None can surely guide another to these places. But the first qualification of a guide, a qualification which may atone for serious defects, is that he himself enjoys the adventure. In the present instance this qualification may be claimed. For the writer has turned his attention chiefly to his own favorites, choosing books or parts of books which appealed to him in a long course of reading, and which came back to him with fragrant memories as he set about reviewing some of the former intimates of his leisure hours. The review is not formal; the method is that of the causerie, not of the essay. Some of the books are of minor value, curiosities rather than masterpieces; in others the Jewish interest is but slight. Yet in all cases the object has been to avoid details, except in so far as details help even the superficial observer to get to the author’s heart, to place him in the history of literature or culture. Not quite all the authors noted in this volume were Jews--the past tense is used because it was felt best to include no writers living when the volume was compiled. It seemed, however, right that certain types of non-Jewish workers in the Hebraic field ought to find a place, partly from a sense of gratitude, partly because, without laboring the point, the writer conceives that as all cultures have many points in common, so it is well to bear in mind that many cultures have contributed their share to produce that complex entity--the Jewish spirit. Complex yet harmonious, influenced from without yet dominated by a strong inner and original power, the Jewish spirit reveals itself in these by-paths as clearly as on the main line. But, though some such general idea runs through the volume, it was the author’s intention to interest rather than instruct, to suggest the importance of certain authors and books, perhaps to rouse the reader to probe deeper than the writer himself has done into subjects of which here the mere surface is touched. The writer could have added indefinitely to these papers, but this selection is long enough to argue against extending it, at all events for the present.