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by an anal) fi3 of your own, or by hints in tke margin ; if 

 thofe things are heaped together, which ftioiild be feparated, 

 dlflinguitb and divide them. If feveral things relating to 

 the fame fubjeft are fcattered through variovis parts of the 

 fame treatife, let them be brought together into one 

 view, by fuitable references ; or if the matter of a book be 

 really valuable and dcferving the labour, you may arrange it 

 in a better method, reduce it to a more logical fcheme, or 

 abridge it into a leifer fonn. All thefe praftices will have a 

 tendency to advance your owo ikill in logic and method, to 

 improve your ju igment in general, and to give you a more 

 comprchenfive furvey of that fubjecl in particular. When 

 you have finifhed the treatife, with all your obftrvations upon 

 it, recolleft and determine what real improvements you have 

 made by reading that author. If a book have no index, or 

 good table of contents, it is ufeful to make fuch as you are 

 reading it ; taking notice merely of thole parts which are 

 newand well written, and wtU worthy of remembrance, or re- 

 view. If the writer be remarkable for any peculiar excel- 

 lencies, or defects in his Ilylc, or maimer of writing, atten- 

 tively obferve them, and whatever ornaments or blemifhes 

 t jcur in the language, or manner of the writer, you may 

 make juft remarks upon them. One book pcrnfed in the 

 manner now propofed, will tend more to enrich the under- 

 Handing, than ikimming over the furtace of 20 authors. 

 " There are many who read," fays the exc lleiit author of 

 whofe ufeful obfeivations we are now availing 0111 Iclves, (fee 

 Watts's Improvement of* the Mind) " with conlf:uicv and 

 diligence, and yet make no advances in true knowledge by 

 it. They are delighted with the notion^ which they read, 

 or hear, as they would be with ftories that are told, but they 

 do not weigh them in their minds as in a juft b?.lance, in 

 order to determine their truth, or falfhood ; they make no 

 obfervations upon them, or inference from them. Perhaps 

 their eye Aides over the pages, or the words flldc over their 

 ears, and vSnilb like a rhapfody of evening tales, or the 

 [hadows of a cloud flying over a green field in a lummer's 

 day ; or, if they review tliem fufRcieiitly to fix them in their 

 remembrance, it is merely with a defign to tell the tale over 

 again, and to {hew what men of learning they are. Thus 

 they dream out their days in a courfe of reading without real 

 advantage. As a man may be e?ting all day, and for want 

 of digeilion is never nourifhed ; fo thefe endlefs readers may 

 cram themfelves in vain with intelletlual food, and without 

 real improvement of their minds, for want of digefting it_by 

 proper refleftion." 



" Never apply yourfclvps," fays the fame writer, " to 

 read any human author with a determination, before-liand, 

 either for or againft him, or with a fettled refolution to 

 believe, or dilbelieve, to confirm, or oppofe whalfoever he 

 faith ; but always read with a defign to lay your mind open 

 to truth, and to embrace it whereloever you find it, as well 

 as to rejeft every falfhood, though it appear under never fo 

 fair a difguife. How unhappy are fhoie men, who feldom 

 take an author in their hands, but they have determined be- 

 fore they begin, whether they will like or diflike him ! They 

 have got fome notion of his name, his charafter, his party, 

 or his principles, hygeneral converfation, or perhaps by fome 

 flight view of a few pages ; and having all their own opi- 

 nions adjufted before -hand, they read all that he writes with 

 a prepoffcflion either for or againtt him : unhappy thofe 

 who hunt and purvey for a party, and fcrape together out of 

 every author, all thofe things, and thofe only which favour 

 their own tenets, while thty defpife and negleft all the reft !" 

 The author fubjojns an ufeful caution ; and wilhes not to 

 be underftood, as perluading a r>erfoii to live without any 

 fettled principles, by which to judge of books, men, an4 



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things, or to be always doubting about his foundations. Buf 

 having fettled, upon good grounds, the moit neceflary and 

 important principles of fcience, prudence, and religion, v: 

 (hould read, with a juft freedom of thought, all thofe books 

 which treat of fuch fubjeCis as may admit of doubt, or 

 reafonable difpute. When we perufe thofe authors who 

 defend our own fettled fentimenta, we fnould not hallily 

 conclude that all their reafonings are juft and folld ; nor 

 eagerly embrace all their leffer opinions, btcaufe wc a^r-e 

 with them in the greater. When we read thole authors 

 who oppofe our moft certain and eftablifited principles, we 

 fhould be ready to receive any information from them in 

 other points, and not abandon every thing they fay, though 

 we arc well fixed in oppofition to their main object : 

 " Seize upon truth where-e'er 'tis found, 



Amongft your friends, amongft your toes. 



On Chrillian, or on heathen ground ; 



The flower's divine where-e'er it grows ; 



Negled the prickles, and alTume the role." 

 Upon the plan of reading above ftated and recommended, 

 a few books well chofen, and thoroughly ftudied, may fuf- 

 fice. It may be added, that as knowledge is naturally ad- 

 vantaereous, and as ever)' man ov.ght to he in the way of in- 

 formation, even a fuperfluity of books is not without its 

 ufe, fince hereby they a'e brought to obtrude themfelves 

 on us, and engage us when we had leaft delign. This 

 advantagf, ■>" ancient father obkrves, we owe to the multi- 

 plicity of books on the fame tubjeCT, that one falls in the way 

 of one man, and another beft fuits the K-vel, or the appre- 

 henfion, of another. " Every tiling that is written," fays 

 he, " does not come into the hands of all perfons : perhaps 

 fome may meet with my books, who may hear nothing of 

 others which have treated better of the fame fubjeCl. It is 

 of fervice, therefore, that the fame quellions be handled by 

 feveral perfons, and after different methods, though all on 

 the fame principles, that the explications of difficulties, and 

 arguments for the truth, may come to the knowledge of 

 every one, by one way or other." Add, that the multitude 

 is the onl) fecurity againft the total lofs or deftruction of 

 books : it is this that has preferved them againft the injuries 

 of time, the rage of tyrants, the zeal of perfecutors, and 

 the ravages of barbarians ; and handed them down, through 

 long intervals of darknefs and ignorance, fafe to our days. 

 " Solaque non norunt ha:c monumenta mori." Bac. de 

 Augm. Sc. lib.i. Auguft. de Trin. lib. i. cap. 3. Barthol. 

 lib. cit. Difl". i. p. 8, &c. 



Books, tie fcardty fjf, is an evil much more to be la- 

 mented, in the furvey of part ages, than their multitude at 

 any later period. Before the art of printing was invented, 

 the trouble and expence of procurins; copies very much re- 

 tarded the progrefs of literature. The univcrfal ignorance 

 that prevailed in Europe, from the feventh to the eleventh 

 century, may be afcribed to the fcarcity of books during 

 that period, and the difficulty of rendering them more com- 

 mon, concurring with other caufes arifing from the ftate of 

 government and manners. The Romans wrote their books 

 either on parchment, or on paper made of the Egyptian pa- 

 pyrus. The latter, being the cheapeft, was of courfe the 

 moft commonly ufed. But after the Saracens conquered 

 Egypt, in the feventh century, the communication between 

 that countr)' and the people fettled in Italy, or in other 

 parts of Europe, was almoft entirely broken off, and the 

 papyrus was no longer in ufe among them. They were ob- 

 liged on that account to write all their books upon parch- 

 ment ; and as the price of that was high, books became ex- 

 tremely rare and of great value. We may judge of the 

 fcarcity of materials for writing them from one circumftance. 

 5 G 2 There 



