From The Social Structure of Revolutionary America
The prejudice against novels shown by North Carolina farms was not shared by men of education. Many such books were advertised in the newspapers, and when a Yale class disputed “Whether reading of Novels be advantageous,” the President himself decided “that it is advantageous in some measure, if not much attended to.”
From The English People on the Eve of Colonization : 1603 – 1630 (1954) by Wallace Notestein:
They [the Elizabethans] bought all sorts of collections of religious extracts and stories, narratives of how this man breaking the Sabbath was struck by lightning and how that woman on her knees in prayer escaped the fire that consumed her house.
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What, no vision of an angel in a piece of toast?
From The Reshaping of Everyday Life : 1790-1840 (1988) by Jack Larkin:
Just after Chloe Peck was married in Rochester, New York, in 1820, she wrote to her sister of “our family, which consists of 7 persons.” Living and eating together in the Pecks’ establishment were the newly wedded couple and five unrelated men and boys—the journeymen and apprentices of Everard Peck’s bookbinding shop.
Today “family” denotes people bound together by marriage and kinship … but early-nineteenth-century Americans almost invariably echoed Chloe Peck in describing their domestic groups as “families,” suggesting their sense of the household’s functional unity … [Everard] Peck a few years later wrote of his strong sense of responsibility for “the welfare of those connected with us, and the harmony and good order of our family.”
Afterthought: I whole-heartedly recommend this book to anyone who wants to understand the tenor and common details of early U.S. history.
From The English People on the Eve of Colonization : 1603-1630 (1954) by Wallace Notestein:
“The matter of the use of Sunday afternoon became presently a controversial one between Puritans and their opponents. In 1616 James I on his way down from Scotland was waited upon in Lancashire by a delegation of servants, laborers, and mechanics, who complained that they were estopped from all recreations on Sunday. James needed no coaxing to utter pronouncements and the chance to encourage Sunday sports was not to be resisted. The upshot was the Book of Sports authorizing the people to enjoy themselves on Sunday afternoon. It was ordered to be read in all churches … although here and there a daring [Puritan] clergyman failed to do so.”
So, we have King James to thank for NFL Football?
I include the following not-so-literary quote because (a) it is from a scholastic reader and so, although it is not about reading, it is for the purpose of teaching children to read, and (b) I really like how the Native American flips the script on the first speaker.
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From The Columbian Reading Book (1799) as quoted in Old-Time Schools and School-books by Clifton Johnson:
The retort Courteous.
A white man meeting an Indian asked him, “whose Indian are you?” To which the copper-faced genius replied, “I am God Almighty’s Indian : whose Indian are you?”
From Delight and Pastime or Pleasant Diversion for both sexes consisting of Good History &c &c (1697) as quoted in Humour, Wit and Satire of the Seventeenth Century collected and illustrated by John Ashton:
“If you ask why borrowed Books seldom return to their Owners? this is the Reason one gives for it : Because ’tis easier to keep ’em, than what is in them.”
Ain’t that the truth.
From The Clergyman’s Almanack (1815) as quoted in America and her Almanacs : Wit, Wisdom, and Weather 1639-1970 by Robb Sagendorph:
“The indiscriminate reading of Novels and Romances is to young females of the most dangerous tendency … it agitates their fancy to delerium of pleasure never to be realized … and opens to their view the Elysium fields which exist only in the imagination … fields which will involve them in wretchedness and inconsolable sorrow. Such reading converts them into a bundle of acutely feeling nerves and makes them ‘ready to expire of a rose in aromatic pain’ … The most profligate villain, bent on the infernal purpose of seducing a woman, could not wish a symptom more favorable to his purpose than a strong imagination inflamed with the rhapsodies of artful and corrupting novels.”
The more things change, the more they stay the same. (Just imagine what they’d say about Twilight! Or internet porn…)
As if I needed a new category of blog post, right? But, I keep stumbling upon interesting or funny quotes about reading, writing, and other literature-related activities, and thinking to myself: “This doesn’t quite qualify as an Archaic Definition, darn it!”
So, “Lit Quotes” is born! It was hard coming up with a name, and the one I finally settled on is fairly boring, I know.
But, “Unfamiliar Quotations” is obvious and overused almost to the point of cliché. Google says 19 000 hits. “Le Quote Quotidien” sets a schedule I am not prepared to meet. “Quoth the Maven,” though awesome, already has a website devoted to it. And, while “Quotient Quotables” would please Jeopardy fans, it promises math-related material.
Added bonus: new theme icon! This one is Moça com Livro by Portuguese painter José Ferraz de Almeida Júnior. The way she is looking up as if thinking about what she just read fits the theme perfectly.
Also, she’s pretty, even if she is made of strips of oil on a flat piece of cloth. Kudos, José!
One final note. Unlike the Archaic Definitions, I don’t plan to publish these on a schedule. I’ll just put them up as I find them. If I find more than one in single day, I’ll try to space them out so there’s a more regular flow, but there may come weeks when I don’t find any. Just managing expectations, y’all.
First real quote coming soon!
