly. I perceive when a thing is good, rather than feel it. It is true,

'Marcian Colonna' is a dainty book;

and the reading of Mr. Keats's _Eve of St. Agnes_ lately made me regret that I was not young again. The beautiful and tender images there conjured up, 'come like shadows--so depart.' The 'tiger-moth's wings', which he has spread over his rich poetic blazonry, just flit across my fancy; the gorgeous twilight window which he has painted over again in his verse, to me 'blushes' almost in vain 'with blood of queens and kings'. I know how I should have felt at one time in reading such passages; and that is all. The sharp luscious flavour, the fine _aroma_ is fled, and nothing but the stalk, the bran, the husk of literature is left.--W. HAZLITT. _On Reading Old Books._

READING FOR LOVE'S SAKE

If thou survive my well-contented day, When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover, And shalt by fortune once more re-survey These poor rude lines of thy deceasèd lover, Compare them with the bettering of the time, And though they be outstripped by every pen, Reserve them for my love, not for their rime, Exceeded by the height of happier men. O! then vouchsafe me but this loving thought: 'Had my friend's Muse grown with this growing age, A dearer birth than this his love had brought, To march in ranks of better equipage: But since he died, and poets better prove, Theirs for their style I'll read, his for his love.'

W. SHAKESPEARE. _Sonnet XXXII._

VALEDICTION TO HIS