74 THROUGH LIBRARY WINDOWS 



it is the companionship of books is like that of 

 intellectual and refined people, inducing social 

 ease, giving wider outlooks, increasing knowl- 

 edge and creating deep hunger for life's best 

 things. 



Fiction may and indeed must deal with the 

 darker side of life, for it has its darker side, 

 but it should shed light just where light is 

 needed, it should flash the radiance of hope into 

 the face of the most hopeless and inspire cour- 

 age. A book that fails in this, fails at its most 

 vital point and is itself a most dismal failure. 

 The bitterest blight of life may be touched into 

 health and beauty by the ennobled spirit, the 

 most wretched may be lifted into companion- 

 ship, the farthest gone may be brought back — i 

 so He says and true fiction must in some way 

 involve His life and His truth if it be in any 

 way helpful to the overburdened. Be it re- 

 membered that life is more than literature, and 

 all true literature is but interpretive of life, re- 

 vealing its powers, gilding its possibilities, 

 opening doors of opportunity and urging in- 

 stant decisions. Literature is the mirror in 

 which the soul learns to recognize its own linea- 

 ments and sense its deeper needs. We cannot 

 separate the influences of literature from the 

 growth of society and civilization. In fact it is 



