A book is one of the most patient of all man's inventions. Centuries mean nothing to a well-made book. It awaits its destined reader, come when he may, with eager hand and seeing eye. Then occurs one of the great examples of union, that of a man with a book, pleasurable, sometimes fruitful, potentially world-changing, simple; and in a library...witho ut cost to the reader.
Interpretation
Books patiently await their readers, offering knowledge and change at no cost.
This quote highlights the timelessness and enduring nature of books as a medium of knowledge and personal transformation. It emphasizes that regardless of the passage of time, a well-crafted book remains accessible and ready to impart wisdom to those who seek it, illustrating the profound relationship between a reader and a book that can lead to significant personal and societal change.
In practice
This quote is perfect for inspiring young students to develop a love for reading.
Books, books, books in all their aspects, in form and spirit, their physical selves and what reading releases from their hieroglyphic pages, in their sight and smell, in their touch and feel to the questing hand, and in the intellectual music which they sing to the thoughtful brain and loving heart, books are to me the best of all symbols, the realest of all reality.
Books themselves need no defense. Their spokesmen come and go, their readers live and die, they remain constant.
I can speak of my own criterion for judging whether or not a book is good or bad. I ask of it a single question, From how deep and true an impulse did it spring? Was it written merely to shock? Only to make money? Or was it written to create something more perfect and more lasting than the life experience from which it came?
No university in the world has ever risen to greatness without a correspondingly great library... When this is no longer true, then will our civilization have come to an end.
What makes a book great, a so-called classic, it its quality of always being modern, of its author, though he be long dead, continuing to speak to each new generation.
This is the gift all writers seek-to write language that incandesces yet does not melt.
To begin with, it's true, she read with trepidation and some unease. The sheer endlessness of books outfaced her and she had no idea how to go on; there was no system to her reading, with one book leading to another, and often she had two or three on the go at the same time.
We think about education as a stepping stone into a higher socio-economic class, into a better job. And it does do those things. But I don't think that's what it really is. I experienced it as getting access to different ideas and perspectives and using them to construct my own mind.
The quality of your public education shouldn't be defined by your zip code.
Our children should learn the general framework of their government and then they should know where they come in contact with the government, where it touches their daily lives and where their influence is exerted on the government. It must not be a distant thing, someone else's business, but they must see how every cog in the wheel of a democracy is important and bears its share of responsibility for the smooth running of the entire machine.
Study hard what interests you the most in the most undisciplined, irreverent and original manner possible.
You can't stop a teacher when they want to do something. They just do it.
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