make the most of life by having these of the best, one realizes that it is worth while to take a good deal of trouble, and if need be to sacrifice the superficial enjoyment of keeping in the front rank of the mad mob of sensation seekers whose only idea of literary merit is noise and novelty. It is a trivial and silly vanity which is unhappy because somebody--or because everybody--has read new books first. There is, moreover, nothing more stupid than the attempt to deceive ourselves,--especially if the attempt succeeds. Of all forms of lying this is at once the most demoralizing and the most utterly useless. If we read poor books from puerile or unworthy motives, let us at least be frank about it in our own minds. If we have taken up with unwholesome writers from idle curiosity, or, worse, from prurient hankering after uncleanness, what do we gain by assuring ourselves that we did not know what we were doing, or by pretending that we have unwillingly been following out a line of scientific investigation? Fine theories make but flimsy coverings for unhealthy desires. Of course this whole matter lies within the domain of individual liberty and individual responsibility. The use or the abuse of reading is determined by each man for himself. To gloat over scorbutic prose and lubricious poetry, to fritter the attention upon the endless repetition of numberless insignificant details, to fix the mind upon phonographic reports of the meaningless conversations of meaningless characters, to lose rational consciousness in the confusion of verbal eccentricities which dazzle by the cunning with which words are prevented from conveying intelligence,--and the writings of to-day afford ample opportunity for doing all of these things!--is within the choice of every reader. It is to be remembered, however, that no excuse evades the consequence. He who wastes life finds himself bankrupt, and there is no redress.