There is a sentence in Dr. Johnson's Gray which might well be written up
in all those rooms, too humble to be called libraries, yet full of books,
where the pursuit of reading is carried on by private people. " . . . I
rejoice to concur with the common reader; for by the common sense of
readers, uncorrupted by literary prejudices, after all the refinements of
subtilty and the dogmatism of learning, must be finally decided all claim
to poetical honours." It defines their qualities; it dignifies their
aims; it bestows upon a pursuit which devours a great deal of time, and
is yet apt to leave behind it nothing very substantial, the sanction of
the great man's approval.
The common reader, as Dr. Johnson implies, differs from the critic and
the scholar. He is worse educated, and nature has not gifted him so
generously. He reads for his own pleasure rather than to impart knowledge
or correct the opinions of others. Above all, he is guided by an instinct
to create for himself, out of whatever odds and ends he can come by, some
kind of whole--a portrait of a man, a sketch of an age, a theory of the
art of writing. He never ceases, as he reads, to run up some rickety and
ramshackle fabric which shall give him the temporary satisfaction of
looking sufficiently like the real object to allow of affection,
laughter, and argument. Hasty, inaccurate, and superficial, snatching now
this poem, now that scrap of old furniture, without caring where he finds
it or of what nature it may be so long as it serves his purpose and
rounds his structure, his deficiencies as a critic are too obvious to be
pointed out; but if he has, as Dr. Johnson maintained, some say in the
final distribution of poetical honours, then, perhaps, it may be worth
while to write down a few of the ideas and opinions which, insignificant
in themselves, yet contribute to so mighty a result.
