Exercises in thinking and expressing [antikvár]

FOREWORDThe Education Act of 1870 taught the whole nation to read, and to-day the illiterate person is an anachronism as well as a curiosity. Yet, oddly enugh, some of the old village ' characters ' who have never penetrated the mysteries of print seem to have more force, originality, and colour in their personalities than thousands of people who read continually.There are a dozen advantages, and one serious disadvantage, in teaching the entire population to read. The man who has acquired a taste for good books naturally lives in a larger world than the man whose interest never strays outside the parish boundary. He is better informed ; he sees trivial matters in their true perspective. As Tennyson remarked on surveying the star-dust through a telescope, " After seeing this, one thinks less of the county families."The teacher who can inspire enthusiasm for fine literature does something for his pupil which will continue to influence him throughout his life. He will light such a candle as shall never be put out. The scholar may be predestined to the drudgery of a minor clerkship ; he may become a mere ' hand ' in a factory ; but every night when his work is done he can take flight into a world of epic exultation or of lyric enchantment. Let a man become possessed by a passion for Shelley, or Dickens, or Blake, and he can never be hopelessly commonplace.The reading habit releases the power of exposition,5