that contributes most to permanent and satisfying work. Let this antecedent culture be once established, and the desirable virtue of rapidity is an easily developed ability, while its evil tendencies are forestalled and avoided.

The Habit of seeking Independent Conclusions. By this is meant that the writer should rely on his own mind's achievements rather than on hearsay. The view of truth that he adopts should be a conviction on which he can lean his whole weight. Of course he must get many of his facts from what others have written, nor should he neglect these; but he should so verify them in experience and vivify them in the realizing imagination that they shall become his own possession and represent his genuine conviction. As far as it has come to a new life in his own discovery, so far let him assert, no farther. He may not see so much, nor so vividly, nor so comprehensively, as another; but what he sees he sees independently. And this is truly invention, because it is thought fused anew in a sincere mind; but when a man writes beyond the focus of his real vision, he is only an echo of other men's assertions.

Along with this the writer needs to develop confidence in his own judgment and his own well-considered conclusions. This is very hard for young writers. They are too timid to strike out for themselves, and are argued out of or into any belief by the last article they have read. A fact natural enough, perhaps, and a wholesome bar to foolhardy rashness of assertion. But it is to be remembered that the significance of one's writing at all lies in his reaching some new landing-place in the onward sweep of thought. He who depends on manufacturing a patchwork out of other men's views soon becomes so at the mercy of others that he has no opinion of his own; while on the other hand he who has reached most confidence in the well-tested deliverances of his own judgment is most benefited by others' ideas as well as most satisfying to his readers.

Ability to hold Judgments in Abeyance. The merit of youthful writers is vigor and directness; their fault, to be overcome by

ripening judgment, is rashness and one-sided assertion. To such minds it is peculiarly painful to be in want of decision or of definite opinions; it seems to indicate weakness and vacillation. And of course there is an excess of painful incertitude to be deprecated. But there are many things that will not bear to be settled by snapjudgment and dismissed as if the last word were said. They require patience, cautious investigation, stern repression of hasty opinion, determination to be wary of first appearances. It is often a real strength of mind and true moral courage to hold decisions in abeyance, to confess uncertainty, to acknowledge how slender are the grounds for a conclusion.

The ripened judgment that enables one to tolerate an uncertain conclusion, is the fruit both of sound culture and of extended experience. It succeeds the heats of youth; and, so far from being inimical to vigor and directness, it leads, rightly developed, to a calmer strength, to a conviction moving when it moves with the momentum of depth and thoroughness.

The foregoing considerations will serve to show how truly the author's career is made up not only of endeavor and achievement, but equally of travail and self-denial. He must learn repression as well as expression. And his only basis of lasting excellence is the recognition, in all his work, that the instruction of men through literature imposes a solemn responsibility, demanding the best employment of all that he can become, by natural endowments and by sound discipline.

III.

Habits of Reading. It is not the purpose here to speak of books and reading in general, nor yet to speak directly of what is called "reading up" for some particular literary task; the object is rather to consider habits of reading as an aid to invention.

Creative Reading." Reading," says Burke," and much reading, is good. But the power of diversifying the matter infinitely in your own mind, and of applying it to every occasion that arises,

is far better." To be an aid to invention, reading must be conducted, according to the suggestion of this quotation, in the attitude of invention; that is, while the reader is receptive, while he is being acted upon by what he is reading, he is at the same time originative, vigorously acting on the same subject-matter, shaping it into a new product, according to the color and capacity of his own mind. To such active reading may be given the name, borrowed from Emerson, of "creative reading." Mr. Emerson says:1

"One must be an inventor to read well. As the proverb says, 'He that would bring home the wealth of the Indies, must carry out the wealth of the Indies.' There is then creative reading as well as creative writing. When the mind is braced by labor and invention, the page of whatever book we read becomes luminous with manifold allusion. Every sentence is doubly significant, and the sense of our author is as broad as the world."

The habit of reading creatively is what distinguishes the scholar from the book-worm, and the thinker from the listless absorber of print. It is the increasing predominance of this latter class of readers that makes the present enormous multiplication of literature a doubtful blessing. Reading can easily become a mental dissipation. There is many a full mind, charged to the brim with printed matter, crammed with vast stores of book-lore; which mind, nevertheless, so far as fruitful thought is concerned, is worthless, being only an insatiable absorber, and having no impulse to creation. Reading may be carried on in such a way as to leave the mind inert and actually deadened, by so much unassimilated knowledge. Browning's figure describes such a mind well: 2

"For I say, this is death and the sole death,
When a man's loss comes to him from his gain,
Darkness from light, from knowledge ignorance;
A lamp's death when, replete with oil, it chokes;
A stomach's when, surcharged with food, it starves."

1 Emerson, Oration on "The American Scholar."
2 Browning, "A Death in the Desert."

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In view of this fact, it is of the first importance that the intended author train himself thoroughly in the attitude of reading, so as to bring to it habitually the active, inventive mind. It is only to such a mind that books bring true blessing. On this point let Emerson again speak. "Books," he says, "are the best of things, well used; abused, among the worst. What is the right use? What is the one end, which all means go to effect? They are for nothing but to inspire. I had better never see a book, than to be warped by its attraction clean out of my own orbit, and made a satellite instead of a system. The one thing in the world, of value, is the active soul. This every man is entitled to; this every man contains within him, although, in almost all men, obstructed, and as yet unborn. The soul active sees absolute truth; and utters truth, or creates. In this action it is genius; not the privilege of here and there a favorite, but the sound estate of every man."

Creative reading, as thus defined, is simply mental alertness applied to books, and set in the direction of invention. It is the scholar's privilege to make this power so thoroughly a second nature that the creative attitude may invigorate all his reading, however rapidly or even cursorily it may be carried on, or for whatever purpose.

The ways in which the writer may conduct his reading, as related to the kind of matter read and the purpose he has in view, may perhaps be best suggested by a well-known passage in Bacon's essay on Studies. "Some Bookes,” he says, 66 are to be Tasted, Others to be Swallowed, and Some Few to be Chewed and Digested: That is, some Bookes are to be read onely in Parts; Others to be read but not Curiously; And some Few to be read wholly, and with Diligence and Attention."

These different ways of reading require some discussion and application; accordingly they will be taken up individually, but in inverse order.

1. Disciplinary Reading. This designation may be applied, for the inventor's sake, to the reading of "some few books," which 1 Emerson, Oration on "The American Scholar."

are "to be chewed and digested, that is, read wholly, and with diligence and attention."

How may I acquire the ability to read creatively? is a question naturally suggested by the foregoing paragraphs; and this habit of disciplinary reading is inculcated first, because it contains the answer to the question. The surest and directest way to arouse the inventive impulse in reading is the way of simple interpretation. That is, the writer should train himself to read thoroughly, patiently, repeatedly, resolving allusions, following out hints and suggestions, tracing thought and sentiment, as the phrase is, "between the lines"; until he is thoroughly imbued with the power and spirit of the work. By such minute interpretation a great creative mind is followed through the paths and by-paths of his invention; and the mind that follows is in some degree stimulated and skilled to take such steps for itself. The complete study, in this way, of one or two masterpieces of literature, provided they are well chosen, is an invaluable aid to literary creativeness. It not only gives the student a store of valuable thought, but bends his mind to a habit and flow of thinking; so that, without being an imitator, he is refined and toned up to the companionship of a

master.

In order to make such reading an effective discipline, it is well for the student to have at hand some great work of literature, to which he may give a little thorough and minute study every day. Let him study this work over and over again, sometimes slowly, sometimes rapidly, now with special attention to one aspect of it, again with special attention to another; until it has become fully inwoven with the fibre of his mind. To keep such discipline as this continually going, even though only a little at a time, is a valuable influence to keep the mind from being dissipated on many things or becoming flippant and shallow through superficial reading. It is the means by which the student's mental powers maintain their tone and grasp.

Of course not all books can or should be read in this manner. It is only "some few books," the masterpieces of original inven