But it happens in our experience, that
in this lottery there are at least fifty or a hundred blanks to a
prize. It seems, then, as if some charitable soul, after losing a
great deal of time among the false books, and alighting upon a few
true ones which made him happy and wise, would do a right act in
naming those which have been bridges or ships to carry him safely
over dark morasses and barren oceans, into the heart of sacred cities,
into palaces and temples. This would be best done by those great
masters of books who from time to time appear,--the Fabricii, the
Seldens, Magliabecchis, Scaligers, Mirandolas, Bayles, Johnsons,
whose eyes sweep the whole horizon of learning. But private readers,
reading purely for love of the book, would serve us by leaving each
the shortest note of what he found.
There are books, and it is practicable to read them, because they
are so few. We look over with a sigh the monumental libraries of
Paris, of the Vatican, and the British Museum. In the Imperial
Library at Paris, it is commonly said, there are six hundred
thousand volumes, and nearly as many manuscripts; and perhaps the
number of extant printed books may be as many as these numbers united,
or exceeding a million. It is easy to count the number of pages
which a diligent man can read in a day, and the number of years
which human life in favorable circumstances allows to reading; and
to demonstrate, that, though he should read from dawn till dark, for
sixty years, he must die in the first alcoves.
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