In Praise of Books: A Vade Mecum for Book-loversPerkins book Company, 1901 - 117 pages |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 6
Page 27
... wonder by feats which only oddly combine acts that we do every day . There is no new element , no power , no furtherance . " Tis only confectionery , not the raising of new corn . Great is the poverty of their inventions . She was ...
... wonder by feats which only oddly combine acts that we do every day . There is no new element , no power , no furtherance . " Tis only confectionery , not the raising of new corn . Great is the poverty of their inventions . She was ...
Page 43
... wonder at what men suffer , but he often wonders at what they lose . We suffer much , no doubt , from the faults of others , but we lose much more by our own ignorance . " If , " says Sir John Herschel , " I were to pray for a taste ...
... wonder at what men suffer , but he often wonders at what they lose . We suffer much , no doubt , from the faults of others , but we lose much more by our own ignorance . " If , " says Sir John Herschel , " I were to pray for a taste ...
Page 45
... wonder to me that it is so little read . With Epictetus I think must come Marcus Aurelius . The Analects of Confucius will , I believe , prove disappointing to most English readers , but the effect IN PRAISE OF BOOKS . 45.
... wonder to me that it is so little read . With Epictetus I think must come Marcus Aurelius . The Analects of Confucius will , I believe , prove disappointing to most English readers , but the effect IN PRAISE OF BOOKS . 45.
Page 74
... wonder that anyone who has read The History of a Foundling should labor under an indigestion ; nor do we comprehend how a perusal of the Faery Queen should not insure to the true believer an uninterrupted succession of halcyon days . If ...
... wonder that anyone who has read The History of a Foundling should labor under an indigestion ; nor do we comprehend how a perusal of the Faery Queen should not insure to the true believer an uninterrupted succession of halcyon days . If ...
Page 84
... wonder that our fathers and grandfathers talked of these men as something only a little lower than the gods . A congenial book can be taken up by any lover of books , with the certainty of its transporting the reader within a few ...
... wonder that our fathers and grandfathers talked of these men as something only a little lower than the gods . A congenial book can be taken up by any lover of books , with the certainty of its transporting the reader within a few ...
Other editions - View all
In Praise of Books: A Vade Mecum for Book-Lovers Ralph Waldo Emerson,John Lubbock,Perkins Book Company No preview available - 2023 |
Common terms and phrases
Analects of Confucius Aristophanes Aristotle authors Bacon beautiful bring century charming cheerful comfort Confucius dæmons Dante delight Demosthenes doubt Earl Spencer EMERSON English enjoy enjoyment entertainment Essays eyes famed books Fathers feel friends genius give greatest Greek happiness heart Homer Horace human hundred imagination important inestimable interesting John Herschel JOHN LYLYE Johnson knowledge learning literature living Lord lover of books LUBBOCK Macaulay master Milton mind modern Molière Montaigne Nature never novel opinion orators perhaps Phædo philosopher Plato pleasure Plutarch poem poetry poets readers rich RICHARD DE BURY Ruskin says scholar Scott selection sentiment Shakespeare Sir John SIR JOHN LUBBOCK society Socrates solitude soul spirits Synesius taste things Thomas à Kempis thought thousand tion translations Vishnu Sarma weary well-furnished library wisdom wise wisest writing Younger Edda
Popular passages
Page 100 - ... here, and audience there, when all the while this eternal court is open to you, with its society, wide as the world, multitudinous as its days, the chosen, and the mighty, of every place and time...
Page 75 - No matter how poor I am ; no matter though the prosperous of my own time will not enter my obscure dwelling. If the sacred writers will enter and take...
Page 71 - Dreams, books, are each a world ; and books, we know, Are a substantial world, both pure and good : Round these, with tendrils strong as flesh and blood, Our pastime and our happiness will grow.
Page 12 - The mathematics and the metaphysics, Fall to them as you find your stomach serves you ; No profit grows where is no pleasure ta'en : In brief, sir, study what you most affect.
Page 100 - ... book is worth anything which is not worth much; nor is it serviceable, until it has been read, and re-read, and loved, and loved again ; and marked, so that you can refer to the passages you want in it, as a soldier can seize the weapon he needs in an armoury, or a housewife bring the spice she needs from her store.
Page 99 - Lecture says, or tries to say, that, life being very short, and the quiet hours of it few, we ought to waste none of them in reading valueless books ; and that valuable books should, in a civilized country, be within the reach of every one, printed in excellent form, for a just price ; but not in any vile, vulgar, or, by reason of smallness of type, physically injurious form, at a vile price.
Page 99 - Except a living man there is nothing more wonderful than a book ! — a message to us from the dead, — from human souls whom we never saw, who lived, perhaps, thousands of miles away; and yet these, in those little sheets of paper, speak to us, amuse us, terrify us, teach us, comfort us, open their hearts to us as brothers.
Page 66 - Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it.
Page 43 - Give a man this taste, and the means of gratifying it, and you can hardly fail of making him a happy man, unless, indeed, you put into his hands a most perverse selection of books.
Page 90 - Next to the originator of a good sentence is the first quoter of it. Many will read the book before one thinks of quoting a passage. As soon as he has done this, that line will be quoted east and west.