218 THE JONATHAN PAPERS 



volume of Malory.) Thus read, thus slowly 

 woven among the intricacies and distractions 

 of our life, these precious books will link its 

 quiet moments together and lend to it a cer 

 tain quality of largeness, of deliberation, of 

 continuity. 



For it is surely a mistake to assume, as 

 people so often do, that in a life full of dis 

 tractions one should read only such things as 

 can be finished at a single sitting and that a 

 short one. It is a great misfortune to read 

 only books that &quot;must be returned within 

 five days.&quot; For my part, I should like to see 

 in our public libraries, to offset the shelves of 

 such books, other shelves, labeled &quot;Books 

 that may and should be kept out six months.&quot; 

 I would have there Thackeray and George 

 Eliot and Wordsworth and Spenser, Malory 

 and Homer and Cervantes and Shakespeare 

 and Montaigne oh, they should be shelves 

 to rejoice the soul of the harassed reader ! 



No, if one can read but little, let him by all 

 means read something big. I know a woman 

 occupied with the demands of a peculiarly 

 exigent social position. Finding her one day 

 reading &quot;The Tempest,&quot; I remarked on her 



