The Educational Effect of Reading
By F. G.
The Attitude of Our Schools Toward the Youth’s Instructor
It has been said that the “printing-press is the lever which moves the world of mind.” The truth is certainly told in this statement. Within the past twenty-five years there has come into the arena of thought two deadly foes of truth and purity. They are the “yellow journal” and the cheap novel. They have, of course, existed in a limited sense ever since the advent of the printing-press, but it is only within the last quarter of a century that their baneful influence has been especially manifest. Some twenty years ago one of the leading New York journals had its character deliberately changed by its proprietor from a high-class journal to that of a sensational one, solely for the purpose of increasing the circulation of the paper by pandering to an apparent desire for the emotional and sensational on the part of so many readers. From this deliberate action has come a flood of evil. Nearly all our great daily newspapers, following the example thus set, are at the present time filled with accounts of murders, divorces, sports, and the doings and sayings of the fabulously wealthy; and the things worthy of thought and consideration are hardly noticed. As an illustration of this, one of the great dailies a short time ago had an account of the return of the Baldwin antarctic expedition brought into a space not over three inches long, while in the same issue a whole page was taken up with an account of a horrible murder of a factory girl. The cheap story and novel have been made possible by the increased facilities for printing and publishing, and, I may also add, by the decreased sense of the pure and good, by both writers and readers. Where one cheap novel was published twenty-five or thirty years ago, the number to-day probably reaches into the hundreds. They are filled with extravagant and unnatural plots and illustrations, abominable and ungrammatical language, and the impurest suggestions. There is a wicked witchery running through this class of novels and stories. They are glossed over with a pretended morality that to the one who has a knowledge of the real and only morality — that based upon the Word of God — only makes the pretense the more shameful. True education aims directly against the work of these classes of literature. There should be placed in the hands of the children and youth in our schools a literature that is really helpful, and that gives a knowledge of the true God. To this end we can recommend nothing more helpful than The Youth’s Instructor. This good paper should be in the hands of all our children and youth, whether they are in our schools or not. We are coming to the close of another year’s school work, and to the beginning of a long vacation. Provision should be made that all our young people may be provided with a good class of reading for the vacation. Would it not be a most excellent plan for some one to be selected in every school, whether advanced, intermediate, or church, to solicit subscriptions from all for this valuable paper? A number of very valuable series of articles are in preparation. These should be read by all our children and young people. Now if this is a valuable suggestion, — and it is, — will not all of our schools act upon it at once, so as to have these subscriptions come in in time for these most profitable contributions which are soon to appear? As a man thinketh so is he; and as a man readeth so he thinketh. So let us all recognize the importance of this grand opportunity of creating a high standard of thought in the minds of all our young people, that they may choose only those things, from all the flood of literature, which are good. F. G.