Show comments from dixie by E A DAVIS cleveland tenn fixation of thought in permanent form is man s most wonderful ace acc his cities vanish his governments fall his lus most massive monuments crumble and decay but ins his books the children of his brain live on said charles kingsley ex capt a living man there is nothing more wonderful than a book a mes sage from the dead from human souls whom we never saw who lived perhaps thousands of miles away and yet these on little sheets of pa per speak to us amuse vivify us teach us comfort us open their hearts to us as brothers milton in his confirms wh h at we all should know from exper cence that books have the power vutha themselves to stir in the hear ts its of their readers the same ses that stir the hearts of those who write them outside his book an auth or is but clay in his book he rises as it were from the grave and walks side by side with us through life talking to us from the page on which his thoughts were breathed ho how quiet how modest he is as un obtrusive as the falling twilight he smites the wrong but loves the right he blows knows how to help us when we are wrestling with life s great est problem though few may have cared to hear his spoken words mil lions now listen intently for the beat ing of his heart through the printed page nine cities claim him dead through which the living homer begged his bread any person with average intelligence can enter a library and without money or price commune with wise st souls who ever lived if I 1 am in perplexity or doubt I 1 can go to the library and call any number of wise counselors counce lors to aid they come w will angly at my call they listen to my doubts and perplexities and oad then in the kindest way tell me ine their con dictions vict ions no mowing took look no prying questions no scolding for example perhaps I 1 can ask ast one of these wise men to help me express better what I 1 am trying to tell you about the tremendous importance to us of the aliveness and immortal ity of books almost nine hundred years ago a lonely monk wrote our house is empty save only my self and the rats and mice who nib ble in solitary hunger there is no voice oice in the hall no tread on the stairs the clock has stopped the pump creaks no more but I 1 sit here with no company but put books dipping into dainty honeycombs of literature all minds in the worlds history find their focus in a library this is the pinnacle of the temple from which we may see all the king doms of the he world and the glory of them I 1 keep egypt and the holy land in the closet next the window 01 the side of them are athens and the empire of rome never was such an army mustered as I 1 have here no general ever had such soldiers as I 1 no kingdom ever bad had half such illustrious subjects ps mine or half hall s well governed I 1 can put my haughtiest subject up or down as it pleases me I 1 can call plato and he answers berea here a noble and sturdy soldier aristotle here a host in himself demos thenes cicero caesar tacitus pliny here they answer and they smile at me in their immert aliby of youth modest all they never i speak unless spoken to bountiful all they never refuse to answer and they are all at peace together my architects are building night and day without sound of hammer my painters designing my poets singing my philosophers discoursing my hist orjans anc theologians weaving their tapestries petres ta my generals marching about without noise pr blood I 1 hold all egypt ui pi fee simple I 1 built not a city but empires at a 4 word I 1 can say as gis much of all the orient as he be aho vho was sent to grass did of babylon AH all the world is around me all that ever aver stirred human hearts or fired the ilaga aaion is harmlessly here my library shelves are the avenues of time ages have wrought generations grown and all their blossoms are cast down here it is the garden of immortal ortal fruit without dog or drag on orl in view of the fact most people read less than a book a year is it any wonder someone has said what fools these mortals be |