He will not forget the
builder while he admires the architect. While he dwells with delight on
the relation of the peculiar arch to the meaning of the whole cathedral,
he will not think it needless to explain the principles on which it is
constructed, or even how those principles are carried out in actual
process. Neither yet will the tracery of its windows, the foliage of its
crockets, or the fretting of its mouldings be forgotten. Every beauty
will have its word, only all beauties will be subordinated to the final
beauty--that is, the unity of the whole.
Thus doing, he shall perform the true office of friendship. He will
introduce his pupil into the society which he himself prizes most,
surrounding him with the genial presence of the high-minded, that this
good company may work its own kind in him who frequents it.
But he will likewise seek to turn him aside from such company, whether
of books or of men, as might tend to lower his reverence, his choice, or
his standard. He will, therefore, discourage indiscriminate reading, and
that worse than waste which consists in skimming the books of a
circulating library. He knows that if a book is worth reading at all, it
is worth reading well; and that, if it is not worth reading, it is only
to the most accomplished reader that it _can_ be worth skimming.
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