Chapter V: Part 5

But the taste for books does not come always by nature: it must be cultivated. And everything between covers is not a book; and a taste for books cannot be cultivated in a bookless house. It may be said that there is no Catholic literature, or that it is very expensive to buy books, or that it is difficult to get a small number of the best books, or to be sure that one has the best in a small compass.

None of these things is true—none of them. There is a vast Catholic literature, and a vast literature, not professedly Catholic, which is good and pure, which will stimulate a desire for study, and help to cultivate every quality of the mind and heart. Does anybody realize how many good books twelve or fifteen dollars will buy nowadays? And, after all, there are not fifty really _great_ books in all languages. If one have fifty books, one has the best literature in all languages. A book-shelf thus furnished is a treasure which neither adversity nor fatigue nor sickness itself can take away. Each child may even have his own book-shelf, with his favorites on it, and such volumes as treat of his favorite hobby—for every child old enough should have a hobby, even if it be only the collecting of pebbles, and every chance should be given to enjoy his hobby and to develop it into a serious study. A little fellow who used to range his pebbles on the table in the lamplight, and get such hints as he could about them out of an old text-book, is a great geologist. And a little girl who used to hang over her very own copy of Adelaide Procter’s poems is spoken of as one of the cleverest newspaper men (though she is a woman) in the city of New York. The taste of the early days, encouraged in a humble way, became the talent which was to make their future.

There should be no bookless house in all this land—least of all among Catholics, whose ancestors in Christ preserved all that is great in literature. Let the trashy novels, paper-backed, soiled, borrowed or picked up, be cast out. Let the choosing of books not be left to mere chance. A little brains put into it will be returned with more than its first value. What goes into the precious minds of the young ought not to be carelessly chosen. And it is true that, in the beginning, it is the easiest possible thing to interest young people in good and great books. But if one lets them wallow in whatever printed stuff happens to come in their way, one finds it hard to conduct them back again. Let the books be carefully chosen—a few at a time—be laid within the circle of the evening lamp—and God bless you all!

PRINTED BY BENZIGER BROTHERS, NEW YORK.

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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

1. Silently corrected typographical errors and variations in spelling. 2. Archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings retained as printed. 3. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.