Read and Think by B. F. Merritt

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 13, 1872

Read and Think.

By B. F. Merritt

When such opportunities as we have are afforded us to become intelligent, how inexcusable we shall be to remain ignorant. I find many persons in this part of our State who cannot read. Men and women of seeming good natural abilities, who in three months, if they would only employ their leisure time, could begin to read, remain a lifetime in ignorance. How inexcusable! How unbecoming a man!

There are others who have learned to read, but their minds seem to be so sluggish they have no taste for it, and do not comprehend what they do read. They fall asleep before they read very far. Their thoughts are weak because their mind is not aroused. There seems to be a glimmering between the eye and the page which keeps the ideas from entering the mind.

Now what such persons need is to wake up. It is a terribly bad habit they have fallen into, but it can be broken up. A lively exercise of the mind calls blood to the brain and strengthens it. Long reaches of thought develop the mind. Without this culture the mind can never be capable of profound thought. There is no excellence without labor.

It is said that Sir Isaac Newton would, at times, arise from his bed in the morning and stand in a thinking posture for hours. Such profound thought developed his giant mind. Adam Clarke was a dull boy, till he was awakened, and his latent energies aroused by emulation.

Have you no taste for mental culture? then cultivate a taste for it. Read and think, and think and read, and you will soon hunger for more information, as you hunger for food. Who can bear the thought of passing through the world like the swine that seldom look higher than their heads when such noble powers are given us? God has bestowed powers and susceptibilities upon us which are capable of endless improvement, of which we can form no adequate idea. He makes it our duty to improve what he has given. Then in the fear of God, Read and think.

How awful it looks to see a man or woman sitting, with languid eyes, in a lazy posture, the whole features indicating that trashy, groveling, dreamy thoughts are floating through the mind, while books and papers all are laid aside, no taste for them, while the mind is withering.

Let me say, Don't sit so. For humanity's sake, don't look so! Get up and go to playing with the children, and get aroused. Or, “go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise.” See all the insects, birds, beasts, and fishes. Are they not all awake and full of animation? and should you their lord be a “dead head”? Haste to the shady grove and there behold the works of God, and approach so near the Infinite Mind by secret prayer that your mind will be illuminated by it.

Read the Bible. The themes God has proposed for our minds to dwell upon are best calculated to elevate and refine us.

Read the REVIEW. It is a great means of grace to us who are trying to live out the present truth. I think we should not consider our duty done till we have read each article with care, if we have opportunity to do so. We may all become intelligent in reference to present truth, and it is our duty to become so. Then read and think, and as the wise man instructs, “If thou criest after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for understanding,” the mind will be awakened, and enlarged.

B. F. MERRITT.

Robinson, Ill.