It costs nothing in money; it is
all profit; it completes our education, founds and fosters
our friendships, and can be enjoyed at any age and in
almost any state of health.
*
And it happens that literature is, in some ways, but an
indifferent means to such an end. Language is but a poor
bull's-eye lantern wherewith to show off the vast cathedral
of the world; and yet a particular thing once said in words
is so definite and memorable, that it makes us forget the
absence of. the many which remain unexpressed; like a
bright window in a distant view, which dazzles and confuses
our sight of its surroundings. There are not words enough
in all Shakespeare to express the merest fraction of a
man's experience in an hour. The speed of the eyesight and
the hearing, and the continual industry of the mind,
produce; in ten minutes, what it would require a laborious
volume to shadow forth by comparisons and roundabout
approaches. If verbal logic were sufficient, life would be
as plain sailing as a piece of Euclid. But, as a matter of
fact, we make a travesty of the simplest process of thought
when we put it into words; for the words are all coloured
and forsworn, apply inaccurately, and bring with them, from
former uses, ideas of praise and blame that have nothing to
do with the question in hand. So we must always see to it
nearly, that we judge by the realities of life and not by
the partial terms that represent them in man's speech; and
at times of choice, we must leave words upon one side, and
act upon those brute convictions, unexpressed and perhaps
inexpressible, which cannot be flourished in an argument,
but which are truly the sum and fruit of our experience.
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