8o THROUGH LIBRARY WINDOWS 



These books of power which live that human- 

 ity may not die, and books of use, which die 

 that other books may live, divide literature be- 

 tween them. They constitute the warp and 

 woof out of which the great universities weave 

 their higher education. In its last analysis a 

 liberal training is the mastery of books of use, 

 and a glad yielding to the mastery of books of 

 power. 



The survival of any literature is its justifica- 

 tion for being. Religion and literature cannot 

 be divorced from each other, nor from life. 

 Both find their right to be in what they can do 

 for the world. Literature reflects the moral 

 quality of society. Life and literature act and 

 react upon each other beneficially. The litera- 

 ture that lives must come from good sources, 

 from throbbing brains and palpitating hearts. 

 Coleridge has somewhere said, that wherever 

 you find a sentence musically worded, of true 

 rhythm and melody, there is something deep 

 and good in the meaning, too. For body and 

 soul, word and idea, go strangely together here 

 as everywhere. There has never been a time 

 when the sway of literature has been so univer- 

 sal and powerful, so reflective of the common 

 life. There is no point in life which it does not 

 touch, there is no relation that it does not ad- 



