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Confessions of a Book-Lover - E. Walter Walters · Timeless Leo Tolstoy Stories

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  Speaker 1: Introduction to Confessions of a Booklover. This is a LibriVox recording.
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  Speaker 1: All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. More information
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  Speaker 1: or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by
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  Speaker 1: Philip Gould. Confessions of a Book Lover by E. Walter Walters,
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  Speaker 1: introduction by Coulson Kernahan. Part of the present volume appeared
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  Speaker 1: in great thoughts. Yet here am I, whose name is associated,
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  Speaker 1: if at all, in the memory of readers with little
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  Speaker 1: thoughts and with booklets impudent in the slenderness of their matter,
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  Speaker 1: presumptuously standing forth to bow the public into the writer's presence,
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  Speaker 1: and essaying to introduce the one to the other. The
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  Speaker 1: necessary explanation shall be brief. I must have been a
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  Speaker 1: young man, and mister E. Walter Walters a boy when
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  Speaker 1: he and I last met. Indeed, I am not sure
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  Speaker 1: that I altogether remember him, but his father, who bore
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  Speaker 1: an honored name, I well remember, the Reverend W. D.
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  Speaker 1: Walters in my own dear and honored father were personal friends.
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  Speaker 1: And when the former son sent me a manuscript of
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  Speaker 1: a book with the request that I should write an introduction,
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  Speaker 1: how could I do otherwise than acceed and express myself
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  Speaker 1: honored by the invitation that I share all mister Walter's
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  Speaker 1: wholehearted bookish enthusiasm. I may not pretend, for, as R. L.
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  Speaker 1: Stevenson says in an Apology for Idlers, books are good
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  Speaker 1: enough in their own way, but they are a mighty
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  Speaker 1: bloodless substitute for life. So long however, as the reading
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  Speaker 1: of it be not allowed to deprive either man or
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  Speaker 1: woman of drinking deep at the wells of life. There
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  Speaker 1: are few greater joys, for young or old than are
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  Speaker 1: to be found within the covers of a noble book.
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  Speaker 1: And to the enthusiastic book lover, mister Walter's volume should
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  Speaker 1: prove treasure trove. Indeed, he drags, to use a phrase
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  Speaker 1: of Stevenson's, with a wide net, but his castings are made,
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  Speaker 1: for the most part in the same way waters of
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  Speaker 1: the literature of the time of Elizabeth, or even of Anne.
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  Speaker 1: He tells us little. And it is not until we
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  Speaker 1: come to Goldsmith, Lamb de Quincey, lei Hunt, and later
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  Speaker 1: to Jeffreys the Row and Stephenson, that mister Walters may
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  Speaker 1: be said to let himself go what my friend mister
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  Speaker 1: le Gallienne calls the lily putt of literary London. He
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  Speaker 1: wisely leaves severely alone. That mister Walters has a pretty
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  Speaker 1: sense of humor is clear from the following passage. Here
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  Speaker 1: is a copy of Milton's Paradise Lost, hooked in the
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  Speaker 1: deep waters of a penny tub. It is calf bound,
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  Speaker 1: mark you, and in fairish condition, though much stained with
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  Speaker 1: the passing of years. My heart leaps. It is very old,
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  Speaker 1: a first edition possibly, but no, it is anything but
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  Speaker 1: that many of the pages are entirely missing, and others
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  Speaker 1: partially so. Judged by the books that surround me, it
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  Speaker 1: is deer at a penny Paradise lost. The wordplay is
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  Speaker 1: not unworthy of mister Zangwell. But when mister Walters writes,
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  Speaker 1: I have frequently trodden snow covered ground with my nose
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  Speaker 1: a few inches from an open book, I wish him
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  Speaker 1: for the time being good afternoon, and seek other company,
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  Speaker 1: preferably that of some lover of the Emerson who wrote,
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  Speaker 1: See thou bring not to field or stone the fancies
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  Speaker 1: found in books leave author's eyes, and fetch your own
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  Speaker 1: to brave the landscape's looks, Or better still, canst thou
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  Speaker 1: copy in verse one chime of the wood bell's peel
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  Speaker 1: and cry. Write in a book the morning's prime, or
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  Speaker 1: match with words that tender sky. I know a pretty
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  Speaker 1: little edition of the Religio Medici, writes mister Legallien in
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  Speaker 1: his retrospective Reviews, which has been quite spoiled for me
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  Speaker 1: by the astounding remark of its editor upon Brown's beautiful
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  Speaker 1: description of his life as a miracle of thirty years.
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  Speaker 1: Yet its actual incidents justify no such description. Mister Walters
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  Speaker 1: will not thus spoil for his readers the work of
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  Speaker 1: the writers he loves. He strikes no jarring note. On
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  Speaker 1: the contrary, He is capable when writing of books, book making,
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  Speaker 1: and book buying, of an enthusiasm which I envy as
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  Speaker 1: much as I admire. I have confessed. He says in
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  Speaker 1: his chapter on second hand books, that I am of
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  Speaker 1: the company of book lovers who delight in dipping into
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  Speaker 1: the lucky tubs to be found outside bookseller's windows. I
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  Speaker 1: know of no pleasanter way of spending a spare half hour.
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  Speaker 1: Give me a few loose coppers, place my feet upon
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  Speaker 1: a likely road, and I am content. I am now
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  Speaker 1: let me say of the happy company of book fishermen
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  Speaker 1: and this mark you is fishing in real earnest, this
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  Speaker 1: effort to hook good food for the mind to place
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  Speaker 1: in one's basket a book that delighteth and giveth perennial satisfaction.
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  Speaker 1: The comparison of a book seeker to an angler is
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  Speaker 1: as happy as it is original, and the phrase, though
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  Speaker 1: phrase making, must not be confused, as Leslie Stephen points out,
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  Speaker 1: with thought finding, a book fisherman has something of Charles
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  Speaker 1: Lamb's own self pleasing quaintness. Lamb would indeed appear to
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  Speaker 1: be mister Walter's favorite author. That he knows his elia
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  Speaker 1: intimately and can interpret him a right to others is
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  Speaker 1: clear from the chapter on Books and Gardens. We are told,
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  Speaker 1: said mister Walters, that Lamb was a lover of towns
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  Speaker 1: and crowded streets. Would it not be truer to say
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  Speaker 1: that he was a lover of the conditions in which
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  Speaker 1: he chanced to be placed. London claimed him for the
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  Speaker 1: sanest reasons, no doubt, and low under his pen, London
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  Speaker 1: became a garden. This is truly, and finally said of
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  Speaker 1: such acute and illuminative comment. There is no lack in
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  Speaker 1: mister Walter's delightful book, which should assuredly find a place
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  Speaker 1: in the life bury of book loving women and men.
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  Speaker 1: End of introduction recording by Philip Gould, Chapter one of
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  Speaker 1: Confessions of a Book Lover by E. Walter Walters. This
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  Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Philip Gould,
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  Speaker 1: Chapter one, Humbly to confess, how ruthlessly Webster strips the
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  Speaker 1: word confession of the tender associations woven arounded by the
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  Speaker 1: hand of the gentle essayist. A confession, he informs us,
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  Speaker 1: is the acknowledgment of a crime or fault, open declaration
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  Speaker 1: of guilt, et cetera. True a brighter note is struck
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  Speaker 1: in further definitions, but I cannot find in any book
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  Speaker 1: at my command a definition of the word is used,
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  Speaker 1: for example, by Thomas de Quincy. The fact that de
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  Speaker 1: Quincey took opium was, I believe, known long before he
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  Speaker 1: wrote his confessions. He personally avers that his object was
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  Speaker 1: to emblazon the power of opium, not over bodily disease
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  Speaker 1: and pain, but over the grander and more shadowy world
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  Speaker 1: of dreams. He desired, umbly to confess a penitential loneliness,
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  Speaker 1: and I take that to mean that he desired to
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  Speaker 1: admit us into the innermost recesses of his heart, to
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  Speaker 1: speak to us as one speaks to a bosom friend.
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  Speaker 1: I plead, therefore, for a wider definition of the word confession,
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  Speaker 1: a definition that embraces those gentle whisperings which pass between
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  Speaker 1: bosom friends, the confidence that springs from the very roots
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  Speaker 1: of the human heart. An eminent essayist of our own
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  Speaker 1: day has been pleading for more autobiographies of unknown persons.
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  Speaker 1: If I read him aright, he wishes that more persons,
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  Speaker 1: however humble, however obscure, would set forth their thoughts and experiences.
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  Speaker 1: He believes that such writings would make better reading than
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  Speaker 1: much that finds its way into print. There is an
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  Speaker 1: idea in some quarters that unless a person enjoys peculiar
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  Speaker 1: gifts of expression, or has achieved distinction in some walk
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  Speaker 1: of life, his thoughts and experiences are of no public interest.
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  Speaker 1: But there are I am certain, many who would rather
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  Speaker 1: have the unadorned expression of a man's innermost feelings than
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  Speaker 1: the thoughts that flit so lightly from the mind of
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  Speaker 1: the accomplished literature. How many are they? Men whose names
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  Speaker 1: are emblazoned upon the role of honor, who have confessed
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  Speaker 1: to a love for conversing with the ordinary man, the
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  Speaker 1: man in the street. As for your men of letters,
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  Speaker 1: you are well aware of their love for conversing with
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  Speaker 1: unknown and frequently humble persons, casual acquaintances. And who shall
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  Speaker 1: say to what extent we are indebted to those persons
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  Speaker 1: for the thoughts, which, having been selected and refined, sparkle
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  Speaker 1: like jewels fresh from the cutter's hands. How numerous are
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  Speaker 1: the men who have read widely and thought deeply, and
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  Speaker 1: yet hesitate before expressing an opinion upon the most trivial matters.
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  Speaker 1: Fortunate is the person who can induce such men to
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  Speaker 1: talk freely, to express their views, their secret thoughts on this,
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  Speaker 1: that and the other subject, their beloved books, their likes,
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  Speaker 1: their dislikes, their aspirations, their fears, their hopes. Such confessions
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  Speaker 1: should make good reading. By din of a little gentle persuasion,
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  Speaker 1: I have managed to glean copy of this description, which
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  Speaker 1: I shall hope to set down in these pages, carefully
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  Speaker 1: avoiding meanwhile any mention of names. The mere thought of
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  Speaker 1: publicity would bring a blush to the cheeks of the
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  Speaker 1: good gentleman. I have in mind, I must adopt the
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  Speaker 1: plan of those knights of the pen of whom mention
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  Speaker 1: has been made. But here the process will be reversed.
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  Speaker 1: Here the rich thought of others will come forth in
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  Speaker 1: homely attire. I would, however, first inquire in what respect
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  Speaker 1: the lover of books differs from the rank and file.
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  Speaker 1: What are his distinctive characteristics? Langford has declared that, no
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  Speaker 1: matter what his rancor position may be, the lover of
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  Speaker 1: books is the richest and happiest of men. But is
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  Speaker 1: that entirely true? I confess that I do not find
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  Speaker 1: it so. The lover of books is I fancy, grievously
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  Speaker 1: prone to hanker after the moon, or, to put it
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  Speaker 1: another way, to build wondrous fairy palaces which he would
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  Speaker 1: fain inhabit, and cannot I fancy he is apt to
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  Speaker 1: suffer from a glorious discontent. He is too imaginative, too
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  Speaker 1: sensitive to enjoy the distinction of being the happiest of men. Indeed,
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  Speaker 1: is it not a fact that we book lovers stand
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  Speaker 1: in danger of falling out of sympathy with this rough
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  Speaker 1: and tumble old world. Certainly many of us resent anything
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  Speaker 1: that threatens to come between us and our idols. I
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  Speaker 1: have friends book lovers who is strongly resent an intrusion
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  Speaker 1: into the sacred nook that holds themselves in a book,
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  Speaker 1: as they would resent the invasion of a foreign power.
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  Speaker 1: Thus grows upon the book lover in ever deepening desire
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  Speaker 1: for solitude, for the quiet life. Others may, if they
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  Speaker 1: choose jostle for the gilded things of life. He is
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  Speaker 1: for other prizes, treasures of the mind and spirit. He,
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  Speaker 1: for his part, prefers to saunter through quiet byways, knowing
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  Speaker 1: full well that prizes will rest in his path, and
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  Speaker 1: that these which he need but stoop to gather will
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  Speaker 1: prove abiding treasures. Yes, certainly the lover of books is rich.
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  Speaker 1: Every true lover must, in the nature of the case
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  Speaker 1: be that listen to Gibbon, my early and invincible love
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  Speaker 1: of reading. I would not change for the treasures of India.
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  Speaker 1: How many have spoken in like manner you O, books
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  Speaker 1: cried Ongarville are the golden vessels of the temple, the
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  Speaker 1: arms of the clerical militia with which missiles of the
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  Speaker 1: most wicked are destroyed, Fruitful olives, vines of ingeddi fig
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  Speaker 1: trees knowing no sterility, burning lamps to be ever held
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  Speaker 1: in hand. I have a friend, a book lover, who
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  Speaker 1: confesses that he acquired this love of his after having
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  Speaker 1: passed through the most painful experiences. Often he stumbled. Often
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  Speaker 1: he fell, seemingly never to rise again. But happily he
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  Speaker 1: has reached safe ground at last. He is now the
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  Speaker 1: contented owner of a rich storehouse of books. But he
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  Speaker 1: confesses that he is not boisterously happy. He doubts not
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  Speaker 1: that others laugh more heartily than he, that many have
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  Speaker 1: lighter hearts. But he, be it remembered, has passed through
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  Speaker 1: deep sorrow, has lost friends, home, wealth, all that men
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  Speaker 1: hold most dear. Without his books and all that they
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  Speaker 1: have taught him, his lot would be that of a
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  Speaker 1: wanderer in a wilderness. My books, he says, are my
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  Speaker 1: inseparable comforters, my friends, companions, teachers, consolers, creators, amusers. But
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  Speaker 1: he makes no claim to being a student or an
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  Speaker 1: authority on books. He does not burn the proverbial midnight oil.
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  Speaker 1: There is nothing of the bookworm about him. He is
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  Speaker 1: simply a book lover, and being such, enjoys the very
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  Speaker 1: best that books can give. I confess that I envy
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  Speaker 1: the pleasure derived by this friend of mine, from the
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  Speaker 1: little crackling sound caused by the opening of a new book.
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  Speaker 1: It is the sweetest music in his ears, an overture
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  Speaker 1: composed of the most pleasing notes. And with what relish
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  Speaker 1: he enters into the entertainment that follows, with what zest
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  Speaker 1: he reads aloud the choice passages. The four walls of
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  Speaker 1: his library must, I fancy have peculiar knowledge of the
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  Speaker 1: dainties that are bred in books. They are his only audience.
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  Speaker 1: When friends are with him, it is they who must
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  Speaker 1: do the reading, whilst he plays the better part. How
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  Speaker 1: many a tale such as this might be told? How
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  Speaker 1: full of eccentricities is the lover of books? Ay, and
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  Speaker 1: how full too of whims and fads and fancies. Each
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  Speaker 1: one is for a particular type of binding, in though
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  Speaker 1: two cases can you find taste exactly alike. One is
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  Speaker 1: for plain cloth plainly lettered, another is for calf or Russia,
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  Speaker 1: another for parchment. And each one has his own views
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  Speaker 1: as regard size. Some cry out for books that can
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  Speaker 1: be handled with ease. Others maintain that the size of
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  Speaker 1: a book should suit the nature of its contents. And
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  Speaker 1: thus the battle wages quite a long and wordy affair
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  Speaker 1: before any question arises as regards the actual contents of
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  Speaker 1: a book. But are not these views concerning the make
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  Speaker 1: up of a book healthy and desirable? I seem to
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  Speaker 1: remember having read of men held in high repute who
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  Speaker 1: had marked preferences as regards the get up of a book.
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  Speaker 1: Did not Charles Lamb maintain that to be strong backed
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: and neat bound is the desideratum of vall. Magnificence comes
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  Speaker 1: after this, when it can be afforded. Is not lavished
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  Speaker 1: upon all kinds of books indiscriminately. I would not dress
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  Speaker 1: a set of magazines, for instance, in full suit. The
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  Speaker 1: deshabille or half binding with Russia backs is our costume
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  Speaker 1: a Shakespeare or a Milton, unless the first editions it
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  Speaker 1: were mere foppery to trick out in gay apparel. And
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  Speaker 1: what of the inside of books? What of their contents?
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  Speaker 1: For my own part, I confess that, when pressed for
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  Speaker 1: a list of my favorite authors, I am at a
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  Speaker 1: loss for an answer, or at least for a satisfactory answer.
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  Speaker 1: The question is so pointed, the answer resting quietly in
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  Speaker 1: my mind, so wide, so shadowy, so needful of explanation.
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  Speaker 1: So much depends upon one's mood and environment. I require
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  Speaker 1: the opportunity to say why certain books appeal to me
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  Speaker 1: in certain moods and leave me untouched at other times.
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  Speaker 1: I desire to show that certain books, in order to
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  Speaker 1: be enjoyed to the full, must be read in certain
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  Speaker 1: seasons and under certain conditions. I wish to hold forth
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  Speaker 1: upon say books and gardens, unknown books, and so forth,
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  Speaker 1: and on the peculiarities of certain authors, giving reasons why
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  Speaker 1: I like or dislike their works. I wish to confess
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  Speaker 1: to bear my heart, and that is too lengthy a
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  Speaker 1: process to cram in a direct answer to a direct question.
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  Speaker 1: Only this much can I confess offhand. The books that
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  Speaker 1: please me most are the books that speak to the heart.
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  Speaker 1: Such volumes are my most highly treasured possessions. End of
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  Speaker 1: chapter one recording by Philip Gould, Chapter two of Confessions
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  Speaker 1: of a Book Lover by E. Walter Walters. This LibriVox
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  Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain. Recording by Philip Gould.
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  Speaker 1: Books and Gardens. The mind relaxing into needful sport should
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  Speaker 1: turn to writers of an abler sort, whose wit well
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  Speaker 1: managed and whose classic style give truth a luster and
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  Speaker 1: make wisdom smile. Cowper. I have confessed that the books
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  Speaker 1: which please me most are the books that speak to
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  Speaker 1: the heart, books that greet one with the ease and
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  Speaker 1: familiarity of a friend. I desire to feel the humanity
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  Speaker 1: the heart of an author. I desire to know that
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  Speaker 1: he is genial, kindly, well disposed. I have no inclination
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  Speaker 1: for angry, fretful men of letters. I no more desire
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  Speaker 1: to meet such through the medium of a book than
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: I desire to make the acquaintance of quarrelsome individuals in
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  Speaker 1: the flesh. I too, find myself facing as stoutly as
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  Speaker 1: I can, a hard, combative existence, full of doubts, difficulties,
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  Speaker 1: and disappointments. Quite a hard enough life without dark countenances
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  Speaker 1: at my elbow. Give me pleasant company, Give me gentlemen
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  Speaker 1: of letters. Still, I have no taste for the company
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  Speaker 1: of the maudlin or weak need. Robert Louis Stevenson says
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  Speaker 1: that we are all for tootling on the sentimental flute
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  Speaker 1: in literature, and not a man amongst us will go
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  Speaker 1: to the head of the march to sound the heady drums.
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  Speaker 1: Note with what grace he makes the observation, it is
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  Speaker 1: more in the nature of a good tempered laugh than
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  Speaker 1: a growl. How gracefully he wears the title a gentleman
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  Speaker 1: of letters, How pleasantly he addresses us. Little wonder if
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  Speaker 1: in his presence our failings are as open wounds, he
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  Speaker 1: has no need to probe. His gentlest touch is sufficient
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  Speaker 1: more effective by far than the rough treatment of the
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  Speaker 1: irascible author. Yes, for friends, give me, gracious authors, give
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  Speaker 1: me the gentle elia, Give me Jeffreys, go Old, Smith, Leigh, Hunt,
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  Speaker 1: and de Quincy. These are the writers I would take
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  Speaker 1: into a garden on a summer's afternoon. I need have
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  Speaker 1: no fear whilst in such company of the flowers being
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  Speaker 1: robbed of their fragrance. The song of the birds will
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  Speaker 1: not be silenced. The gentle whisperings of the trees will
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  Speaker 1: still be audible. The writers in mind are of the
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  Speaker 1: company who claim kinship with nature. Whilst with them I
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  Speaker 1: may read and yet meditate, I may learn, and yet
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  Speaker 1: hear and feel. Where is the nature lover who will
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  Speaker 1: not readily confess that, when in a flowering garden he
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  Speaker 1: is frequently torn between his devotion to the book in
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  Speaker 1: his hand and the beauties that surround him. I confess
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  Speaker 1: that I, for one, like to mix the dainties that
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  Speaker 1: are bred in books with the wondrous attractions of nature.
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  Speaker 1: I am ready enough to take my favorite authors into
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  Speaker 1: a garden, but not so ready to give them my
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  Speaker 1: undivided attention. Another book, which must forever remain unrivaled, claims
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  Speaker 1: my eyes my attention. Richard Jeffreys is pleasing, but not
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  Speaker 1: so pleasing as the beauties to be found in a garden.
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  Speaker 1: Goldsmith brings a warm glow, but see the sun shines
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  Speaker 1: in the heavens. Lamb puts me in a playful vein,
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  Speaker 1: but his tune is not so gay as the song
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  Speaker 1: of the birds in yonder bushes. The light touch of
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  Speaker 1: Lee Hunt is delightful, but not so pleasing as the
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: quickly shifting lights upon the tree tops. But it is
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: good to have old friends at one's elbow. And if
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: I am able to enjoy myself without them on a
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: summer's afternoon, it is because they, on some winter's evening,
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: have opened my eyes and quickened my senses. It is they,
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: I say, who have taught me to love the beauties
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: of nature. I am familiar with their golden passages, And
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: whilst seated beneath the trees, can recall them at my pleasure,
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: or should the mood arise, read them again and yet again.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: How good, for example, to read such a passage as this.
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: There is something beyond the philosophers in the light, in
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: the grass blades, the leaf, the grasshopper, the sparrow on
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: the wall. Some day the great and beautiful thought which
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: hovers on the confines of the mind. Will it last
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: alight in that is hope? The whole sky is full
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: of abounding hope. Still, one does not always experience a
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: sense of loss when reading in the open. Far from it.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: The heavens are not always blue and prate as we
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: will about the subtle beauty of gray skies and leafless trees,
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: we are at times willing enough to escape from them. I,
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: for one, am glad under such conditions to warm myself
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: by the light of a printed page. Happily, I am
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: of the company of men who can walk and read,
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: and have frequently trodden snow covered ground with my nose
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: a few inches from an open book. Believe me, he
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: who can read whilst walking has a long pull over
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: the book lover who must needs have quietude and a
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: bended knee upon which to nurse his beloved books. There
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: is a worthy and distinguished company of book lovers to
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: whom reading whilst a foot is not only uncongenial, but impossible.
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: I seem to remember a passage in which that great
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: book lover, Charles Lamb speaks of his inability to enjoy
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: a book whilst out of doors. These I find are
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: the words in mind. I am not much a friend
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: to out of doors reading. I cannot settle my spirits
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: to it. I knew a Unitarian minister who was generally
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: to be seen upon snow Hill as yet Skinner Street,
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: was not between the hours of ten and eleven in
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: the morning studying a volume of Lardner. I own this
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: to have been a strain of abstraction beyond my reach.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: I used to admire how he sidled along, keeping clear
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: of secular contacts, and a literate encounter with a porter's
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: nott or a bread basket would have quickly put to
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: flight all the philosophy I am master of, and have
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: left me worse than indifferent to the five points. Thus
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: the gentle Elia playfully dismissed the person who is pleased
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: to boast of his ability to read whilst walking was
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: there ever a writer so fastidious, yet so tolerant, So
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: playful is he? Speaking of the conditions under which certain
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: books should be read, he says much depends upon when
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: and where you read a book in the five or
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: six impatient minutes before the dinner is quite ready. Who
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: would think of taking up the Fairy Queen for a
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: stop gap, or a volume of Bishop Andrew's sermons. Milton
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: almost requires a solemn service of music before you enter
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: upon him. Winter evenings and the world shut out with
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: less of ceremony. The gentle Shakespeare enters at such seasons
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: the tempest or his own Winter's Tale. Books of quick
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: at interests that hurry on for incidents are for the
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: eye to glide over only. I wish it was possible
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: to add a few words from the same whimsical pen
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: upon reading in a garden on a summer's afternoon. I
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: have a friend who is disposed to think that such
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: writing would contain little about books and much about nature.
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: We are told that Lamb was a lover of towns
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: and crowded streets. Would it not be truer to say
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: that he was a lover of the conditions in which
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: he chanced to be placed. London claimed him for the
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: sanest reasons, no doubt, and lo under his pen, London
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: became a garden. It is well that some brave souls
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: can make believe that the noise of the traffic of
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: a London thoroughfare makes good music. It is well that
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: some have the spirit to sound the heady drums. But
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: for my own part, give me a garden removed from
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: the turmoil of a big town. I shall not then
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: be over particular as regards my reading. Let me drop
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: in my breast pocket of volume by one of the
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: authors named, and I shall be content. I too, shall
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: then be able to say it matters nothing to me
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: that the Earth and the Solar System are whirling through
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: space at the rate of sixty miles a second from
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: No one knows where to, no one knows whither. If
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: I may sit in my garden with a book for
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: company on a summer's afternoon, end of chapter two recording
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: by Philip Gould, Chapter three of Confessions of a Book
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: Lover by E. Walter Walters. This LibriVox recording is in
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: the public domain. Recording by Philip Gould, Chapter three, Books
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: that tempt Some books are to be tasted, others to
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested bacon.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: What are the books that tempt? Are they the old
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: familiar volumes, old friends in old clothes, well worn editions
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: of the classics? Or are they those same old friends
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: decked in rich and fanciful bindings. I am acquainted with
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: a book lover who confesses that he has no taste
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: for the fanciful modern reprint. You may show him Lamb
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: or Hazlet, or Hunt, or Jeffreys or Stevenson in the
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: richest of binding, and tempt him not. He is not.
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: He declares to be caught that way. As well might
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: the reader go arrayed in frills and furbelows to a
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: masculine friend and expect to be received with decorum. This
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: friend of mine, I say, is as contemptuous of the modern,
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: richly bound classic as of any other form of foppery.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: He insists on meeting his friends, whether it be in
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: print or in the flesh, in unaffected, homely attire. He
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: will tell you that the gentle Elia was of the
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: same way of thinking, and that he wrote, in effect,
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: how beautiful to a general lover of reading? Or the
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: sullied leaves and worn out of appearance, nay the very
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: odor beyond Russia. If we would not forget the kind
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: feeling and fastidiousness of old circulating library volumes. How they
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: speak of the thousand thumbs that have turned over their
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: pages with delight of the lone seamstress, whom they cheered
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: milliner or hard working mantua maker, after her long day's
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: needle toil, running far into midnight, when she has snatched
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: an hour ill spared from sleep, to steep her cares
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: as in some lathian cup and spelling out their enchanted contents.
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: Who would have them a whit less soiled What better
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: condition could you desire to see them in? Fastidious readers
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: who insist upon having new books or books good as new,
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: must I fancy feel a twinge of guilt in the
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: face of such humane sentiments. I confess to my shame
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: that I am of the guilty company, that I am
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: fastidious as regards the condition of a book, that torn,
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: well thumbed books do not tempt me, whatever their contents.
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: And not only am I guilty, but would seek to
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: defend my guilt. I protest that it is the pleasurable
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: duty of the book lover to keep his treasured volumes
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: in goodly condition, That a cover is but a new home,
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: and that when the old one has served its purpose,
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: it should be replaced as readily as one would find
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: a worthy dwelling place for a beloved relative. I like
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: to see my friends in the best possible circumstances. I
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: like to see them bearing a well cared for, well
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: favored appearance. I do not forget the lone seamstress spoken
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: of so tenderly by Lamb. I would have torn volumes
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: repaired and shabby ones replaced in all circulating libraries. In
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: those circumstances would I permit a treasured classic to go
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: forth in a shabby condition. I would place new volumes
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: or volumes good as new, within the reach of all.
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: But it cannot be denied that many tender associations are
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: woven around numerous aged, well preserved volumes. Where is the
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: true book lover who could not give a list of
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: such their very odor? He will tell you is beyond Russia.
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: How sacred their well preserved pages, Your up to date
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: reprints with their fanciful covers, or no company for such
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: their gaiety is shamed by stately calf bound volumes. Yes,
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: there is a grave and sober dignity about old, well
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: preserved books. It matters not whether they be bound in Morocco,
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: calf or Russia. The sacred associations of old age are theirs.
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: If we do not love them, at least we reverence them.
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: What a place to be in is an old library.
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: It seems as though all the souls of the bab
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: Layans were reposing here, as in some dormitory or middle state.
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: I seem to inhale, learning walking amid their foliage, and
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: the odor of the old moths scented coverings is fragman
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: is the first bloom of those sciential apples which grow
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: amid the happy orchard. Yes, to many, the old mouth
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: scented volumes are the books that tempt. I have a
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: friend who has placed a standing order with a bookseller
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: to supply him with all old calf bound volumes, to
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: be procured at a certain sum. Dare I state the
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: sum fixed? It is counted in pence pence only mark you.
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: But as my friend has made no stipulations as regards
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: the contents of the desired volumes, he has a goodly
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: array of books each one mouth scented, each one a
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: model of dignity. My friend, however, is not a great reader.
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: He is not, I venture to assert, a book lover.
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: I fancy he should be called an antiquarian. Certainly, his
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: liking for antiquities is greater than his love for the
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: contents of books. Books, to him are rather furniture for
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: rooms than for mines. Show him an exact sample of
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: skillfully tooled calf, and you will please him better than
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: if you had voiced an inspiring thought. But wait, I
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: must hold my pen. Who can say to what depths
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: of thought and feeling? My friend is moved by the
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: side of his well filled shelves. Has it not been
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: said that there is inspiration in a mere glance at
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: old volumes, that they seem to exhale learning. Still, I,
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: from one am ready enough to confess that old calf
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: bound volumes as such leave me unmoved. Too often have I,
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: together with other lovers of books, found them dry as
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: well as dusty. I respect their age, I consider the
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: mellowed calf in which they are bound admirable material. I
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: admire their durability. But such features do not greatly tempt me.
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: I am for volumes of homely appearance, my own coat
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: being of simple homespun, I am more at home with
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: volumes bound in cloth. Give me for my daily companion's
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: unpretentious books men in my possession, costs no more than
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: from two to three pence. For I too, am of
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: the company of book lovers who dip at times into
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: the lucky tubs to be found outside bookseller shops. I
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: confess moreover that I belong to the class of street reader, who,
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: not having the wherewithal to buy or hire a book,
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: felt a little learning at the open stalls. Often and
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: often have I been tempted by the well worn volumes,
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: so unpretentious, without, so rich within that await the attention
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: of the leisurely passer by two humble pens, and a
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: mine of wisdom becomes one's own. So much then for
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: old volumes. Now, what of the new? What of the
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: many dainty volumes sent out daily by modern makers of books?
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: I am thinking at the moment of the men whose
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: business it is to bind in print, who with amazing
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: ingenuity send forth volumes having the appearance of jeweled caskets,
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: wondrous designs of every tent to be found on a
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: painter's palate. I confess that I find such productions exceedingly attractive.
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: I confess that I am frequently tempted by them. It
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: would be good I feel to be the possessor of
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: a volume of selected English essays, bound in leather soft
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: as velvet. I am more fanciful in my taste than
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: that friend of mine who insists upon seeing his old
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: comrades in well worn attire. I like to see Charles
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: Lambs strutting forth in purple and gold. I am touched
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: when I behold the great men who reign in the
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: world of the Classics, standing shoulder to shoulder, arrayed in
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: gorgeous confections, upon a shelf in a bookseller's window. But
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: I have no desire to possess the large and weighty
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: volume that falls under the title addition to Luxe. I
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: am not tempted by bulky volumes, however elaborately they may
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: be adorned. I have no desire to undergo the painful
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: experience of a certain gentleman pictured in Punch, who, after
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: making valiant efforts to handle one such volume, was finally
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: reduced to an abject state of exhaustion. Give me volumes
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: of convenient size. Give me I pray volumes I can master.
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: End of chapter three recording by Philip Gould. Chapter four
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: of Confessions of a Book Lover by E. Walter Walters.
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: Philip Gould, Chapter four outside their books. The first time
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: I read an excellent book, it is to me just
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: as if I had gained a new friend Goldsmith. I
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: have confessed that I like to feel the heart the
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: humanity of an author. How natural, then if I desire
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: to know something about his home life, his family, his
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: manner of living, his favorite means of recreation. Surely such
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: curiosity is free from censure of what stuff are the
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: fine gentleman made who tell us that we have no
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: business with the private affairs of our great writers. Does
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: not our curiosity spring from respect, from admiration, from love?
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: Am I to be blamed if I desired to know
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: how the affairs of this world went with the writer
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: who has charmed and instructed me, who has led me
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: into new worlds of thought and feeling. If I have
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: learned to love an author through his books, may I
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: not be permitted to ask whether he was happily situated.
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: We speak glibly enough of the friendship of books, and
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: what pray does that mean? But the friendship of authors
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: I have still to learn that it is no part
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: of a man's duty to take an interest in the
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: home life of his friends. We are not all hero worshipers,
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: says Alexander Smith, but most of us are so. To
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: a large extent, A large proportion of mankind feel a
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: quite peculiar interest in famous writers. Concerning such men, no
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: bit of information is too trifling. Everything helps to make
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: out the mental image we have dimly formed for ourselves.
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: And this kind of interest is heightened by the artistic
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: way in which time occasionally groups them. We think of
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: the wild geniuses who came up from the universities to
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: London in the dawn of the English drama. Green Nash,
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: Marlowe are professional men of letters. How they cracked their
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: satirical whips. How pinched they were at times, How when
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: they possessed money they flung it from them as if
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: it was poison. With what fierce speed they wrote, How
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: they shook the stage. Wherefore, I say, let the fine
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: gentlemen who boast of their superiority to the so called
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: trivialities of life. Go their way whilst I go mine.
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: Let them still upon their lofty pedestals, whilst I inquire
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: how my favorite authors lived, how they spent their days,
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: how they divided their time, how many hours were given
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: to work, and how many to recreation. I have no
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: fear that such knowledge will lessen my admiration for my heroes.
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: I look up, it is true, with feelings akin to
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: awe at the great men who have influenced me. But
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: I desire at times to have a clearer view. I
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: like to walk round and about them, to peer through
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: the brilliant globe by which they are surrounded, to see
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: the men, to feel their humanity, to learn how they
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: met the common daily round. And I confess that it
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: matters little to me how I glean the desired information.
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: But for preference, give me the records of a trained observer.
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: For how much better to see with the eyes of
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: one whose vision is clear, keen and penetrating. How good,
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: for instance, to accompany Alexander Smith on a visit to
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: the mermaid in session, and there be hold the great
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: Shakespeare's bland oval face, the light of a smile spread
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: over it, and Ben Jonson's truculent image, and Beaumont and
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: Fletcher sitting together in their beautiful friendship. And how good
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: to think that we may go in the company of
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: the same gracious guide to the famous Literary Club, and
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: there find Burke and Johnson, and Garrick and Goldsmith. The
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: doctor has been talking there for a hundred years, and
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: there will talk for many a hundred more. And then,
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: so highly are we favored, we may go, And who
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: would not to Charles Lamb's snug little room in inner
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: Temple Lane, And there find the hush of a wist
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: table in one corner, the hosts stuttering puns as he
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: deals the cards, and sitting about Hunt, whose every sentence
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: is flavored with the hawthorn and the primrose, and Hazlitt,
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: maddened by Waterloo and Saint Helena, and Goodwin with his
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: wild theories, and Kimball with his Roman look. And before
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: the morning comes, and Lamb stutters yet more thickly, for
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: there is a slight flavor of punch in the apartment.
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: What talk there has been of Hogarth's Prince, of Isaac Walton,
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: of the old dramatists, of Sir Thomas Brown's urn burial,
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: with Elia's quaint humor breaking through every interstice and flowing
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: in every fissure and cranny of the conversation. Ah. Yes,
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: it is good to have such glimpses as these, to
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: find the authors who have charmed and instructed us, free
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: from the fetters of the pen, their own good or bad, sweeter, petulant,
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: always brilliant selves. And how true it is that such
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: glimpses lend peculiar interest to written words. The booklovers who
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: like to feel the humanity of an author must surely
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: form a vast and ever increasing company. You know how
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: it fares with the superior individual who bears himself as
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: though unmoved by feelings common to the average mortal. He
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: does not inspire friendship or admiration, or for that matter,
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: any feeling worth the having. Knowing the frailty of human nature,
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: we suspect him of playing a double part. And so
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: it is surely with the author who addresses us in
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: the manner of one who is a stranger to the
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: feelings that mold this mortal clay. We know better. We
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: know full well that the writer is not continually dwelling
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: amongst the roses and lilies of life. He is not
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: continually uttering generous sentiments and saying fine things on him
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: as on his brethren. The world presses with prosaic needs.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: He has to make love and marry, and run the
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: usual matrimonial risks. The income tax collector visits him as
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: well as others around his head at Christmas drives a
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: snowstorm of bills. Outside of his books. He is pretty
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: much the same as other men. And so I say,
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: we have greater sympathy with an author if he takes
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: us into his confidence, allows us to bear a part
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: of his burdens, to feel that he too is subject
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: to human trials and difficulties. It is interesting to note
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: that authors themselves are of the same way of thinking.
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: They too, like to get at the hearts of men.
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: Speaking of a visit paid to Coleridge at Highgate, Emerson
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: complained that he was in his company for about an hour,
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: but found it impossible to recall the largest part of
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: his discourse, which was often, like so many printed paragraphs
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: in his books, perhaps the same. So readily did the
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: great Coleridge fall into certain commonplaces. The visit was rather
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: ReSpectacle than a conversation, And so you see, we who
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: desire at times to meet authors outside their books are
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: in good company. And if we are not so fortunate
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: as to play Boswell's part, if we cannot sit at
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: the feet of our heroes, if we cannot mourn or
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: make merry in their company, we can at least approach
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: them through the medium of a printed page. And that
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: I hold, is as good a way as any other,
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: if not the best, few of the books so deep
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: in human interest as biographies of men of letters. This,
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: it is said, arises from the pictures of comparative defeat,
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: which in almost every instance such books contain. We see failure,
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: more or less, seldom clear victorious effort. Like the old
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: guard at Waterloo. They are fighting bravely on a lost field.
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: In literary biography, there is always an element of tragedy,
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: and the love we bear the dead is mingled with pity.
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: End of chapter four recording by Philip Gould. Chapter five
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: of Confessions of a Book Lover by E. Walter Walters.
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: Philip Gould, Chapter five. Books that captivate, if thought unlock
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: her mysteries, if friendship on me, smile I walk in
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: marble galleries, I talk with kings the while Emerson. The
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: world of books is full of friendly voices. Where is
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: the book lover who has not, at times felt like
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: a sulky guest and genial, well disposed company. Many authors
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: who await our attentions have no other desire than to entertain,
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: to please, to delight. All authors are not preachers. I confess, however,
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: that for my part I like to be preached at.
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: But my preacher must be of the gentle, captivating type,
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: one who employs the beckoning finger. I am willing enough
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: to be led, but immediately adopt a proverbial stubbornness at
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: the touch of a rod. This reminds me of a
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: certain book lover who declares that he is only influenced
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: by authors who preach from his own pulpit. That is
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: his way of saying that the authors who captivate him
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: are the authors who touch a responsive chord in his nature,
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: who view affairs from his standpoint. How greatly tastes differ.
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: I know of many persons book lovers of a kind
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: who must have what they are pleased to call original books.
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: But where I ask or such books to be found?
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: Is it not true that there is no such thing
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: as original thought? A writer expresses his views with regard
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: to this, that, or the other subject, only to find
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: that the same observations have been made before, or were
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: made at the same moment by some other person in
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: some other quarter of the globe. Ideas march along in
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: extended order. They are not isolated discoveries made by specially
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: brilliant individuals. Their influence is in the air. It is
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: felt by numbers of thinkers at the same time. Often
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: it is by no means the greatest of them who
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: first announces that he has felt it. Thus we come
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: to see that style is the immortal thing in literature.
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: The style that echoes a charming personality is ever fresh.
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: Who can deny that many an author has earned popularity
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: by expressing in a winsome manner thoughts that are common
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: to every thinking mind. I confess that I, as in
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: the case of many others, am not so anxious to
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: come across fresh and startling views as I am to
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: find writers who bring fresh light to bear upon the
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: old problems. I would rather dwell upon the descriptive passages
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: quoted elsewhere in these pages than keep company with a
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: mental acrobat. Too often one finds that the so termed
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: original author is a mere trickster who does not hesitate
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: to employ any means that promise to produce a startling effect.
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: I am of the same opinion as the book lover
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: who declares that any merry andrew can blow down the
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: wrong end of a trumpet. But it does not follow
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: that the style that captivates me will captivate my neighbor.
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: I am for a mellow style in letters, for delicate phrasing,
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: the polite manner. My neighbor may prefer the style that
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: has a sting in it. I am acquainted with a
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: book lover who confesses that he has no objection to
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: being driven by an author. He likes to feel that
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: an author has a firm hand upon the reins, and
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: will use a whip if the need arises. Gentle conciliatory
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: authors bore this friend of mine. Others are for whimsical authors.
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: Others again are for writers who play with their reader's emotions,
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: now drawing forth tears, now causing laughter a few or
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: for grave and solemn teachers. Many are for the authors
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: whose only ambition is to entertain. There is no limit
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: to the world's requirements. But happily, of the making of
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: books there is no end. We need have no fear
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: of the supply running short, or of our own peculiar
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: needs going unsupplied. Books, says Langford, are always with us,
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: and always ready to respond to our wants. As you
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: grow ready for it, adds another. Somehow or other you
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: will find what is needful for you in a book.
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: A wise man will select his book with the utmost care.
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: He will not wish to class them all under the
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: sacred name of friends. For my own part, I confess
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: that I like to turn at times to authors of
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: umbler sorts. I like to dip into the volumes which
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: booksellers label remainders. How frequently one finds in such books
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: the very features that captivate, the style and matter that
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: immediately touch a responsive court in one's temperament. Many a
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: book labeled remainder deserves our warmest gratitude. Learning, says Fuller,
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: has gained most by those books by which the printers
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: have lost. But it must not be supposed that I
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: crave for new books. I beg leave to be of
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: the same opinion as Lowell, who says in his fables
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: for critics, reading new books is like eating new bread.
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: One can bear it at first, but by gradual steps
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: he is brought to death's door of a mental dyspepsi.
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: The truth is, no hard and fast rule can be
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: set down with regard to the books that captivate. But
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: it is I fancy pretty safe to affirm that the
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: books that please us most are the books that reflect
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: our own thoughts and feelings. There has been a run
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: of late upon authors who are wise enough to recognize
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: that the majority of persons are more or less simple
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: and unaffected at heart, nursing their pet aspiration as a
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: child nurses a beloved toy. For my own part, I
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: desire to retain a certain youthfulness of heart and mind.
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: I am therefore willing enough to confess that the books
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: that captivated me in early life are the books that
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: captivate me. Still, we grown ups make a brave outward show,
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: but at the back of it there is still the
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: old craving for a friendly hand, a kindly word, a
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: sympathetic friend. And when it comes to the question of fiction,
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: I confess that my own liking is for books that
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: introduce pleasing characters, I have no desire to meet again
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: in novels the type of individual who glares at me
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: from the police columns of the daily press. Murderers, thieves,
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: and adulterers are not, to my mind less unpleasant because
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: they happen to occupy a romantic platform. Give me, I
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: pray congenial company. And if, as some declare, we must
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: needs have all types represented, then let the artist who
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: draws them employ the touch that convinces and yet spares.
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: I do not desire to see black laid upon black.
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: To dwell unduly in fiction upon sin and sinners is
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: neither instructive nor entertaining, and it is, as inferred, a
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: poor sort of artist whose pictures are all shade. I
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: beg leave to be of the company of book lovers
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: who prefer a pleasant flavor to their fiction, and happily
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: we are well supplied. Book Land is rich and winsome personalities,
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: both as regards authors and their creations. When we speak
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: of the books that captivate, how often we have in
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: mind the charming persons who, in the working out of this,
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: that or the other story, played so noble and inspiring.
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: A part end of Chapter five recording by Philip Gould,
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: Chapter six of Confessions of a Book Lover by E.
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: Walter Walters. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: Recording by Philip Gould, Chapter six, Personalities in Bookland. Give
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: me leave to enjoy myself that place that does contain
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: my books. The best companions is to me a glorious court,
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: where hourly I converse with the old sages and philosophers,
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: and sometimes for variety I confer with kings and emperors
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: and weigh their councils Beaumont and Fletcher. It is good
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: to think of the many captivating personalities one is met
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: on one's rambles through Bookland. To greet again with extended hands,
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: the genial Vicar immortalized by Goldsmith, to ponder in one's
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: mind his godly charity, to listen enthralled to his delicate
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: and gracious observations. It is good, I say, to set
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: forth on a mental pilgrimage to the homes of the
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: entertaining folk who were first made known to us through
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: those little sheets of paper, and who are ever ready
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: to amuse us, teach us, comfort us, open their hearts
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: to us as brothers. One may select one's own company,
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: and may as the mood takes, one be learned or flippant,
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: grave or gay, one may visit the famous Vicarage. Or,
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: in another mood, and with another end in view, go
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: in the enchanting company of Goldsmith to the home of
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: bow TIBs, there to laugh at poor TIB's foibles, to
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: learn from his old Scotch servant that his good lady
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: is away washing his twash shirts at the next door,
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: because they have taken an oath against lending their tub
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: out any longer. But eventually the good lady presents herself,
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: making twenty apologies for the carelessness of her attire, and
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: explaining in a grand manner that she had stayed the
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: night at Vauxhall Gardens with a certain countess. We are
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: invited to dinner something elegant, being suggested by mister Tibbs,
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: a turbot or an ortolun, whereupon missus Tibbs cries, what
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: do you think, my dear, of a nice pretty bit
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: of ox cheek, piping hot and dressed with a little
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: of my own sauce The very thing, cries mister Tibbs,
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: I hate your immense loads of meat that is country
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: all over, extreme disgusting to those who are in the
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: least acquainted with high life. But we do not remain
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: for the dainty morsel, For as our guide whispers, the
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: company of fools may at first make a smile, but
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: at last never fails of rendering us melancholy. And so
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: we take our leave, assured by bou Tibbs that had
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: we remained, dinner would have been ready in less than
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: two hours. And thus one may journey from house to house,
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: from street to street, from county to county, and from
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: country to country, to wellnigh any spot between the two poles,
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: there to find some old friend or other whom one
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: has met in book land. And how varied is the company,
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: how representative, how cosmopolitan, how sure one may be of
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: finding just the very persons one wishes to meet. The child,
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: still in the age of innocence looking for a playmate
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: may find one in book Land. The youth whose blood
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: runs hot and strong, and who desires a companion who
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: can speak of mighty enterprises, may make his choice. The
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: young woman who desires lessons in deportment and manners will
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: find many good souls waiting to instructor. And what company,
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: what models of virtue and loveliness await the young man
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: whose fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. Yes, in
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: book land there are persons to suit all ages, and
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: all types, and all moods. Can we, who have read
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: with delight from our childhood days onward, ever, forget our
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: dear old friends? Can we forget the characters, some simple,
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: sweet and charming, other strange, wild grotesque with whom we
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: became acquainted in our nursery days? Can we forget Alice
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: and her adventures in Wonderland? Are the army of whimsical
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: beings found in books of the same alluring order? Do
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: they not still influence us and guide our morals? And
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: what of the book born acquaintances of our youth? Is
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: it not true that the books that charmed us in
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: youth recall the delight ever afterwards? What a time for
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: reading is that period when the blood runs warm and strong,
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: and the mind is vigorous, one's whole nature keen and impressionable.
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: Ah youth is the time to meet a maiden in
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: a book, to feel, just as the author no doubt
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: felt himself, that she is wonderful, fair to look upon, charming,
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: alike in manners, voice and looks. One may venture to
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: suspect that many a young man has lost his heart
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: to the maidens who flit so gracefully through the pages
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: of books. The young women of bookland are not, however,
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: all of fairylike type. Who can forget the many whose
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: goodness of heart surpassed their bewitching looks. Heroic women, true
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: as steel, and faithful unto death. Ideals must surely have
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: been formed by readers from such as these and their
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: like sought no doubt in real life. And one may
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: go further and venture to hope that they have been
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: found and have given their hearts to noble seekers and
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: lived with them, as the story books say happily. Ever after,
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: then what of the more stayed? And it may be
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: more serious period in life We are, let us say,
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: now beginning to settle down to feel a sense of responsibility.
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: Father Time, with his scythe has not greatly concerned us
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: up to now, But we fancy that we see his
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: figure faint and shadowy, and it may be only just
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: discernible coming towards us from over the horizon. We are
• 56:10
  Speaker 1: ready for serious books now, But bless you, that is
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: just a stage, a period in our pilgrimage through life.
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: The old loves return the volumes that charmed us in
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: childhood and in youth again claim our affections. And with
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: what zest we we read those precious volumes. How heartily
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: we greet our dear old friends. How grateful we are
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: to the authors who have introduced us to this or
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: that genial fellow, to this sedate and scholarly gentleman, to
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: this wensome maid, to that noble man, to this gracious lady.
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: And how many more await us? Yes, the persons one
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: meets in book Land form an ever increasing army, so vast,
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: so numerous, that, when meditating upon them and their characteristics,
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: their virtues, their weaknesses, their foibles, their whimsicalities, these their sins,
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: and their noble deeds, one is led to divide them
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: into classes and place them under the names of their creators.
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: To set apart the delicately but firmly pictured characters of
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: Jane Austen in a line running parallel with, say, the
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: creations of Missus Gaskell and other lady novelists, taking care
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: to keep them some little distance apart from the creations
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: of Fielding and Stern. For in book Land, as in
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: real life, it is unreasonable to expect persons of widely
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: different temperaments to live on amicable terms. That was a
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: good plan, surely of the book lover, who not only
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: classified the characters of his favorite authors under the name
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: of their creators, but also, after carefully considering their various characteristics,
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: group them in little compartments. It is good, however, to
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: feel that the characters of many of our famous novelists
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: may be left to mix freely. One cannot, for example,
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: doubt that the great majority of the creations of Charles
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: Dickens were meant to rub shoulders. So wide were the
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: sympathies of that great delineator of human life, that few,
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: indeed are the children of his imagination who are lacking,
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: in some point or other of common interest. Tapley, Pinch, Micawber, Toots,
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: and the lovable Pickwick, and a host besides may be
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: left safely in one compartment. But all this may lead
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: you to suppose that the persons who played a part
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: in real life as well as in bookland are being forgotten.
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: That can never be, for who can forget the chief
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: characters in the historical works of our great novelists. These
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: in a sense, are more real to us than children
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: of the imagination. For we may first study the conditions
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: in which this or that great figure played a part
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: in life, and then look upon them in the searching
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: light of the skillful novelist. How natural, however, if the
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: lover of books should at times overlook the greatest of
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: figures in a company so vast, he will do well
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: if if he but keeps a warm corner or two
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: in his heart for old friends, and an open place
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: for new ones. And if meanwhile he can manage to
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: keep his mind fresh and active, ready to receive new ideas,
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: and eager for fresh knowledge, he may surely rest content happily.
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: For the makers of books, we have not all the
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: same tastes. Some are for this class of book, others
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: for that. Some seek knowledge, others seek entertainment. But I
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: am running away from the vein in which this little
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: book was started. I am forgetting to set forth my
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: own little likes and dislikes. There is a reason, however,
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: and it is this. I have nothing more exciting to
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: confess at this point than the plain fact that I
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: am of the company of bookmen who read simply for
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: the love of it. End of chapter six recording by
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: Philip Gould, Chapter seven of Confessions of a Book Booklover
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: by E. Walter Walters. This LibriVox recording is in the
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: public domain. Recording by Philip Gould, Chapter seven, second Hand Books.
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: The love of books is a love which requires neither justification,
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: apology nor defense. Langford, I have confessed that I am
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: of the company of book lovers who delight in dipping
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: into the lucky tubs to be found outside bookseller's windows.
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: I know of no pleasanter way of spending a spare
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: half hour. Give me a few loose coppers, place my
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: feet upon a likely road, and I am content. I am.
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: Now let me say of the happy company of book fishermen.
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: And this mark you is fishing in real earnest, this
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: effort to hook good food for the mind, to place
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: in one's basket, a book that delighteth and giveth perennial satisfaction. Ah,
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: it is a good road. I am on one of
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: London's happy thoroughfares, a road rich in book shops. Here,
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: for a humble penny, one may dip into a tub
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: or barrel and perchance pick out a volume worth its
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: weight in gold. We hear so frequently of marvelous catches.
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: You know how this, that or the other fine sportsmen
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: boast of landing fish of amazing weight. Well, it is
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: so with your book, fishermen. Has he not told you
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: of first editions procured for a single copper? And who
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: shall say? What fine day may not find us among
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: fortune's favored ones. And so now to our fishing. Here
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: is a copy of Milton's Paradise Lost, hooked in the
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: deep waters of a penny tub. It is calf bound,
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: mark you, and in faiish condition, though much stained with
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: the passing of years. My heart leaps. It is very old,
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: a first edition possibly, But no, it is anything but that.
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: And alas like the egg that has grown in to
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: a proverb, it is only good in parts. Many of
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: the pages are entirely missing, in others partially so. Judged
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: by the books that surround me, it is dear at
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: a penny Paradise lost. Yes, I confess that this fishing
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: has its distressing side. One is frequently disappointed, and how
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: heartrending it is to find great works in a soiled
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: and tattered condition, to discover on drawing one's hand from
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: some lucky tub that one holds the remains a few
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: pages it may be, or the cover only of a
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: book that is played a part in the making of
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 1: this world's history. And how touching to find a winsome
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: companion like the gentle Elia soiled, torn bereft of covering,
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: showing yellow gum and coarse stitching. I confess that such
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: a sight almost moves me to tears. Fair wear and
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: tear would never have reduced the gentle Elia to so
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: pity of estate. I suspect hans as callous as those
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: of the butcher in the slaughter house across the way,
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: alas that there should be men to whom books are
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: merely so much paper and cloth. A book, you tell them,
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 1: is the precious life blood of a master spirit, embalmed
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: and treasured upon purpose to a life beyond. And their
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: answer is a smile. But this is no time for repining.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: The great army of book lovers swells with each passing year.
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: From all sides come recruits, often from the most unexpected quarters,
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: from mill and factory, mean street and slum. Yes, tis
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: a great day for books, and soon every man will
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: have his library in fact as well as in name,
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: and who dare say, who can guess what treasures his
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: library will hold? Now back to our fishing. Here is
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: a tub that promises well. The price per volume is
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: a four time is only one penny. See here is
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: a dainty volume, slim and shapely of form, enclosed in
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: a delicate green A minor poet. You guess, yes, the
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: work of a minor poet, published, no doubt at the
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: author's own expense. But do not turn aside. Do not
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: say that such books are of no value. I confess
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: that I am for lingering over this slender booklet. Its
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: cover is very pleasing, the type is large and clear,
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: the paper is of good texture. And what anxiety, what
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: patient care probably went to the making of its contents.
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: Brave minor poet, you have withstood many rebuffs. The road
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: you travel holds I doubt not many pure delights. You walk.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: It may be beneath a star strown sky, but stargazing
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: has proved in your case a dangerous occupation. He who
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: raises his eyes to the heavens forgets the stones and
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: puddles at his feet. Alas, you have had many falls,
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 1: and when perchance you have come to the ground, it
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: has often been to the accompaniment of heartless laughter. Here
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 1: cry the critics is another minor poet on all fours,
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: and with ill timed jests they proceed to point out
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: your weaknesses, how that you have not the feet to
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: walk aright, much less run. And as for wings, there
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: is not tis frequently said so much as a sign
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: of their sprouting. But for all that you have scrambled
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: to your feet and marching bravely forward, continued to give
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: generously of your gentle fancy. Long may you live in
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: you we have, And here is my strongest point in
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: your favor. Many a great and worthy poet in the bud.
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: And so I confess gladly, and indeed with a proud heart,
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: that in my book shelves you hold a warm, well
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: sheltered corner. I love to handle your slender volumes, to
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: pour over your early fancies. Ill expressed it times it
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: may be, but with a sincerity that is refreshing, and
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: a simplicity that is delightful. And if your work is
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: pour from cover to cover, which is rarely, if ever
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: the case, well you have given us a book. Yes,
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: I am of the company of booklovers who revere anything
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: in the form of a book lovers are made that way,
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: and it is futile to inquire how I can bring
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: myself to love books of all sorts and conditions. As well?
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 1: Might you ask the nature lover why he speaks so
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: tenderly of, say, the worm that peeps through the tender
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: green of some sunlit lawn. Tis simply love, love for
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: the umblest children of dear mother Earth. And so it
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: is with the true booklover, for the umblest volume. He
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: has a tender thought. But what of our fishing? This is?
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 1: I take it a fitting place to record how, on
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: such and such a day I had the good fortune
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: to hook a copy of this or that desirable work
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: for a few humble pens a mere song. Well so
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: it has been day in and day out. But those books,
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: I would remind you, are now my companions, my friends,
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: And I can no more associate money with their value
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: than I can judge a friend in the flesh by
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: the contents of his purse to me. They are priceless.
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 1: End of chapter seven recording by Philip Gould. Chapter eight
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: of Confessions of a Book Lover by E. Walter Walters.
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: Philip Gould, Chapter eight, The Cult of the book plate.
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: You have often heard the cry, and know full well
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: its meaning. My books are priceless. What wonder, then, if
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: you and I, lovers of books, take lively interest in
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: what an ingenious man of business has called the cult
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: of the book plate. The mission of the book plate,
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: he advises us, has always been, and must always be,
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: primarily to indicate ownership of the books in which they
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: are placed. They may be ornate or simple, as the
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: taste or means of the owner may indicate. They may
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: incorporate crests, arms, motto, or other family attribute. Or again,
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: they may reflect the personal interests or occupations of the owner.
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: But the real aim of the book plate remains ever
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: the same. A reminder to those who borrow pretty ground
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: this for contemplation, for doubts, counsels, hopes, fears, regrets, aye,
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 1: and for rejoicing. How my mind leaps first this way
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: than that when I meditate upon that rich circle of
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: friendship in which I may borrow from a fellow book
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: lover's treasured volumes, and of course lend of my own.
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: Yet by what unspeakable regrets am I possessed? When I
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: think of certain treasured volumes len in wildly generous moments
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: to good but short minded friends. I have in mind
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: a little volume of essays, a first and only edition
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: by an unknown but charming writer, which is now in
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: the possession of that restless fellow. K May he see
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: these words and repent? And what of that treasured edition
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: once mine? But alas mind no more of certain writings
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: of doctor Johnson. Oh that I could send the good
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: doctor in quest to the volume. What blush is of
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: shame he would bring to the cheeks of the heartless borrower, Sir,
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 1: he would cry? And what words would follow? Very speedily?
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: Should I be in a position to fill the gap
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 1: in my shelves? And there is that dainty little calf
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 1: bound volume of Lamb's Essays borrowed some months back by Jay.
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 1: Where are you in my little volume? Now, good friend?
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 1: For reasons known to ourselves alone, I address you tenderly.
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 1: But I would that I could send the gentle Elia
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: to recover my lost jem very gently. Would he deal
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: with you with quaint phrases, puns and happy jests? Ay,
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 1: and with little speeches uttered with that fascinating lisp of
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: his Indeed, I fear, now that I come to give
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: the matter careful thought, that he would leave you empty handed.
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 1: It would be so like his charming ways to console,
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: comfort and amuse you, and leave with you. After all,
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 1: my volume of his incomparable essays, the truth is this
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: work of restoring borrowed volumes to one's shelves calls for
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: a stout heart. I confess that I am wanting in
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 1: the necessary qualifications. I have not the courage to speak
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 1: harshly to a fellow book lover, so firm as his
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: hold on my affections, that I am as wax in
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: his hands. Yet booklovers to a man agree that the
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: borrower who never repays stands in dire need of correction.
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: I must call another to the task, one of stronger metal. Listen,
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 1: even the field mouse cries, My champion has a russet
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: gown to match the mold. But the booklover who has
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: let loose a borrower in his library is as forlorn
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: as the goat tied up for tiger's bait. True that
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 1: to spare your Homer, you may plead you are reacquainting
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: yourself with the Iliad, But that is to save Homer
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 1: and lose Virgil. You cannot profess that you study all
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: the classics simultaneously, And who knows that better than the borrower?
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: Snatch your browning from his grip, and his talons sink
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 1: into Gerta instead. What does it matter to him? He
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: is out for books, and he will not be placated
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: until he has left gaping rents in your shelves like
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: the hull of a bombarded battleship. These chasms shall burden
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 1: your soul with the weight of many unkindly maledictions. But
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 1: the borrower will return no evil thought, for the simple
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 1: and satisfactory reason that he will now think no more
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: either of you or of your books. Stabled securely upon
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: his shelves, they will remain on one of those perpetual
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 1: leases that amount to a freehold. It is useless to
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 1: invade his lair with the hope of bringing back the spoil.
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: Are you not instructed that he has not yet had
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 1: time to read them? But that they are yours? Again?
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 1: Whenever you will out generaled and outflanked, you retreat empty handed.
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: Books are gentle, lovable company. Why should the lust of
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 1: them corrupt human nature, turning an amiable citizen into that hopeless,
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: irreclaimable the inveterate book borrower. Is it that law of
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 1: contrast which associates with the noble steed the ignoble horse coper,
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: and with the gentle dove, the cropped head and unshaven
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 1: jowl of the pigeon flyer. But truce to theories it
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 1: is the hour of action will not have anigh. Finally,
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 1: reforming government insists that lent books shall be registered like
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 1: bills of sale, and a list drawn up of notorious borrowers,
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 1: with compulsory inspection of their dens, to protect our defenseless
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: libraries from the ravages of the book pirate. If it
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 1: is hopeless to look for his cure, shall we not
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 1: at least petition for his prevention? You will allow that
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 1: all this bears directly upon the subject in mind, does
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 1: not the ingenious gentleman whom I have quoted at the
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: head of this chapter aver that the real aim of
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 1: the book plate remains ever the same, a reminder to
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: those who borrow. Here then is one thread of hope,
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 1: but only a very thin thread. I fear not for
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 1: one moment, dare I venture to think that it will
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 1: bear the weight of our grievances. It is too fine,
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 1: too delicate to save us from the hands of the
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 1: ruthless borrower. Indeed, I suspect that if it in any
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: wise alters our position, it is only to draw us
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: into fresh danger. For you know how many and how
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: varied are the charms of book plates, both old and new. Indeed,
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: I have known book lovers borrow a volume for the
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: sole purpose of tracing the design upon the fly leaf.
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: It is a fault of which the present writer is guilty.
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: With shame he confesses it. But wait, why should I
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 1: speak with blushes of my admiration for the brave armorial
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 1: designs which adorn the calf bound volumes of my friend H. Well,
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: may he be proud of his family attributes, And well
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: may I admire the manner in which some skillful designer
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: long departed has incorporated arms and family matter with the
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: familiar words ex libris. I know not, by the way,
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 1: how any book lover can bring himself to ignore information
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: so absolutely clear the announcement from my library seems, in
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: the case of the particular book plate in mind to
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: come nay, does come from a trumpet of amazing dimensions.
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 1: But it is to be feared that the imaginative designer
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: has been allowed too free a hand, So rich is
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: his fancy, so skillful his line work, that the force
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: of his call to duty is dulled by admiration. Perhaps
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 1: that is why my friend's volume still rests on my shelves,
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: And perchance herein may rest an explanation of the heartless
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: manner in which my friend has held fast to my
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: treasured volume of Cowper's poems. It is, I say, to
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: be feared that designers of book plates have sacrificed the
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 1: primary aim of their calling to the elaboration of playful fancies.
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 1: From the very birth of the book plate, the fault
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 1: seems to have been present. I am told that the
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 1: earliest specimens date back to fifteen sixteen, and on the continent,
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: notably in Germany, even earlier than that. Far back into
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: the ages must we travel to find the first offenders.
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: Let the interested book lover examine the ancient examples presented
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 1: in fifteen seventy four by Sir Nichol Cholas Bacon to
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: the University of Cambridge. He will then see pretty clearly
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: how the war has been waged between the pictorial and
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: the practical, and how all along the line the victory
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: has been with the former. And what wonder with such
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: mighty craftsmen as Albert Durer, Lucas Krnosh and Hans Holbein
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 1: to wield the steel point of the engraver. Can one
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 1: be surprised if such men defeat the chief aim of
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: the book plate and put to silence with their wonderful
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 1: skill the simple cry ex libris. Book plates by Durer,
• 1:16:35
  Speaker 1: Cranache or Holbein must surely give great value to the
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: volumes in which they rest. Note the danger. True book
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 1: lovers will blush to own it. But we must acknowledge
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 1: the fact that a book plate may have greater attractions
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 1: than the volume in which it rests. Wherefore, I say
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: we booklovers will be well advised if we see to
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: it that we do not fall into the error of
• 1:16:57
  Speaker 1: keeping on our shelves books which may be covered for
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: the plates they contain. Book Plates in the delicate manner
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 1: of Chippendale, with wreath and ribbon and open shell work,
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 1: are too alluring. Designs in the manner of Sheraton are
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 1: also dangerously attractive. Jacobean plates come nearer the desired mark.
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 1: But to my mind the good old English style of plate,
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 1: simple armorial, is best fitted for the purpose. Always, we
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 1: must remember that the primary object of the book plate
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: is a reminder to those who borrow. On this score,
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: I am disposed to favor those inexpensive modern plates in
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 1: which are interwoven some dear familiar scene, a nook or
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 1: corner of one's garden, or a beloved scene in one's
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 1: native place. If the ruthless borrower has aught of good
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 1: in him, surely he will be affected by such tender
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: personal associations. But we have seen that the average borrower
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 1: of books is a strange fellow, alas I know him
• 1:17:59
  Speaker 1: only two Well. Indeed, I too must confess that, out
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 1: of an intimate knowledge of my own sinful ways have
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 1: I spoken. End of chapter eight recording by Philip Gould,
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 1: Chapter nine of Confessions of a Book Lover by E.
• 1:18:19
  Speaker 1: Walter Walters. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 1: Recording by Philip Gould, Chapter nine, bedside Books. I come
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 1: to my subject in a sleepy mood. It seems a
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: daring confession to make, But you will allow that only
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 1: when one's mind is bent on thoughts of sleep can
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 1: one hope to speak fittingly of bedside books. Tis a
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: subject calling for gentle quiet thoughts. And what better state
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 1: of mind? You remember Robert Lewis Stevenson's prayer give us
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 1: the quiet mind? How often has a similar prayer been offered?
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 1: Too often are we disturbed in thought, harassed, perplexed, worried.
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 1: Let us now turn our attention to books that soothe
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 1: and lull to rest. Here they stand ready to hand,
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: But name them. I dare not save in my own heart,
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 1: for your taste in this matter may be totally different
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 1: from mine. I dare only say at this point, for
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 1: here surely I may speak with confidence that no bedside
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 1: shelf is complete without a copy of Stephenson's prayers. With gratitude,
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 1: I confess that of the many volumes which has comforted
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 1: me during the dark hours, not one is so dear,
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 1: so close to my heart, as the little volume bearing
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 1: the golden letters R L S. Be with our friends,
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 1: Be with ourselves, Go with each of us to rest,
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 1: if any awake, temper to them the dark hours of watching.
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 1: And when the day returns, return to us our sun
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 1: and comforter, and call us up with morning faces and
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 1: with morning hearts, eager to labor eager to be happy,
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 1: if happiness be our portion, and if the day be
• 1:20:09
  Speaker 1: marked for sorrow, strong to endure it. Certainly the prayers
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 1: of r l s should have a place on every
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 1: bedside shelf that you are familiar with the foregoing prayer.
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 1: I cannot doubt many are the golden passages the lover
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: of good books has by heart. It may be that
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 1: you have upon your own particular bedside shelf many devotional
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: authors with whose every word you are familiar, books small
• 1:20:36
  Speaker 1: and great, which are as jewels in your shelf. And
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 1: no doubt you have upon the same shelf many every
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 1: day and every hour books, acting, as it were, as
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 1: a setting to your gems. For certainly, the bedside shelf,
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 1: if it is to be complete, must contain books to
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 1: suit all moods. One cannot be certain in what mood
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 1: the night watches will find one. The over excited brain,
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: for instance, needs its own particular medicine, and sometimes two, three,
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 1: or more drugs are required according to the state and
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 1: nature of the patient. In the majority of cases, it
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 1: is feudile to attempt to cure with a book less
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 1: lively than the patient's own brain. His abnormal condition must
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 1: be writed by degrees. One book or drug must follow
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 1: another till his mind has been restored to a normal state.
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 1: Then may he resort to his accustomed rest books, and
• 1:21:29
  Speaker 1: so fall asleep. But I fear that such talk smacks
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 1: of the doctor in his medicine chest, and I desire
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 1: to conjure up RESTful thoughts. Well, may the reader be
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 1: forgiven if he starts up in protest. Indeed, here is
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 1: the difficulty, in the danger of seeking to promote a
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 1: RESTful condition. One is so apt to make, with the
• 1:21:51
  Speaker 1: best intentions possible, a remark which has the reverse effect.
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 1: There is, I say, the risk of naming a book
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: which to the reader might come as a call to action,
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 1: to daring deeds and mighty enterprises. A mood is far
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 1: removed from slumber as the north pole from the south.
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 1: I may, however, speak freely enough in the company of booklovers,
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 1: who wake with the rising sun and take to themselves
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 1: one of their beloved books. They will not resent my
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 1: likes and dislikes. They who open the day with a
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 1: jolly good book in their company. I may confess that
• 1:22:26
  Speaker 1: for the early morning I prefer a book with plenty
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 1: of go in it. Give me life and spirit and enterprise.
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 1: Thus I may hope to retain some measure of the
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 1: buoyancy of youth. It is good to have been young
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 1: in youth, and as the years go to grow younger, many,
• 1:22:44
  Speaker 1: it is written, are already old before they are through
• 1:22:47
  Speaker 1: their teens. But to travel deliberately through one's ages is
• 1:22:50
  Speaker 1: to get the heart out of a liberal education. Times change,
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 1: opinions vary to their opposite, and still the world appears
• 1:22:59
  Speaker 1: a brave jim ynasium, full of sea bathing and horse
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 1: exercise and bracing manly virtues. And what can be more
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 1: encouraging than to find the friend who is welcome at
• 1:23:09
  Speaker 1: one age welcome at another. Let Westward Hoe stand on
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: your bedside shelf, and many other books of the same.
• 1:23:16
  Speaker 1: Brave and lively order the travel and adventure books of
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 1: our spirited youth. These, if you meet fresh days with
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 1: a book, will brace you for the battle. Stevenson must
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 1: of course remain one of your companions, your faithful friend,
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 1: both night and morning bravery he will give you and
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: grace Also forth from the casement on the plain where
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 1: honor has the world to gain, pour forth and bravely
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 1: do your part. O knights of the unshielded heart, forth
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 1: and forever forward out from prudent turrent and redoubt, And
• 1:23:51
  Speaker 1: in the malay charge a main to fall, but yet
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 1: to rise again, captive ah still to honor, bride a
• 1:23:59
  Speaker 1: captive soil of the right, or free in fighting good
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 1: with ill, unconquering but unconquered still and mark again with
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 1: what manly grace and beauty of expression. Stephenson turns our
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 1: thoughts to the giver of all strength. Give us grace
• 1:24:16
  Speaker 1: and strength to bear and to persevere offenders. Give us
• 1:24:20
  Speaker 1: the grace to accept and to forgive offenders. Forgetful ourselves,
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 1: help us to bear cheerfully. The forgetfulness of others. Give
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 1: us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind. Spare us
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 1: to our friends, soften us to our enemies. Bless us,
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 1: if it may be in all our innocent endeavors, if
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 1: it may not give us the strength to encounter that
• 1:24:43
  Speaker 1: which is to come, that we be brave in peril,
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 1: constant in tribulation, temperate in wrath, and in all changes
• 1:24:51
  Speaker 1: of fortune, and down to the gates of death, loyal
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 1: and loving one to another. If there is a more
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 1: helpful bedside author than Stevenson, I should much like to
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 1: make his acquaintance to few. Is it given to speak
• 1:25:04
  Speaker 1: the word that cheers with such a fine combination of
• 1:25:06
  Speaker 1: tenderness and courage. It is a commonplace, he says, that
• 1:25:11
  Speaker 1: we cannot answer for ourselves before we have been tried.
• 1:25:15
  Speaker 1: But it is not so common a reflection, and surely
• 1:25:18
  Speaker 1: more consoling, that we usually find ourselves a great deal
• 1:25:22
  Speaker 1: braver and better than we thought. I believe this is
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 1: everyone's experience, but an apprehension that they may belie themselves
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 1: in the future prevents mankind from trumpeting this cheerful sentiment abroad.
• 1:25:35
  Speaker 1: I wish sincerely, for it would have saved me much trouble.
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 1: There had been some one to put me in a
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 1: good heart about life when I was younger, to tell
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 1: me how dangers are most portentous on a distant site,
• 1:25:47
  Speaker 1: and how the good in a man's spirit will not
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: suffer itself to be overlaid, and rarely or never deserts
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 1: him in the hour of need. To the troubled, relaxed mind,
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 1: such words come as a tonic. Too often have we
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 1: passed sleepless hours for want of a word in season,
• 1:26:06
  Speaker 1: something to put a little grid into us for the
• 1:26:08
  Speaker 1: duties of the morrow where the average mortal is concerned.
• 1:26:12
  Speaker 1: Stephenson certainly supplies that need, should he, by any chance fail, well,
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 1: there is an essayist of our own day, waiting to
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 1: minister to the most exacting needs. I have in mind
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 1: the many beautiful and tender pages written by one whom
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 1: we associate with a certain college window. Certainly of him,
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 1: it may be said that he seeks to comfort and console,
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 1: and to sue, then loll to rest. End of chapter
• 1:26:41
  Speaker 1: nine recording by Philip Gould, Chapter ten of Confessions of
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 1: a Book Lover by E. Walter Walters. This LibriVox recording
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 1: is in the public domain. Recording by Philip Gould. Old
• 1:27:01
  Speaker 1: friends come and take choice of my library, and so beguiled,
• 1:27:05
  Speaker 1: I sorrow, Goldsmith. Now let us dwell upon our every
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 1: day and every hour books, our dear, old familiar friends
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 1: on a shelf in my bookcase, says Alexander Smith. Are
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 1: collected a number of volumes which look somewhat the worse
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 1: for wear. Those of them that originally possessed gilding have
• 1:27:25
  Speaker 1: had it fingered off. Each of them has leaves turned down,
• 1:27:29
  Speaker 1: and they open of themselves in places wherein I have
• 1:27:32
  Speaker 1: been happy, and with whose every word I am familiar
• 1:27:35
  Speaker 1: is with the furniture of the room in which I
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 1: nightly slumber. Each of them has remarks relevant and irrelevant,
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 1: scribbled on their margins. Those favorite volumes cannot be called
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 1: peculiar glories of literature. But out of the world of
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 1: books I have singled them, as I have singled my intimates,
• 1:27:51
  Speaker 1: out of the world of men. Ah that makes pleasant reading.
• 1:27:56
  Speaker 1: For do not the sentiments expressed reflect our own feelings?
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 1: And do they not place us in gracious and distinguished company.
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 1: In his charming way, Goldsmith whispers, the first time I
• 1:28:08
  Speaker 1: read an excellent book, it is to me as if
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 1: I had gained a new friend. When I read over
• 1:28:13
  Speaker 1: a book I have perused before, it resembles the meeting
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 1: with an old one. And to this Dylan adds, choose
• 1:28:21
  Speaker 1: an author as you would choose a friend, whilst Langford,
• 1:28:24
  Speaker 1: touching the same thing, declares that a wise man will
• 1:28:27
  Speaker 1: select his book with care, for he will not wish
• 1:28:30
  Speaker 1: to class them all under the sacred name of friends.
• 1:28:33
  Speaker 1: And his friendship has its roots deep set in love
• 1:28:36
  Speaker 1: and sympathy, and is for serene days and country rambles
• 1:28:39
  Speaker 1: and also for rough roads and hard fare, shipwreck, poverty
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 1: and persecution, and moreover keeps company with the sallies of
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 1: the wit. It is easy enough to understand why such
• 1:28:52
  Speaker 1: authors as Charles Lamb, Oliver Goldsmith, William Haslett, Leigh Hunt,
• 1:28:57
  Speaker 1: Richard Jeffreys, Thomas de Quiancy, Joseph Addison, and of later
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 1: years Robert Louis Stevenson have our affections. Here they stand Lamb, Goldsmith, Haslett, Hunt, Jeffreys,
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 1: the whole lovable company. What shall I say concerning these
• 1:29:18
  Speaker 1: friends of ours? I am moved by deep and serious feelings.
• 1:29:23
  Speaker 1: But according to his own telling, the gentle Elia, the
• 1:29:27
  Speaker 1: first in mind, had a general aversion from being treated
• 1:29:30
  Speaker 1: like a graver respectable character, and kept a wary eye
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 1: upon the advances of age that should so entitle him.
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 1: He heard it always while it was possible with people
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 1: younger than himself. He did not conform to the march
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 1: of time, but was dragged along in the procession. His
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 1: manners lagged behind his years. He was too much of
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 1: the boy man. The toga Virilus never sat gracefully on
• 1:29:57
  Speaker 1: his shoulders. The impressions of infancy had burnt into him,
• 1:30:02
  Speaker 1: and he resented the impertinence of manhood, and therein surely
• 1:30:06
  Speaker 1: rests the secret of his charm. In spite of his
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 1: brave confessions, how firm to discerning hearts is the bed
• 1:30:13
  Speaker 1: of the stream over which his thoughts flow. Who can
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: doubt the source of a stream that flows so sweetly?
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 1: And what of Oliver Goldsmith, poor Goldie, as he was
• 1:30:24
  Speaker 1: called by his circle of entimates on earth? He too
• 1:30:27
  Speaker 1: was very human, and indeed had many weaknesses. And they
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 1: tell us, they who write of such matters with authority,
• 1:30:35
  Speaker 1: that his days of poverty and wretchedness were largely, if
• 1:30:38
  Speaker 1: not entirely, the outcome of his follies. Even in the
• 1:30:41
  Speaker 1: sphere in which he shines a clear, bright, inextinguishable star,
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 1: it is said that he had many shortcomings. He had
• 1:30:49
  Speaker 1: neither the gift of knowledge nor the power of research.
• 1:30:53
  Speaker 1: As an essayist and poet, he has neither extended views
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: nor originality. As a critic. Upon the few occasions upon
• 1:31:00
  Speaker 1: which he embarks on criticism, his sympathies are of the
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 1: most restricted kind. And yet for the warmth and gentleness
• 1:31:07
  Speaker 1: of his heart, and the purity of his style, we
• 1:31:10
  Speaker 1: love him. His playful and delicate style transformed everything he
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 1: touched into something radiant with warmth and fragrant, with a
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 1: perfume all its own. And how fared it with Hazlit
• 1:31:21
  Speaker 1: the keen critic, the impassioned writer, unbending and severe insurgent
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 1: in his political views. Are we not told that he
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: was really more of an artist and sentimentalist than a politician.
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 1: As for his life, it was esthetic, bohemian, and irregular
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 1: in the extreme. The restraints of domestic life were intolerable.
• 1:31:42
  Speaker 1: He wanted to be alone to write. Rough accommodation and
• 1:31:46
  Speaker 1: coarse fair appeased him best. Tinkerdom was the ordinary state
• 1:31:50
  Speaker 1: of his interior environment, save for two pictures, which served
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 1: as a link with past aspiration and were treasured accordingly.
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 1: He had no property. A fugitive amour seemed to furnish
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 1: the emotional side of him with the stimulant it most required.
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 1: He was a knight, rambler and a reveler in Rousseau,
• 1:32:10
  Speaker 1: over whose eloise and confessions he expended literally pints of tears.
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 1: Such was the temperament of the writer, artist and sentimentalist
• 1:32:20
  Speaker 1: who gave us those incomparable essays on going a journey
• 1:32:24
  Speaker 1: on the ignorance of the learned and on familiar style.
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 1: And what of those other old friends Hunt Jeffreys de Quincey,
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 1: Robert Louis Stevenson. But our inquiries have gone far enough.
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 1: What boots it to repeat that our friends were human
• 1:32:40
  Speaker 1: in life, just as surely as they are human in
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 1: their books, but with a humanity that allures, charms, captivates.
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 1: They do not preach to us, these old friends of ours,
• 1:32:51
  Speaker 1: or make open claims to virtue. And yet we are
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 1: never so conscious of goodness as when they are near
• 1:32:57
  Speaker 1: their lightest raillery scorns a mean act in their company.
• 1:33:01
  Speaker 1: Meanness fleas is from a pestilence our friends. Wisely, is
• 1:33:07
  Speaker 1: it said that the best way to represent to life
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 1: the manifold use of friendship is to cast and see
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 1: how many things there are which a wise man cannot
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 1: do himself. And then it will appear that it was
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 1: a sparing speech of the ancients to say that a
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 1: friend is more than himself. For that a friend is
• 1:33:25
  Speaker 1: far more than himself. And so I thank Heaven for
• 1:33:30
  Speaker 1: my friends, for the wise, the lovely, and the noble minded,
• 1:33:33
  Speaker 1: who stands side by side, ever willing, ever ready upon
• 1:33:37
  Speaker 1: my humble shelf. End of Chapter ten recording by Philip Gould,
• 1:33:48
  Speaker 1: Chapter eleven of Confessions of a Book Lover by E.
• 1:33:51
  Speaker 1: Walter Walters. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 1: Recording by Philip Gould, Chapter eleven through Rose Colored Spectacles.
• 1:34:03
  Speaker 1: Now let us occupy the printed page. I have promised
• 1:34:06
  Speaker 1: to give the experiences of other book lovers, to show
• 1:34:09
  Speaker 1: how books influence their thoughts and ways. And I am
• 1:34:13
  Speaker 1: anxious to introduce a short, slim gentleman of sixty odd summers,
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 1: with a smiling face and an air of well being,
• 1:34:20
  Speaker 1: a retiring, peaceful book lover, whom you would never suspect
• 1:34:23
  Speaker 1: of playing any part in a mystery. Nevertheless, my friend
• 1:34:29
  Speaker 1: must plead guilty to practicing the art of make believe
• 1:34:31
  Speaker 1: to such a degree that one could never be certain
• 1:34:33
  Speaker 1: how much was real concerning him in his affairs and
• 1:34:37
  Speaker 1: how much was imaginary. Indeed, the only sure and unchanging
• 1:34:41
  Speaker 1: thing about him was his spectacles and the manner in
• 1:34:43
  Speaker 1: which he viewed life through them. His point of view.
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: My spectacles, he told me over and over again, are
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 1: rose colored. You understand rose colored? They and myself are inseparable.
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 1: Without them, I am as bad as stone blind, and
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 1: dare not take a step in any direction. Then he
• 1:35:02
  Speaker 1: would smile in a manner that led one to suspect
• 1:35:05
  Speaker 1: that he was merely drawing upon his imagination. But I
• 1:35:08
  Speaker 1: learned that my friend's life had been lived under such
• 1:35:11
  Speaker 1: peculiar difficulties, and that he had passed through so much
• 1:35:14
  Speaker 1: sorrow and affliction, that without his rose colored spectacles he was,
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 1: in one sense stone blind. It pleased him to imagine
• 1:35:23
  Speaker 1: that the lenses in his treasured spectacles, which were gold
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 1: rimmed and old fashioned in shape, had been cut from
• 1:35:29
  Speaker 1: rose colored pebbles, with the power of giving a rosy
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 1: hue to life and bringing all things into correct perspective,
• 1:35:36
  Speaker 1: correct perspective in the right point of view, he remarked,
• 1:35:39
  Speaker 1: on a certain day, are everything in life? My spectacles
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 1: give me the correct vision. They bring men and affairs
• 1:35:46
  Speaker 1: into proper focus, and what is more, they give them
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 1: a rose tint. Robert Lewis Stevenson more spectacles, something like mine,
• 1:35:55
  Speaker 1: But his were far and away more powerful. They enabled
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 1: him to see farther and more clearly. They were of
• 1:36:02
  Speaker 1: a deeper and purer tent. He drew from his pocket
• 1:36:06
  Speaker 1: a small cloth bound edition of passages from Stevenson's works,
• 1:36:10
  Speaker 1: The little volume did not measure more than say, three
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 1: by five inches, and was considerably soiled and worn, but
• 1:36:17
  Speaker 1: he handled it as though it were worth its weight
• 1:36:19
  Speaker 1: in precious stones. It was clear before he opened the
• 1:36:23
  Speaker 1: volume that he knew the greater part of the contents
• 1:36:25
  Speaker 1: by heart, For he commenced to quote as he ran
• 1:36:28
  Speaker 1: his fingers round the edge of the cover. When you
• 1:36:31
  Speaker 1: have read, you carry away with you a memory of
• 1:36:33
  Speaker 1: the man himself. It is as though you had touched
• 1:36:36
  Speaker 1: a loyal hand, looked into brave eyes, and made a
• 1:36:40
  Speaker 1: noble friend. There is another bond on you, thenceforward, binding
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 1: you to life and to the love of virtue. He
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 1: accompanied the quotation with a pleasing smile, as who should
• 1:36:51
  Speaker 1: say how true that is, and how nobly expressed. Then
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 1: he turned the leaves hastily, as though looking for a
• 1:36:58
  Speaker 1: favorite passage. But he he abandon the search a moment
• 1:37:01
  Speaker 1: later and glanced up. I fancy I can give you
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 1: the passage correctly. I should like you to hear it.
• 1:37:08
  Speaker 1: It will throw light upon what I have said about
• 1:37:10
  Speaker 1: my rose colored spectacles. He looked up as he spoke
• 1:37:13
  Speaker 1: at the trees overhanging the lane through which we walked,
• 1:37:17
  Speaker 1: Nor does the scenery any more affect the thoughts than
• 1:37:20
  Speaker 1: the thoughts affect the scenery. We see places through our
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 1: humors as through differently colored glasses. He paused a moment,
• 1:37:29
  Speaker 1: then repeated the last lines, slowly and with emphasis. We
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 1: see places through our humors as through differently colored glasses.
• 1:37:41
  Speaker 1: We are ourselves. He continue to termine the quotation a
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 1: note of the chord, and make discord and harmony almost
• 1:37:48
  Speaker 1: it will. There is no fear for the result if
• 1:37:51
  Speaker 1: we but surrender ourselves sufficiently to the country that surrounds
• 1:37:54
  Speaker 1: and follows us, so that we are ever thinking suitable
• 1:37:57
  Speaker 1: thoughts or telling ourselves some suitable sort of story as
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 1: we go. We become thus, in some sense, a center
• 1:38:05
  Speaker 1: of beauty. We are provocative of beauty, such as a
• 1:38:09
  Speaker 1: gentle and sincere character is provocative of sincerity and gentleness
• 1:38:13
  Speaker 1: in others. Then he told me some suitable sort of
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 1: story about a certain man who built a castle upon
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 1: dry land, a castle of stone, firm as a rock,
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 1: and filled it with his heart's desire. But no sooner
• 1:38:26
  Speaker 1: had the man taken up his abode therein than the
• 1:38:28
  Speaker 1: tide of circumstances turned. Misfortune followed misfortune sorrow followed sorrow,
• 1:38:36
  Speaker 1: first the loss of earthly possessions, then the loss of
• 1:38:39
  Speaker 1: loved ones. All brightness and hope were taken out of
• 1:38:42
  Speaker 1: the man's life, and for many years he dwelt in darkness.
• 1:38:47
  Speaker 1: At this point, my friend turned away, then slowly thoughtfully
• 1:38:52
  Speaker 1: polished his spectacles. One could not help thinking that he
• 1:38:56
  Speaker 1: was relating in a parable the story of his own past.
• 1:39:00
  Speaker 1: This suspicion was strengthened, if not actually confirmed, when he
• 1:39:03
  Speaker 1: readjusted his spectacles and continued. Then this same man built
• 1:39:08
  Speaker 1: a castle in the air, partly out of the creations
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 1: of his own mind, partly out of the creations of others,
• 1:39:15
  Speaker 1: a castle of thought, a building without visible support. He found, however,
• 1:39:20
  Speaker 1: that this castle in the air, built on lines he
• 1:39:23
  Speaker 1: had been taught to smile at in his youth, was
• 1:39:25
  Speaker 1: more enduring than his castle of stone. Moat and drawbridge
• 1:39:30
  Speaker 1: were impassable, the gates impregnable. Changed circumstances could not effect it.
• 1:39:36
  Speaker 1: Misfortune and sorrow could not shake it. Even death left
• 1:39:39
  Speaker 1: it unmoved. You see, he continued, what I am driving at.
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 1: Listen to this from my little volume. No man can
• 1:39:47
  Speaker 1: find out the world, says Solomon from beginning to end,
• 1:39:51
  Speaker 1: because the world is in his own heart, and this
• 1:39:55
  Speaker 1: an inspiration, is a joy forever, a possession as solid
• 1:39:59
  Speaker 1: as a landed ast eight, a fortune we can never exhaust,
• 1:40:02
  Speaker 1: in which gives us, year by year, a revenue of
• 1:40:04
  Speaker 1: pleasurable activity. To have many of these is to be
• 1:40:08
  Speaker 1: spiritually rich. The next moment, he drew from his pocket
• 1:40:12
  Speaker 1: a worn leather case and showed me a portrait of
• 1:40:14
  Speaker 1: Robert Louis Stevenson. He had it wrapped in two layers
• 1:40:18
  Speaker 1: of paper, both yellow with age and stained from much handling,
• 1:40:23
  Speaker 1: but the likeness was well preserved, as clear, perhaps as
• 1:40:26
  Speaker 1: on the day it was taken. I number this likeness,
• 1:40:29
  Speaker 1: he said, amongst my treasures, they go everywhere with me,
• 1:40:33
  Speaker 1: this portrait of Stevenson, in this little volume of extracts
• 1:40:36
  Speaker 1: from his works. He fingered the cover affectionately. The case,
• 1:40:41
  Speaker 1: he continued, is worn with much handling, but the rose
• 1:40:44
  Speaker 1: colored lenses have not lost their power. Listen to this.
• 1:40:49
  Speaker 1: It is in virtue of his own desires and curiosities
• 1:40:52
  Speaker 1: that any man continues to exist with even patience, that
• 1:40:56
  Speaker 1: he is charmed by the look of things and people,
• 1:40:59
  Speaker 1: and that he awakens it every morning with a renewed
• 1:41:01
  Speaker 1: appetite for work and pleasure, and this noble disappointment, noble
• 1:41:07
  Speaker 1: self denial are not to be admired, not even to
• 1:41:10
  Speaker 1: be pardoned, if they bring bitterness. It is one thing
• 1:41:14
  Speaker 1: to enter the kingdom of heaven, maime another to maim
• 1:41:17
  Speaker 1: yourself and stay outside. He glanced up and handed me
• 1:41:21
  Speaker 1: the volume. Make your own selection, he suggested, read something
• 1:41:26
  Speaker 1: that condemns me. I acted on the suggestion, or rather
• 1:41:30
  Speaker 1: the first part of it, for my selection, contrary to
• 1:41:33
  Speaker 1: his request, was in the form of commendation. His was
• 1:41:37
  Speaker 1: indeed a good influence in life. While he was still
• 1:41:40
  Speaker 1: among us, he had a fresh laugh. It did you
• 1:41:44
  Speaker 1: good to see him, And however sad he may have
• 1:41:47
  Speaker 1: been at heart, he always bore a bold and cheerful
• 1:41:50
  Speaker 1: countenance and took fortunes worst as it were, the showers
• 1:41:53
  Speaker 1: of spring. I was not aware how entirely this fitted
• 1:41:57
  Speaker 1: my friend's case until some months had passed. Our friendship
• 1:42:01
  Speaker 1: was only in its infancy at that time, little more
• 1:42:03
  Speaker 1: than an acquaintance. We had no formal introduction. He had
• 1:42:08
  Speaker 1: asked the time of day, then gone on to talk
• 1:42:10
  Speaker 1: of his rose colored spectacles. We had much to say
• 1:42:14
  Speaker 1: concerning his spectacles in the days that followed, always in
• 1:42:18
  Speaker 1: a light and pleasant vein. To be tedious or heavy
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 1: was to his mind a grievous fault, particularly in books,
• 1:42:26
  Speaker 1: in life, and in letters. He would always look for,
• 1:42:28
  Speaker 1: and never fail to find the brightest side, the happiest passages,
• 1:42:33
  Speaker 1: and he would apply the one to the other, a
• 1:42:36
  Speaker 1: passage from Stevenson or some other author, to an incident
• 1:42:39
  Speaker 1: in his own or some other life, in a manner
• 1:42:42
  Speaker 1: that was wonderfully, illuminating and helpful. In brief, his was
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 1: the life that loves, that gives, that loses itself, that overflows,
• 1:42:52
  Speaker 1: the warm, hearty, social, helpful life. From a sorrowful chapter
• 1:42:58
  Speaker 1: in his history, he would weave a story for the
• 1:43:00
  Speaker 1: help of others, always from a rose colored standpoint. From
• 1:43:04
  Speaker 1: a calamity, he would make a fairy tale, showing that,
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 1: in spite of adversity, the house beautiful was still upon
• 1:43:10
  Speaker 1: its hilltop. I remarked in introducing him that he was
• 1:43:14
  Speaker 1: guilty of playing a part in a mystery. You will
• 1:43:17
  Speaker 1: have seen through the mystery by now, at least as
• 1:43:20
  Speaker 1: regards his rose colored spectacles. But there is more to
• 1:43:24
  Speaker 1: be said concerning his life and his love of Books,
• 1:43:28
  Speaker 1: end of chapter eleven. Recording by Philip Gould, Chapter twelve
• 1:43:39
  Speaker 1: of Confessions of a Book Lover by E. Walter Walters.
• 1:43:42
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by
• 1:43:46
  Speaker 1: Philip Gould, Chapter twelve with Nature, Another meeting with my
• 1:43:53
  Speaker 1: friend of the rose colored spectacles was beneath a blue
• 1:43:55
  Speaker 1: sky and in a glow of sunlight. This was some
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 1: while after a visit to the little room that formed
• 1:44:01
  Speaker 1: his home, where I had seen certain photographs which had
• 1:44:04
  Speaker 1: aroused my interest and curiosity. Come, he wrote, and saunter
• 1:44:09
  Speaker 1: with me for an hour or two in the best
• 1:44:11
  Speaker 1: stretch of country within easy reach of London, which to
• 1:44:15
  Speaker 1: us shall be the best between the two poles. Take
• 1:44:18
  Speaker 1: rail to Hampstead, and meet me near the flagstaff overlooking
• 1:44:21
  Speaker 1: the Heath Valley at any hour you care to name,
• 1:44:25
  Speaker 1: but mark you. I only promise to saunter. I have
• 1:44:29
  Speaker 1: no legs for hard walking, and even if I had,
• 1:44:31
  Speaker 1: would prefer an easy pace. You remember the Roe's words
• 1:44:35
  Speaker 1: in praise of Sauntering. I have met with but one
• 1:44:38
  Speaker 1: or two persons in the course of my life who
• 1:44:40
  Speaker 1: understood the art of walking, that is, of taking walks,
• 1:44:45
  Speaker 1: who had a genius, so to speak, for sauntering, which
• 1:44:48
  Speaker 1: word is beautifully derived from idle people who roved about
• 1:44:51
  Speaker 1: the country in the Middle Ages and ask charity under
• 1:44:55
  Speaker 1: pretense of going a la santerre to the Holy Land,
• 1:45:00
  Speaker 1: till the children exclaimed, there goes a san terror, a saunterer,
• 1:45:05
  Speaker 1: a holy lander. They who never go to the Holy
• 1:45:08
  Speaker 1: Land in their walks, as they pretend, are indeed mere
• 1:45:11
  Speaker 1: idlers and vagamonds. But they who do go there are
• 1:45:15
  Speaker 1: saunterers in the good sense, such as I mean. Some, however,
• 1:45:19
  Speaker 1: would derive the word from sans terre without land or home,
• 1:45:24
  Speaker 1: which therefore, in the good sense will mean having no
• 1:45:27
  Speaker 1: particular home, but equally at home everywhere. For this is
• 1:45:31
  Speaker 1: the secret of successful sauntering. He who sits still in
• 1:45:35
  Speaker 1: the house all the time may be the greatest vagrant
• 1:45:37
  Speaker 1: of all. But the saunterer in the good sense is
• 1:45:40
  Speaker 1: no more vagrant than the meandering river, which is all
• 1:45:43
  Speaker 1: the while sedulously seeking the shortest course to the sea.
• 1:45:48
  Speaker 1: But I prefer the first, which indeed is the most
• 1:45:51
  Speaker 1: probable derivation. For every walk is a sort of crusade
• 1:45:55
  Speaker 1: preached by some Peter the hermit in us to go
• 1:45:58
  Speaker 1: forth and reconquer this holy land from the hands of
• 1:46:00
  Speaker 1: the infidels. That is so very pleasingly and bravely expressed.
• 1:46:05
  Speaker 1: The letter continued that I am hoping it will convert
• 1:46:07
  Speaker 1: you to the gentle pace, but have no fear that
• 1:46:11
  Speaker 1: my spirit will prove as slow as my legs. I
• 1:46:14
  Speaker 1: am still in possession of my rose colored spectacles and
• 1:46:17
  Speaker 1: can take full share and joy derived from pleasing thoughts
• 1:46:20
  Speaker 1: and impressions. This too was bravely expressed, for when I
• 1:46:25
  Speaker 1: met my friend at the spot named I was pained
• 1:46:28
  Speaker 1: to find him considerably thinner and paler than at our
• 1:46:30
  Speaker 1: last meeting. But his greeting was as cordial as on
• 1:46:34
  Speaker 1: any previous occasion, and I was glad to find that
• 1:46:37
  Speaker 1: his voice had lost none of its familiar ring of enjoyment.
• 1:46:40
  Speaker 1: What think you of this passage, he cried, after an
• 1:46:43
  Speaker 1: exchange of greetings. It is from a comparatively modern book,
• 1:46:47
  Speaker 1: from a novel to be precise, by Henry Harland. I
• 1:46:51
  Speaker 1: fancy it should put us in the right mood. For
• 1:46:53
  Speaker 1: our saunter, there is an open estate across the heath
• 1:46:56
  Speaker 1: into which we may go and find much of the
• 1:46:58
  Speaker 1: splendor mentioned. As we sauntered forward, he read the passage
• 1:47:02
  Speaker 1: for my benefit in his rich musical voice. Beyond the shade,
• 1:47:07
  Speaker 1: the sunshine broke into a mosaic of merry colors on
• 1:47:10
  Speaker 1: larkspur and iris, pansies and pink geraniums, jessamine, sweet peas,
• 1:47:15
  Speaker 1: tulips shameless in their extravagance, of green and crimson, red
• 1:47:20
  Speaker 1: and white carnations, red white and yellow roses. The sunshine
• 1:47:25
  Speaker 1: broke into color. It laughed, it danced, It almost rioted
• 1:47:29
  Speaker 1: among the flowers. But in the prim alleys, and on
• 1:47:32
  Speaker 1: the formal hedges of box and the quaintly clipped ewes,
• 1:47:35
  Speaker 1: and the old purple brick walls where fruit trees were trellised,
• 1:47:40
  Speaker 1: it lay fast, fast, asleep, without the walls, in the
• 1:47:44
  Speaker 1: cool greenery of the park, there was a perpetual drip,
• 1:47:47
  Speaker 1: drip of bird notes. This was the web upon which
• 1:47:51
  Speaker 1: a chosen handful of more accomplished birds were embroidering and
• 1:47:54
  Speaker 1: cross embroidering their bold, clear arabesques of song. You will
• 1:47:59
  Speaker 1: notice that displeasing passage is in lighter vein than the
• 1:48:02
  Speaker 1: style of writing that usually won my friend's admiration. I
• 1:48:06
  Speaker 1: think the reasonly in his desire to show that a
• 1:48:09
  Speaker 1: man might suffer from indifferent health and still enjoy a
• 1:48:11
  Speaker 1: bright and lively spirit. I wish you could have heard
• 1:48:15
  Speaker 1: him give voice to the following passage. As we made
• 1:48:18
  Speaker 1: our way over the heath through a wealth of freshly
• 1:48:21
  Speaker 1: green undergrowth, he looked up as he recited the words
• 1:48:24
  Speaker 1: at the blue sky, and spoke half playfully, half seriously.
• 1:48:30
  Speaker 1: The sky is an inverted bowl of blue sevres, that
• 1:48:33
  Speaker 1: priceless blue royal. The air is full of gold, like
• 1:48:37
  Speaker 1: ou de vie de Danzig. If only we had a
• 1:48:40
  Speaker 1: liquefying apparatus, we could recapture the first, fine, careless nectar
• 1:48:45
  Speaker 1: of the gods, the poor dead gods of Greece. The
• 1:48:48
  Speaker 1: earth is as aromatic as an orange stuck with cloves.
• 1:48:52
  Speaker 1: I can't begin to tell you all the wondrous, woody, mossy,
• 1:48:55
  Speaker 1: racy things it smells of, And the birds and the
• 1:48:59
  Speaker 1: robin and the throstles, the blackbirds and the black caps,
• 1:49:04
  Speaker 1: the linnets and the little jenny wrens, knowing the value
• 1:49:07
  Speaker 1: of silence or hoarding it like misers, but like prodigals
• 1:49:11
  Speaker 1: their squandering sound. The ear of mortal never heard such
• 1:49:15
  Speaker 1: a delirious, delicious, such a crystalline, argentine, ivory, smooth, velvety, soft,
• 1:49:22
  Speaker 1: Such a ravishing, such an in ravished tumult of sweet voices, showers,
• 1:49:27
  Speaker 1: cascades of pearls and rubies, emeralds, diamonds, sapphires. He laughed
• 1:49:33
  Speaker 1: aloud after the last word had left his lips, out
• 1:49:36
  Speaker 1: of pure lightness of heart. Then went on to speak
• 1:49:39
  Speaker 1: of the value of pure air as a health restorer.
• 1:49:42
  Speaker 1: Pure air and an unsophisticated spirit in the presence of nature,
• 1:49:47
  Speaker 1: these are the best medical appliances. Bright color showed in
• 1:49:51
  Speaker 1: his cheeks as he continued to speak in playful vein
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 1: of the doctor in his pharmacopeia. To his mind, Mother
• 1:49:57
  Speaker 1: Nature was the best of doctors. Had not Stevenson and
• 1:50:00
  Speaker 1: many others written in praise of the soothing influence of
• 1:50:03
  Speaker 1: conditions such as we enjoyed that day, the happy impressions,
• 1:50:08
  Speaker 1: the sense of peace and well being. Then the conversation
• 1:50:12
  Speaker 1: drifted into other channels, and we fell to talking of
• 1:50:15
  Speaker 1: the time spent together in my friend's little room, of
• 1:50:18
  Speaker 1: his books, his pictures, his china, and of the photographs
• 1:50:22
  Speaker 1: he had shown me. And here our talk took on
• 1:50:26
  Speaker 1: a serious complexion, but we were still conscious of the
• 1:50:29
  Speaker 1: flood of sunlight, the happy surroundings. Therefore, our tone, though serious,
• 1:50:34
  Speaker 1: had nothing of melancholy. I learned that the photographs that
• 1:50:38
  Speaker 1: had aroused my curiosity had been taken at an establishment
• 1:50:42
  Speaker 1: in Old Hampstead, now demolished. In those days, my friend
• 1:50:46
  Speaker 1: had lived in a large, well appointed house overlooking the heath.
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 1: His means had been ample, his positions seemingly secure. But
• 1:50:55
  Speaker 1: misfortune had come. Business reverses, the failure of a company
• 1:50:59
  Speaker 1: in which large interests were vested, the betrayal of a
• 1:51:03
  Speaker 1: friend in whom confidence had been placed, then followed the
• 1:51:07
  Speaker 1: sickness and death of his wife and child. I looked
• 1:51:11
  Speaker 1: at my friend and marveled at his courage in the
• 1:51:13
  Speaker 1: face of such misfortunes. At our first meeting, he had
• 1:51:16
  Speaker 1: said that without his rose colored spectacles, his bright point
• 1:51:19
  Speaker 1: of view all seemed dark. The meaning of his words
• 1:51:23
  Speaker 1: was now touchingly clear. How could he have continued to
• 1:51:26
  Speaker 1: live had he not been blessed with an indomitable spirit.
• 1:51:30
  Speaker 1: I wish I could give a faithful idea of the
• 1:51:32
  Speaker 1: inspiring manner in which he interwove his story with bride
• 1:51:36
  Speaker 1: and consoling touches. But so much depended upon his manner,
• 1:51:40
  Speaker 1: the inflections of his voice, the expression in his eyes
• 1:51:44
  Speaker 1: that I cannot hope to convey an adequate impression. I
• 1:51:47
  Speaker 1: can only say that no spark of hope or consolation
• 1:51:50
  Speaker 1: escaped his gratitude, that his bright and cheerful spirit was
• 1:51:54
  Speaker 1: as pervasive as sweet lavender, unavoidable as the sun set
• 1:51:58
  Speaker 1: before the westward bound traveler. The blue sky above, the foliage, around,
• 1:52:03
  Speaker 1: the rich growth beneath our feet all had their message.
• 1:52:07
  Speaker 1: Nature was our good host for the day, and he
• 1:52:10
  Speaker 1: looked through nature up to Nature's God. So the day
• 1:52:13
  Speaker 1: passed by, and the shadows lengthened, but the lights still
• 1:52:17
  Speaker 1: shone upon the hill tops, whilst the sun set in
• 1:52:20
  Speaker 1: a glory of red. I wonder, said, my friend, if
• 1:52:23
  Speaker 1: you remember to rose beautiful passage we walked in, so
• 1:52:27
  Speaker 1: pure and bright a light gilding the withered grass and leaves,
• 1:52:30
  Speaker 1: so softly and serenely bright, I thought I had never
• 1:52:33
  Speaker 1: bathed in such a golden flood without a ripple or
• 1:52:36
  Speaker 1: a murmur to it. The west of every wood and
• 1:52:39
  Speaker 1: rising ground gleamed like the boundary of Elysium, and the
• 1:52:43
  Speaker 1: sun on our backs seemed like a herdsman driving us
• 1:52:46
  Speaker 1: home at evening, So we sauntered towards the Holy Land,
• 1:52:50
  Speaker 1: till one day the sun shall shine more brightly than
• 1:52:53
  Speaker 1: ever he has done, shall perchance shine into our minds
• 1:52:57
  Speaker 1: and hearts, and light up our whole lives, the great
• 1:53:00
  Speaker 1: awakening light as warm and serene and golden as on
• 1:53:05
  Speaker 1: a bank side in autumn. End of chapter twelve, recording
• 1:53:09
  Speaker 1: by Philip Gould, Chapter thirteen of Confessions of a Book
• 1:53:19
  Speaker 1: Lover by E. Walter Walters. This LibriVox recording is in
• 1:53:23
  Speaker 1: the public domain. Recording by Philip Gould, Chapter thirteen, A pilgrimage.
• 1:53:31
  Speaker 1: So we sauntered towards the Holy Land, till one day
• 1:53:34
  Speaker 1: the sun shall shine more brightly than ever he has done,
• 1:53:38
  Speaker 1: shall perchance shine into our minds and hearts, and light
• 1:53:42
  Speaker 1: up our whole lives with a great awakening, light as
• 1:53:45
  Speaker 1: warm and serene in golden as on a bank side
• 1:53:48
  Speaker 1: in autumn. These were the last words I heard from
• 1:53:52
  Speaker 1: my friend's lips. He had a serious relapse shortly after
• 1:53:56
  Speaker 1: our visit to the country, and died within a few days.
• 1:54:00
  Speaker 1: And now I am divided between a deep sense of
• 1:54:02
  Speaker 1: personal loss and my duty to his memory. He would,
• 1:54:05
  Speaker 1: I know, have me look upon his journey to the
• 1:54:08
  Speaker 1: other side, in the light of a pilgrimage, gone upon bravely, cheerfully,
• 1:54:13
  Speaker 1: in perfect confidence by my side. Is a letter in
• 1:54:16
  Speaker 1: which he speaks of this attitude, in the course of
• 1:54:18
  Speaker 1: a reference to our day in the country. I have
• 1:54:21
  Speaker 1: been reading, he says, a volume of mister A. C.
• 1:54:24
  Speaker 1: Benson's essays procured from a circulating library, and am filled
• 1:54:28
  Speaker 1: with gratitude for their soothing influence. The following passage from
• 1:54:32
  Speaker 1: his essay on Beauty will recall the conversation we had
• 1:54:35
  Speaker 1: at our last meeting, our day in the country. Nature
• 1:54:40
  Speaker 1: has a magic for many of us, that is to say,
• 1:54:43
  Speaker 1: a secret power that strikes across our lives at intervals
• 1:54:46
  Speaker 1: with a message from an unknown region. And this message
• 1:54:50
  Speaker 1: is aroused by symbols a tree, a flash of light
• 1:54:54
  Speaker 1: on lonely clouds, a flower, a stream. Simple things that
• 1:54:59
  Speaker 1: we we have seen a thousand times have sometimes the
• 1:55:02
  Speaker 1: power to cast a spell over our spirit and to
• 1:55:05
  Speaker 1: bring something that is great and incommunicable near us. This
• 1:55:09
  Speaker 1: must be called magic, for it is not a thing
• 1:55:12
  Speaker 1: which can be explained by ordinary laws or defined in
• 1:55:15
  Speaker 1: precise terms. But the spell is there, real, insistent, undeniable.
• 1:55:23
  Speaker 1: It seems to make a bridge for the spirit to
• 1:55:25
  Speaker 1: pass into a far off, dimly apprehended region. It gives
• 1:55:29
  Speaker 1: us a sense of great issues and remote visions. It
• 1:55:32
  Speaker 1: leaves us with a longing which has no mortal fulfillment.
• 1:55:36
  Speaker 1: I mention this the letter continues, because it seems to
• 1:55:39
  Speaker 1: me to lead to certain deep issues of life about
• 1:55:41
  Speaker 1: which I have seldom spoken. I have always felt a
• 1:55:45
  Speaker 1: certain diffidence in touching upon matters relating to the soul
• 1:55:48
  Speaker 1: and the life hereafter. Yet I have not let others
• 1:55:51
  Speaker 1: do all the thinking. I have had my own thoughts,
• 1:55:55
  Speaker 1: my own visions. But after all, refined speculations are of
• 1:55:59
  Speaker 1: little use if there be not some tangible belief at
• 1:56:02
  Speaker 1: the back of them. I like the passage just quoted,
• 1:56:05
  Speaker 1: and I like the author's reference in another part of
• 1:56:08
  Speaker 1: the volume to the guarded city of life. But I
• 1:56:11
  Speaker 1: think the following passage makes the strongest appeal for all
• 1:56:15
  Speaker 1: may participate in the deep yet simple feelings expressed. What
• 1:56:19
  Speaker 1: are the thoughts of the mighty, unresting heart, to whose
• 1:56:22
  Speaker 1: vastness and agelessness the whole mass of these flying and
• 1:56:25
  Speaker 1: glowing suns are but as a handful of dust that
• 1:56:27
  Speaker 1: a boy flings upon the air. How has he set
• 1:56:30
  Speaker 1: me here, a tiny moving atom, yet more sure of
• 1:56:34
  Speaker 1: my own identity than I am of all the vast
• 1:56:36
  Speaker 1: panorama of things which lie outside of me? Has he
• 1:56:41
  Speaker 1: indeed a tender, impatient thought of me, the frail creature
• 1:56:46
  Speaker 1: whom he has molded and made? I do not doubt it.
• 1:56:50
  Speaker 1: I look upon the star sown spaces, and the old
• 1:56:53
  Speaker 1: aspiration rises in my heart. Oh that I knew where
• 1:56:56
  Speaker 1: I might find him, that I might come into his presence,
• 1:57:00
  Speaker 1: How would I go, like a tired and sorrowful child
• 1:57:03
  Speaker 1: to his father's knee, to be comforted and encouraged in
• 1:57:07
  Speaker 1: perfect trust and love, to be raised in his arms,
• 1:57:11
  Speaker 1: to be held to his heart? He would but look
• 1:57:13
  Speaker 1: in my face, and I should understand, without a question,
• 1:57:18
  Speaker 1: without a word. When I think of this passage in
• 1:57:21
  Speaker 1: others which were included in letters written by my friend
• 1:57:23
  Speaker 1: during his illness, I see clearly that he must have
• 1:57:26
  Speaker 1: realized that he stood on the brink of the unknown.
• 1:57:29
  Speaker 1: But no fears were expressed. Indeed, I gathered nothing from
• 1:57:34
  Speaker 1: his letters regarding his physical condition. He made no mention
• 1:57:37
  Speaker 1: of sickness or pain, drop, no hint of weariness. On
• 1:57:41
  Speaker 1: the contrary, the letters of which I speak struck a
• 1:57:43
  Speaker 1: deeper and truer note of cheerfulness and courage than any
• 1:57:46
  Speaker 1: previous communications from his hand. I like to think that
• 1:57:50
  Speaker 1: he continued, as of old to speak of his rose
• 1:57:53
  Speaker 1: colored spectacles his point of view. The secret of a
• 1:57:58
  Speaker 1: happy life, he remarks in the letter from which I
• 1:58:00
  Speaker 1: have just quoted, consists in immediately clearing away the specks
• 1:58:03
  Speaker 1: of dust which are so apt to fall upon one's
• 1:58:06
  Speaker 1: rose colored spectacles, the little annoyances, the petty worries, the
• 1:58:11
  Speaker 1: one hundred and one little dark specks, which I leave
• 1:58:13
  Speaker 1: you to name at your leisure. Then follows a deeper
• 1:58:16
  Speaker 1: note taken, I think from Epictetus. Happiness is not in strength,
• 1:58:21
  Speaker 1: or wealth, or power, or in all three. It lies
• 1:58:26
  Speaker 1: in ourselves, in true freedom, in the conquest of every
• 1:58:29
  Speaker 1: ignoble fear, in perfect self government, in a power of
• 1:58:33
  Speaker 1: contentment and peace, the even flow of life, even in poverty, exile, disease,
• 1:58:39
  Speaker 1: and the very valley of the shadow of death. So
• 1:58:43
  Speaker 1: you see, my friend continues, there are also dark fogs
• 1:58:47
  Speaker 1: and thick mists against which the would be cheerful man
• 1:58:50
  Speaker 1: must contend, deep trials compared to which our daily petty
• 1:58:54
  Speaker 1: annoyances are, indeed but specks of dust. But these too
• 1:58:57
  Speaker 1: may be overcome. The truth is, the cheerful life is
• 1:59:01
  Speaker 1: neither a matter of circumstance nor of temperament. It is
• 1:59:04
  Speaker 1: a gift of God, and we can covet no better gift.
• 1:59:08
  Speaker 1: The black hag of care can no longer sit on
• 1:59:10
  Speaker 1: the shoulder of the man whose cheerfulness is the child
• 1:59:13
  Speaker 1: of reason, not of impulse, whose heart is light because
• 1:59:17
  Speaker 1: he can trust, not because the sky is blue in
• 1:59:20
  Speaker 1: the world smiling. I wish I could give you some
• 1:59:23
  Speaker 1: account from personal knowledge of the way my friends spent
• 1:59:26
  Speaker 1: his last days. This I cannot do, for many miles
• 1:59:30
  Speaker 1: stood between us. But I am told by those who
• 1:59:33
  Speaker 1: nursed him that up till the end, his mind retained
• 1:59:35
  Speaker 1: its clearness and vigor, that he never ceased to take
• 1:59:38
  Speaker 1: an interest in his surroundings in the great world outside
• 1:59:41
  Speaker 1: his little room, in the many ill favored ones whom
• 1:59:44
  Speaker 1: he had befriended. Close by my side stands a shelf
• 1:59:48
  Speaker 1: upon which are stored a number of volumes from his library.
• 1:59:52
  Speaker 1: They are typical of his treasured collection, some of the
• 1:59:55
  Speaker 1: best of the world's best books, each volume showing signs
• 1:59:58
  Speaker 1: of much reading and meditation, each page bearing marginal notes,
• 2:00:03
  Speaker 1: original observations and thoughts from other sources, showing how one
• 2:00:07
  Speaker 1: great writer differed from others, or, in the main was
• 2:00:09
  Speaker 1: of like opinion with his contemporaries. Many of the observations
• 2:00:13
  Speaker 1: seemed to me to be remarkably fresh and interesting. Quite simple,
• 2:00:18
  Speaker 1: it is true, but of the type of simplicity that captivates.
• 2:00:22
  Speaker 1: I shall hope to set down some of these, together
• 2:00:24
  Speaker 1: with the passages to which they refer. Here is one
• 2:00:28
  Speaker 1: example which will serve to convey an idea of my
• 2:00:30
  Speaker 1: friend's manner of commenting upon an author's words. The passage
• 2:00:34
  Speaker 1: in point reads thus, when thou hast been compelled by
• 2:00:38
  Speaker 1: circumstances to be disturbed in a manner, quickly return to thyself,
• 2:00:42
  Speaker 1: and do not remain out of tune longer than the
• 2:00:44
  Speaker 1: compulsion lasts, for thou wilt have more mastery over the
• 2:00:48
  Speaker 1: harmony by continually recurring to it. By the side of
• 2:00:52
  Speaker 1: this written in lead pencil, or the following words. Might
• 2:00:55
  Speaker 1: not human life be compared to an orchestra composed of
• 2:00:58
  Speaker 1: all kinds of instruments. I mean that each of our
• 2:01:02
  Speaker 1: natures is so to say, an instrument some more pleasing
• 2:01:06
  Speaker 1: and seemingly more useful than others, but of equal value
• 2:01:10
  Speaker 1: when played in accord with the combined orchestra. And if we,
• 2:01:14
  Speaker 1: at any time drop out of tune, is it not
• 2:01:16
  Speaker 1: because we have failed to give our attention to the
• 2:01:18
  Speaker 1: great conductor of all. They tell me that towards the
• 2:01:22
  Speaker 1: end he referred repeatedly to the help he had derived
• 2:01:25
  Speaker 1: from keeping his spiritual vision clear, his faith unclouded. So
• 2:01:30
  Speaker 1: far as I can gather his closing words, were these
• 2:01:34
  Speaker 1: faith kept in lively exercise can make roses spring out
• 2:01:38
  Speaker 1: of the midst of thorns, and change the briers of
• 2:01:40
  Speaker 1: the wilderness into the fruit trees of paradise. End of
• 2:01:44
  Speaker 1: chapter thirteen, recording by Philip Gould, Chapter fourteen of Confessions
• 2:01:56
  Speaker 1: of a Book Lover by E. Walter Walters. This libri
• 2:02:00
  Speaker 1: acording is in the public domain. Recording by Philip Gould,
• 2:02:04
  Speaker 1: Chapter fourteen. Farewell, I have attained my desire. I have
• 2:02:10
  Speaker 1: introduced you to a true book lover. And if you
• 2:02:13
  Speaker 1: wonder why I have chosen a life shadowed by sorrow,
• 2:02:16
  Speaker 1: I answer that love comes that way. Tis no new
• 2:02:20
  Speaker 1: teaching that which shows how sorrow and tribulation are the
• 2:02:23
  Speaker 1: paths by which men travel to perfection. We start upon
• 2:02:27
  Speaker 1: life's journey with a glad cry, but many fall from
• 2:02:31
  Speaker 1: the ranks some distance from the first milestone. And fortunate
• 2:02:35
  Speaker 1: are the fallen ones who find an open book by
• 2:02:37
  Speaker 1: the wayside. It was thus the love of books came
• 2:02:40
  Speaker 1: to my friend of the rose colored spectacles. Shadows fell
• 2:02:44
  Speaker 1: across his path, and he fell from the ranks. But
• 2:02:47
  Speaker 1: out of the shadows came sweet voices telling of gentle
• 2:02:51
  Speaker 1: fancies and strength giving realities. This was the road, need
• 2:02:55
  Speaker 1: I hesitate in confessing it, upon which I too came
• 2:02:59
  Speaker 1: by the life of books. Oh how much we book
• 2:03:02
  Speaker 1: lovers owe to those little sheets of paper that teach us,
• 2:03:06
  Speaker 1: comfort us, open their hearts to us. As brothers. We
• 2:03:11
  Speaker 1: ought to, and surely do, reverence books, to look upon
• 2:03:15
  Speaker 1: them as good and mighty things. Whether they are about
• 2:03:18
  Speaker 1: religion or politics, farming, trade or medicine, they are messages
• 2:03:25
  Speaker 1: of the teacher of all truth. More cannot be said.
• 2:03:29
  Speaker 1: And so farewell, fellow book lover. May you find upon
• 2:03:33
  Speaker 1: the way many wise and friendly books. But wait, I hear,
• 2:03:38
  Speaker 1: as though voiced in clear tones, the beautiful passage to
• 2:03:41
  Speaker 1: be found in the little book. Friend, whose name is
• 2:03:44
  Speaker 1: on so many lips, Let me follow the pleasing example
• 2:03:47
  Speaker 1: of my friend of the rose colored spectacles. Let me
• 2:03:51
  Speaker 1: echo the brief passage before I take leave of you.
• 2:03:54
  Speaker 1: It is scarcely farewell, for my road is ubiquitous eternal,
• 2:03:59
  Speaker 1: their green ways in Paradise and golden streets in the
• 2:04:02
  Speaker 1: beautiful City of God. Nevertheless, my heart is heavy, for,
• 2:04:07
  Speaker 1: viewed by the light of the waning year, road mending
• 2:04:10
  Speaker 1: seems a great and wonderful work which I have poorly
• 2:04:13
  Speaker 1: conceived of and meanly performed. Yet I have learned to
• 2:04:17
  Speaker 1: understand dimly the truths of the three paradoxes, the blessing
• 2:04:22
  Speaker 1: of a curse, the voice of silence, the companionship of solitude.
• 2:04:27
  Speaker 1: And so take my leave of this stretch of the road,
• 2:04:30
  Speaker 1: and of you who have fared along the White Highway
• 2:04:33
  Speaker 1: through the medium of a printed page. End of chapter fourteen,
• 2:04:38
  Speaker 1: recording by Philip Goul End of Confessions of a Book
• 2:04:41
  Speaker 1: Lover by E. Walter Walters