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Show gafbclics and the gboicc of BocUs l-'ieo-n years ago the Rev. J. F. X. OVonor, s. J., then professor of poetry at Georgetown university, in a discussion discus-sion o books and reading, inquired: "Would it be untrue or unkind to say t!)- t "ai holies have not attended to l-t'-rature as they should?" So lar ;s this neglect came from a ca:e of i he more necessary, the more it! portLtit and higher duties of life, Pa tin-i- oo.nor admitted no blame sl'"uid l,e attached, but he suspected Jhat oft.n real literature was spurned for trash. "The most sensational and i:s'-l.-ss authors," he declared, "from 'lime novels to Wiikie Collins and ''hark.; u,.;,..; wju i,e devoured, but m. amiir,-. the great masters of Eng- fiish thought wjj e ignored, and even their very names unknown." 1 Since thf-s words were written there j h- s been a great change in the reading I hiibits and lastfs flf American Catho- A little investigation this sum- I "i' r induced a great publishing house je haime their front from one of po-ir,di!Terenc.- t: one of actual revis- j' n where Catholics had protested I fca:i.st passages in a cyclopaedia, this, 1 iticj.lent illustrating perfectly how I ' if. ,h,. change has been. Publishers "id not know it had taken place until 1 I '-- looked it up. j I Multiniyjngf educational agencies, a ! Pieat national university, 'summer j J setK(MSi reading circles, club lectures. 4 jnurishing magazines of literary qual- j I "'. publishing houses. increasing lro;rinencp of individual Catholics as j Y,'it,,,'s. e-ditors and critics:, all these j (,"v,-lopmcnts both foster the reading ''Rbit and testify to its existence. I p.Su' h addresses, however, as that of i J'ishop Spalding of Peoria at the con- I vottion of educators in Chicago this j I Rummer, in which he called for great I 'rained experts to represent Catholicism I 'n the highest work of every field. "'a to be Eupplcmented by continued j ! i adjuration to the ordinary, every-day, average Catholic, the business man, as well as the member of a profession, the office secretary, as well as her sister who teaches in the high school, the stay-at-home, as well as the gad-about, that he (and she) should know the great books of all time, the prime necessities of life. If Catholics are to acquit themselves creditably in the new era of toleration and good feeling, when Americans of all creeds greet one another an-other cordially in the mart, in the political po-litical conference, and in the forum of newspaper discussion, as well as in the more ornamental functions of life, is there any mental equipment, any enrichment" en-richment" of thought, too good for Catholics? Father O'Conor's warning against trash necessary when he uttered it, and alas! necessary, no doubt, yesterday, yester-day, today and forever, gains its force in the main from the tendency of human hu-man nature to gape with bulging eyes at whatever is in plain sight instead of I diligently seeking those things which ! pre best worth having. People read new books because they are new, or because they are advertised noisily. ! When an excuse is offered it is that j they desire to "keep up with the I times!" In order to show how absurd this is one needs only suggest that if . these readers would begin at the be-j be-j ginning of the great literatures they I wpuld lind themselves 3,000 years be-. I hind the times, and the new novel for I which they so feverishly rush would not, in its proper order, be reached in j this life. Nor is the new-book fad the only illogical and shallow restriction by ! which readers suffer themselves to be stunted. "Happily." said the pastoral letter of the third plenary council, "the Store of Catholic literature, as well as works which, though not written by Catholics nor treating of religion, are pure, instructive and elevating, Is now so large that there can be no excuse ex-cuse for running risk or wasting one s time with what is inferior, tainted or susnicious." It is quite natural that Catholics should be drawn by association associa-tion and by Hearing of them to the works of Catholic wrfters. just as any other special interest carries with it a bodv of special literature, some of it eminent., some not; but it has now been long recognized that for a Catholic to deprive himself of general literature by forming the "Catholic-list "Catholic-list habit" serves neither the church nor his own mind. In 1860, with the sanction and blessing of the holy see. certain English Eng-lish Catholics under the patronage of the cardinal archbishop of Winchester and the English, Irish and Scotch hierarchies, founded the St. Anselm's society, the chief aim of which is the selection of non-Catholic books for Catholic reading. The late Professor George E. Hardy made a list of "Five Hundred Books for the Young," mainly non-Catholic. Mrs. Margaret Mooney of the Albany, N. Y., Normal college, contributed a list of Catholic and non-Catholic non-Catholic works for the young to Mosh-er's Mosh-er's Magazine (January, 1S39.) The catalogue of the Cathedral library in New York contains a broad list of works prized by every one and unobjectionable unob-jectionable to Catholics.! j That newness, however, and Catholic authorship, are not the only illogical restrictions which readers may place upon their choice is obvious enough from the titles of text-books divers and sundry. "American literature." Wrhat is it? Is there any reasonable significance, signifi-cance, for instance, to a classification which should call Bret Harte and Harold Har-old Frederic "American" authors, when they wrote chiefly in London? "English literature" is not so narrow and may be convenient for the purposes of the class room, but with translations available avail-able of all important works of general literature from every tongue, what clear-headed reader determined upon making himself a cultivated member of society, would otherwise than browse among all the books there are? There is in the Boston public library, li-brary, number 6129.32, a little book six inches by four with seventy-six pages, which contains' a descriptive catalogue of books. It omits Newman, Wiseman, Azarias and others (Aristotle, (Aristo-tle, for instance), but it is worth owning, own-ing, because it has a good title. It is called "Books of All Time." From Addison to Thomas Bailey Aldrich, from-Bacon -to-Charlotte Bronte: Cervantes, Cer-vantes, Goethe, Dante, Virgil. Thomas Aquinas, Homer, King David, Augustine, Augus-tine, Plutarch: is anything too good? Probably 100 titles would cover the pieces of writing which an educated , man (college-bved or self-bred) absolutely abso-lutely must Jnow. At one book a week this means two years. Is there anybody any-body who can afford to put off for another an-other winter the perusal of those 100 books? The Republic. Boston. |
