A man once asked me, 'Which is the best English Grammar?' My answer was, 'The first you come at. A poor one to-day is better than a good one to-morrow. Begin your studies at once with the grammar you have; and you will soon find out which is the best.' And so I say with regard to books on other subjects. Make the best use you can of the books you have, and you will soon come across better. And when you do come across them, you will be all the better prepared to profit by them, than if you were to waste your time in idleness till you can get hold of the best of all. Besides; the book that is best for others, may not be the best for you.
And if a man should ask me, 'Which is the best translation of the Bible?' I would say, 'The first you come at. Read any, till you meet with others. Then read many, and, using your common sense, judge for yourself which is best. That which does most to make you a good, a strong, a useful and a happy man is the best.'
Some want books and teachers that will save them the trouble of study. And there are none such. It would be a pity if there were. They would do no good, but harm. Nothing strengthens and develops the mind like labor. But if you had the best books possible they would not enable you to acquire much useful knowledge, without close study, and vigorous mental effort.
I learned Greek with the worst Greek Grammar I ever saw; but when I had learned the language tolerably, I found one of the best Greek Grammars in the world, and went rapidly through it, and found that it had little to add to the information I had gained already from the poorer one.
And it is the same with regard to books on God, religion, and duty. Books with numbers of defects,--with defects of style, defects of arrangement, and even defects in matter, may teach you many useful lessons, if you read and study them properly; and the best books on earth will not teach you much if you read them carelessly.
A great deal, almost every thing, depends on the spirit or the object with which a man reads a good book. You may read the best books to little profit, and you may get great good from very inferior ones.
The Bible is the best religious and moral book on earth; it is, in its most imperfect translations, able to make men wise, and good, and useful, and happy to the last degree, if they will read and study it properly. But there is not a better book on earth for making a man a fool, if he comes to it with a vain mind, a proud spirit, a fulness of self-conceit, or a wish to be a prophet. A desire to be a prater about the millennium, the second coming of Christ, the personal reign, the orders of angels, the ranks of devils, the secrets of God's counsels, the hidden meaning of the badgers' skins, the shittim wood, the Urim and Thummim, the Cherubim and Seraphim, the Teraphim and Anakim, and all the imaginary meanings of imaginary types, and the place where Paradise was situated, and the mountain peak on which the Ark rested, and Behemoth, and Leviathan, and the spot at which the Israelites entered the Red Sea, and the compass of Adam's knowledge before he named the animals, and the fiery sword at the gate of Paradise, and the controversial parts of Paul's epistles, and the mysteries of the Book of Revelation, and the spiritual meaning of Solomon's Song, and the place where Satan had his meeting with the sons of God in the days of Job, and the exact way in which Job used the potsherd, when he scraped himself as he sat among the ashes, &c., &c.,--I say if this is what a man desires, the Bible will help him to his wish, and make him the laughing-stock, or the pity of all sensible men.