e.'--
PROVERBS xiii. 20.

IT is one of the tragedies of the book-collector's life that he is made
aware continually of the deficiencies of his collection. Every
bookseller's catalogue that he takes up reveals these lacunae; and even
after many years of diligent book-hunting, when he can look upon his
library with no small pride and has come to regard it as being more or
less complete (for his own purposes, that is), some intimate friend to
whom he is displaying his treasures will ask to see some well-known book,
and he will be obliged to confess that he does not possess a copy. The
reason probably is either that he has collected books upon no definite
system, or that he has lost sight of the many works which his library
should contain, through having confined himself too rigidly to
specialism.

Both practices are bad, though the former is infinitely the worse. To
collect books indiscriminately tends to develop the dread bibliomania. To
specialise in a particular class of books should be the object of every
collector; but to adhere so rigidly to that one class of literature as to
exclude from our library the great books of the world, is to deprive
ourselves of all the advantages which a library can offer. 'There are
some books, as Homer, Virgil, Horace, Milton, Shakespeare, and Scott,
which every man should read who has the opportunity; should read, mark,
learn and inwardly digest. To neglect the opportunity of becoming
familiar with them, is deliberately to sacrifice the position in the
social scale which an ordinary education enables its possessor to
reach.'[20] What a number of famous names one can add, without which no
library worthy the name can be complete! We are not all such sages as
that great man Philip Melanchthon, whose library is said to have
consisted of four authors only, namely, Plato, Pliny, Plutarch, and
Ptolemy the geographer. But then, these are whole libraries in
themselves.

Who, beside ourselves, shall decide what we shall read? 'A man's reading,
to be of any value,' wrote Professor Blackie, 'must depend upon his power
of association; and that again depends upon his tendencies, his
capacities, his surroundings, and his opportunities.' But there are some
authors whom the world has decided are great, whom we cannot possibly
afford to neglect in the course of our literary education. There can be
no doubt as to our decision here; and although it has been said trul