There has never been a time when self-possession and sound judgment in dealing with contemporary literature were more important than they are to-day. The immeasurably prolific press of the nineteenth century is like a fish-breeding establishment where minnows are born by the million a minute. There are so many books that the mind becomes bewildered. The student who might have the strength of mind to form an intelligent opinion of five books is utterly incapable of doing the same by five thousand. We are all constantly led on to read too many things. It has been again and again remarked that our grandfathers were better educated than their grandsons because they knew thoroughly the few works which came in their way. We have become the victims of over-reading until the modern mind seems in danger of being destroyed by literary gluttony. It is well in dealing with contemporary work to be especially self-exacting in insisting that a book is not to be read once which is not to be read a second time. This may seem to be a rule made merely for the sake of having a proper theory, yet it is to be taken literally and observed exactly. It is true that the temptation is so great to read books which are talked about, that we are all likely to run through a good many things which we know to be really unworthy of a single perusal, and of course to go over them again would be a waste of more time. Where to draw the line between the permanent and the ephemeral is a point which each must settle for himself. If, on the whole, it seem to a man well to pay the price in time and in the risk of forming bad mental habits, it is his right to do this, but pay the price he must and will. * * * * *