But the cure will probably come from the very nature of the disease. If we put a dangerous power in the hands of the crowd by the infinite facilities given nowadays to reading and the discussion of books, we support the traditions of literature by giving unprecedented opportunities to persons of native capacity to fortify themselves in the truth. No boy, nowadays, in the whole English-speaking world, can wholly refrain from indulgence in literary pleasures, if an appetite for such enjoyments have been born in him. In some newspaper, in some cheap reprint, that which is exquisite and final, that which is assimilated to the inviolable standards of excellence, must meet his eye and be accepted by him. The enemies of literature may become extremely numerous; they will remain languid and blundering; its friends will be always few, perhaps, but they will be ardent and active. That the good tradition may be swamped for a time in some Commune of the intellect seems to me very possible, but that it should be lost, that it should go down altogether into the deeps of anarchical vulgarity, that, happily, is not to be believed. Meanwhile, every one who, however humbly, is devoted to what is nobly and purely said in prose and verse, may do his or her part to prevent even a temporary descent into barbarism. The only way to become sensitive to what literary excellence is, is to study and re-study those books which have stood the assaults of time, and are as fresh to-day as when they were written. It is not to be expected that to any one taste all these books, in their various classes, will appear equally delightful. But it is from a wide acquaintance with these, and a reverent and affectionate wish to discover their charm, that literary appreciation grows. If once we are convinced that there is a standard, that a well-written book is distinguishable from a dull and slovenly one, that style is not a vain ornament, but as essential to literary life as oxygen is to a human being, then, without affectation or priggishness, every man may become a sober lover of the best, and may feel that though certain specimens of literary work may go up and down in public esteem, the central standards are firm and the laws of intellectual beauty immutable. [Illustration] THE LAUGHY-MAN. Ho, for the Laughy-Man! laughing all day, Laughing the sunshiny hours away, Laughing and kicking his little pink heels Just to impress us with how good he feels! Hey, for the Laughy-Man! Ho, for his smiles! Hail to the angels who taught him such wiles! Ho, for the Laughy-Man! waking to play, Waking to laugh at the first peep o' day, Waking to churn up the blanket and sheet, Like waves of the sea, with his fists and his feet! Hey, for the Laughy-Man! Ho, for his smiles! Hail to the angels who taught him such wiles!