Excerpt from Studies in American and British Literature The object of literature in education is to open the mind, to correct it, to refine it, to enable it to comprehend and digest its knowledge, to give it power over its faculties, application, flexibility, method, critical exactness, sagacity, address and expression. - John Henry Newman. All the arts are dwarfed by the power of literature. Each other art can express only some part of the mind; music a part, architecture a part, painting a part, but literature can express all the thoughts and emotions of the entire spirit. And this art one can carry with him when he travels; it can flourish in one little room. It depends not upon wealth or house or gallery, but where the mind has a common education there this art can find its home. - Professor Swing. To love the best literature is to possess the truest and most imperishable of earthly riches. Such a love gives to the young what they most need. It creates and sustains high and beautiful ideals of human life, gives them the choicest companions and truest friends, and enlarges their mental and spiritual horizon. It enables them to keep the keen appreciation, sweet trustfulness, and beautiful simplicity of childhood, while it multiplies both their powers or usefulness and sources of happiness. - Frank V. Irish. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.