In books of entertainment, and especially of fiction, corresponding carefulness is necessary. There are books among the best which are, in various degrees and ways, of evil influence, and should be read with caution and reserve. To yield one's self to the enjoyment of an entertaining book may be as foolish as to give one's self into the hands of an untried agreeable companion. Ability to please is to these incautious subjects of it a most dangerous influence; and books as well as men when most attractive should be treated warily. In Rabelais and Swift, in Fielding and Smollett, coarse manners must be reprobated. In George Eliot's novels, with exceptions, and in 'Jane Eyre,' there is a subtle taint that is unwholesome to the unguarded reader. Thackeray too frequently compels us to associate with evil company; and, while admiring the writer's skill, the reader should keep well outside of almost every group in Thackeray's novels. Distinct alike from the progressive student and the discriminating reader, is an abundant class who, without individuality, and mere omnivorous devotees of books, chiefly reading the lighter literature of the day. These people, through excess and self-indulgence, become feeble-minded, intellectually dissipated, and incapable of serious study. In every rank of life the book-devouring vice abounds; but chiefly among women, girls, and boys; men finding in the newspapers their daily pabulum. This thoughtless, fragmentary, reading has debilitated the contemporary mental fibre of the nation; and has so absorbed the time, we cannot say the attention, of the immense majority of the reading public, that many of them are ignorant even of the existence of the standard works of literature. The late discussion, therefore, about books has been of use; it has made known to the great community of people, who now can read, the fact, that there are certain books, a hundred more or less, far more worth reading than the popular and periodical literature of the day. If this discovery could be impressed upon the public mind with practical effect, the result would be a beneficial change in their condition. The abundant tattle and affected interest about names and things of mean and transient notoriety, and the discursive dinner-table gossip of the world would then perhaps subside; and English conversation would become a constant and a beneficial intellectual enjoyment. FOOTNOTES: [99] Croker's 'Boswell,' pp. 767, 8vo. ed. [100] 'The Choice of Books,' p. 37. [101] Mr Lowell's Address at the dedication of the Free Public Library, Chelsea, Massachusetts. [102] Notes to Bacon's 'Essays.' [103] Mr. Lowel. Art. IX.--1. _Popular Government. Four Essays._ By Sir Henry Sumner Maine. Second Edition. London, 1886. 2. _Democracy in America._ By Alexis de Tocqueville. Translated by Henry Reeve. New Edition. London, 1862.