upon us in times of adversity or distress. It always receives us
with the same kindness; amusing and instructing us in youth, and
comforting and consoling us in age.

Men often discover their affinity to each other by the mutual love
they have for a book--just as two persons sometimes discover a
friend by the admiration which both entertain for a third. There
is an old proverb, "Love me, love my dog." But there is more
wisdom in this: "Love me, love my book." The book is a truer and
higher bond of union. Men can think, feel, and sympathise with
each other through their favourite author. They live in him
together, and he in them.

"Books," said Hazlitt, "wind into the heart; the poet's verse
slides into the current of our blood. We read them when young, we
remember them when old. We read there of what has happened to
others; we feel that it has happened to ourselves. They are to be
had everywhere cheap and good. We breathe but the air of books.
We owe everything to their authors, on this side barbarism."

A good book is often the best urn of a life, enshrining the best
thoughts of which that life was capable; for the world of a man's
life is, for the most part, but the world of his thoughts. Thus
the best books are treasuries of good words and golden thoughts,
which, remembered and cherished, become our abiding companions and
comforters. "They are never alone," said Sir Philip Sidney, "that
are accompanied by noble thoughts." The good and true thought may
in time of temptation be as an angel of mercy purifying and
guarding the soul. It also enshrines the germs of action, for
good words almost invariably inspire to good works.