Reading occupies a very important place in education. It is one of the principal means of treasuring up knowledge. It is, therefore, highly necessary that a taste for reading should be early cultivated. But a mere taste for reading, uncontrolled by intelligent principle, is a dangerous appetite. It may lead to ruinous consequences. The habit of reading merely for amusement, is a dangerous habit. Reading for amusement furnishes a constant temptation for reading what is injurious. It promotes, also, an unprofitable manner of reading. Reading in a hasty and cursory manner, without exercising your own thoughts upon what you read, induces a bad habit of mind. To profit by reading depends, not so much on the quantity which is read, as upon the manner in which it is read. You may read a great deal, in a gormandizing way, as the glutton consumes food, and yet be none the better, but the worse for what you read.

If you would profit by reading, you must, in[156] the first place, be careful what you read. There are a multitude of books, pamphlets, periodicals, and newspapers, in circulation at the present day, which cannot be read, especially by the young, without great injury, both to the mind and heart. If any one should propose to you to associate with men and women of the lowest and most abandoned character, you would shrink from the thought—you would be indignant at the proposition. But it is not the mere bodily presence of such characters that makes their society dangerous. It is the communion which you have with their minds and hearts, in their conduct and conversation. But a great portion of the popular literature of the day is written by such characters. By reading their writings, you come into communion with their minds and hearts, as much as if you were personally in their company. In their writings, the fancies which fill their corrupt minds, and the false and dangerous principles which dwell in their depraved hearts, are transferred to paper, to corrupt the unwary reader. Here are, likewise, glowing descriptions of evil conduct, more fascinating to the youthful heart than the example itself would be, because the mischief is artfully concealed behind the drapery of fine literary taste, and beautiful language. There are, likewise,[157] many such writings, the productions of persons of moral lives, but of corrupt principles, which are equally dangerous. You would not associate with a person whom you knew to be an unprincipled character, even though he might be outwardly moral. He would be the more dangerous, because you would be less on your guard. If it is dangerous to keep company with persons of bad character or bad principles, it is much more so to keep company with bad books.

I have treated at large on the subject of novel-reading, and other objectionable writings, in my “Young Lady’s Guide;” and to that I must refer you, for my reasons, more at length, for condemning such reading. I shall here only suggest, for the regulation of your reading, a few simple rules.

1. Always have some definite object in view, in your reading.—While pursuing your education, you will be so severely taxed with hard study, that reading merely for diversion or amusement does not furnish the relaxation which you need. It keeps the body idle and the mind still in exercise; whereas, the diversion which you need, is something that will exercise the body and relax the mind. If your object is diversion, then it is better to seek it in useful labor, sprightly amusements, or healthful walks. I can[158] think of nothing more injurious to the young than spending the hours in which they are released from study, bending over novels, or the light literature of ou............