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The importance of reading is incalculable, by Joseph Barker 1847
Who will question the usefulness of the art of reading? Where is the orthodox man himself who will say that inability to read is not a calamity, or that the ability to read is not a great blessing? The importance of reading is incalculable! If a man cannot read, he is shut out from one of the most important means of gaining knowledge. If a man cannot read, he is unable to peruse the sacred Scriptures themselves. Reading is one of the most important arts in existence. To be unable to read is one of the greatest calamities under which a man can labour. To be able to read is one of the greatest blessings that a man can enjoy. The art of reading has been to me both one of the greatest advantages and one of the greatest pleasures of my life. The eyes themselves are not of greater service to the body, than the power of reading to the mind. The first thing therefore which we propose to teach is a good thing. In enabling people to read the Scriptures, and to read such other books as are calculated to give them knowledge and to minister to their comfort and improvement, we must be doing good.
The second thing we propose to teach is writing. Writing is of as much importance as reading. In one sense it is more important. Reading is dependant upon writing. There can be no reading without writing. If no one writes books, no one can read books. It is as important therefore that people should be able to write, as it is that they should be able to read.
The ability to write is calculated to prove a blessing to people in various ways. It is calculated to prove a blessing and a benefit to them in temporal matters. The man that can write is both better able to help himself, and better able to help and serve others, than the man that cannot write. The man that cannot write finds himself labouring under disadvantages innumerable. He cannot keep an account of his own labour. He cannot write down the directions which he may receive with respect to his journey or his work. He cannot correspond with his absent friends. He cannot send a word of counsel or advice, of rebuke or consolation, to any one at a distance. He cannot keep a record of his thoughts. He cannot put down the instructions which he receives from books or lecturers, from private friends or from public teachers. The man that cannot write cannot read writing. If he receives a letter from a friend, it must be entrusted to another to be read. And if he wishes to send a letter to another, he must have the expense and inconvenience of employing another party.
The man who cannot write is shut out from one of the most important means of usefulness to his fellow-men. There is no way in which men have more effectually and extensively served the interests of truth and righteousness, and promoted the welfare of their fellow-men, than by writing. What a blessing has the Bible been to mankind! Yet we are indebted for the Bible to the art of writing. What infinite blessings have been conferred upon the world by other good books! Yet for all those books we have been indebted to the art of writing. What a vast and happy influence are books and tracts exerting upon the world at this moment! Yet for all those books and tracts we are indebted to the art of writing. How many dark minds are illumined, how many sad hearts are cheered, how many unbelievers are convinced, how many erring Christians are instructed, how many feeble and irresolute souls are strengthened by the instrumentality of books and tracts! Yet for all those books and tracts we are indebted to the art of writing. What wonders books are working both in this country and in Europe at large! What wonders they are working in America! What a mighty revolution they are effecting both in politics, in commerce, and in religion! Yet for all these wondrous effects we are indebted to the art of writing.
Writing enables a man to speak to the most distant inhabitants of the earth, and to the remotest ages of time. The art of writing enables a man to speak to millions at a time, and to speak to them unceasingly for hours and days and weeks, aye, even for months and years together. The arts of reading and writing together, enable us to converse with the distant and with the dead; with the highest and best of our race; with the greatest philanthropists and the brightest geniuses; with men of all ranks; with the skillful in every branch of knowledge, and in every useful art. The arts of writing and reading make man's social and domestic circle as wide as the world, and enable him to carry along with him on his journey without expense and without inconvenience, the best and the brightest companions which have ever adorned the earth, or glorified human nature. But if we were to speak for days we should not be able to unfold or to display at full the advantages which the art of writing confers upon men. worth is infinite. The blessings which it has conferred upon the human race can never be numbered. The blessing's which it is now conferring upon the human race can never be numbered. The good that it is doing at this moment is beyond all conception; and the good that it will continue to do will be the same: it will be both boundless and eternal.
In teaching people to write therefore we are conferring upon them one of the greatest blessings which man can enjoy. We are, in fact, raising man to a higher rank of being. We are making him almost as much superior to a man who cannot read and write, as a man is superior to a brute. We are giving him a power that knows no limits. We are imparting to him a blessing which is inestimable. We are fitting him for usefulness to his fellow-creatures without all bounds. Where would Bunyan have been, -Where would Milton, or Locke, or Newton have been, if it had not been for the ability to read and to write? Where would have been the bright names of Penn, of Howard, and of Fox, if it had not been for their ability to read and to write? Where would have been all those rich and boundless treasures which we find in our works of philosophy, our works of poetry, our books of history, our writings in theology, in morality, and in science,
I say, where would all these rich, these vast, these invaluable treasures have been, if it had not been for the art of writing? They would either never have been created, or would have been buried in darkness, and never seen the light. It is the art of writing that has created those treasures; it is the art of writing that has preserved those treasures. On the art of writing we are dependant for the spiritual wealth of the world. And not for the spiritual wealth of the world only, but for the wealth of the world in general. To the art of writing we are indebted for the blessings of freedom, of commerce, and of peace. To the art of writing we are indebted, though it may seem strange to some, for the cultivation of our fields, for our crops of corn, for the flowers and fruits in our gardens, for the roads on which we travel, for the quick dispatch of our letters, for the rapid railway train, and for the electric Telegraph. But on this subject I have published my sentiments at large in the pamphlet entitled Mercy Triumphant.' It is not therefore necessary to say more on this subject here. There are few, we imagine, who will call in question the great usefulness of the art of writing. There are few, we imagine, but what will acknowledge, that in teaching people to write we are imparting to them a most important power, and conferring upon them a great advantage, an invaluable blessing. ing. There are few, in short, but what will acknowledge, if they are candid, and will consider the subject, that in teaching people to write, we are engaged in doing good; great good.
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