The Gentle Reader

"Much may be said on that point," said Don Quixote. "God only knows whether there be any Dulcinea or not in the world. These are things the proof of which must not be pushed to...

"Precisely so," answers the Gentle Reader, "and that's what I want to find out. How are you going to discover what an author thinks about himself if he hides behind a mask of im...

I am well aware that the attitude of the Gentle Reader seems to many strenuous persons to be unworthy of our industrial civilization. These persons insist that we shall make har...

"Dagonet, the fool, whom Gawain in his moods Had made mock-knight of Arthur's Table Round, At Camelot, high above the yellowing woods, Danced like a withered leaf before the hall."

This is the charm of Lamb's letter to the gentleman who inquired "whether a person at the age of sixty-three, with no more proficiency than a tolerable knowledge of most of the...

One half the world does not know what the other half reads; but good people are now taught that the first requisite of sociological virtue is to interest themselves in the other...

Avery would have none of this, so when most of the men were away from the ship he sailed off with the treasure, leaving them to their evil ways, and to a salutary poverty. Here...

"When Raphael had made an end of speaking, though many things occurred to me both concerning the manners and laws of that country that seemed very absurd ... yet since I perceiv...

As long as the primrose was there, he could be trusted to describe it accurately enough. But set Peter Bell the task of describing last year's primrose. "There aren't any last y...

Here is a book published in Wheeling, Virginia, in 1809. It is "A Narrative of the Introduction and Progress of Christianity in Scotland, before the Reformation; and the Progres...

If you cannot see them riding on, a gallant company over the meadows, and if you hear no echoes of their laughter, and if there is no longer any enchantment in the vision of tha...

The specialist is apt to speak patronizingly of such work, as if it were necessarily inferior to his own. It seems to bear the marks of superficiality. To appreciate it properly...

This gave Mr. Chadband his opportunity for continued speech. "My young friend, it is because you know nothing that you are to us a gem, a jewel. For what are you? Are you a beas...

You have observed what happens to the unfortunate questioner. What a sorry exhibition he makes of himself! No sooner does he open his mouth than every one recognizes his intelle...

It is an experience which is quite familiar to the readers of history. "All who knew Sancho," moralizes the author, "wondered to hear him talk so sensibly, and began to think th...