Sir John Lubbock delivered an interesting lecture this day week
at the Working-men's College, on "Books," remarking that while one of the greatest of the privileges of the present day is the easier access to books, this easy access results in an indifference as to what book shall be read, and a willingness to read the first that offers itself, which sometimes more than compensates the advantage of the ease with which books are obtained. In the old days, when books were scarce, the interest in the best of them was even more passionate than it is now. Sir John Herschel's story was quoted, of a village blacksmith who read aloud the whole of Richardson's " Pamela " to a village audience, who were so delighted when at length the happy denouement was reached, that they got hold of the church bells and set the peal ringing. Sir John corrected Renan's character- isation of this age as one of the most 'amusing' in the world's history, by substituting 'interesting' for amusing,' the interest being in great measure due to its free access to books. But it is the idlers, said Sir John, who are most easily caught by frivolous books, just as it used to be said that the devil needed no bait for idlers, since they would take greedily even the naked hook.
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