Journeys through Bookland : a new and original plan for reading applied to the world's best literature for children . ered it as a proper vehicle for conveying instruc-tion among the common people, who bought scarcely anyother books; I therefore filled all the little spaces thatoccurred between the remarkable days in the calendar withproverbial sentences, chiefly such as inculcated industryand frugality as a means of procuring wealth, and therebysecuring virtue; it being more difficult for a man in wantto act always honestly as, to use here one of the proverbs,it is hard for an empty sack to s
Journeys through Bookland : a new and original plan for reading applied to the world's best literature for children . ered it as a proper vehicle for conveying instruc-tion among the common people, who bought scarcely anyother books; I therefore filled all the little spaces thatoccurred between the remarkable days in the calendar withproverbial sentences, chiefly such as inculcated industryand frugality as a means of procuring wealth, and therebysecuring virtue; it being more difficult for a man in wantto act always honestly as, to use here one of the proverbs,it is hard for an empty sack to stand upright. These proverbs, which contain the wisdom of manyages and nations, I assembled and formed into a connecteddiscourse, prefixed to the almanac of 1757, as the harangueof a wise old man to the people attending an auction. Thebringing all these scattered counsels thus into a focusenabled them to make greater impression. The piece, beinguniversally approved, was copied in all the newspapers ofthe continent and reprinted in Britain on a broadside,to be stuck up in houses; two translations were made of 407. 408 Poor Richards Almanac it in French and great numbers bought by the clergy andgentry, to distribute gratis among their poor parishionersand tenants. In Pennsylvania, as it discouraged uselessexpense in foreign superfluities, some thought it had itsshare of influence in producing that growing plenty ofmoney which was observable for several years after itspublication. The Preface for the Year 1757 [F?^/v -. , v^OURTEOUS Reader: I have heardthat nothing gives an author so greatpleasure as to find his works respect-fully quoted by other learned pleasure I have seldom though I have been, if I may sayit without vanity, an eminent author ofalmanacs annually now for a full quarter of a cen-tury, my brother authors in the same way, for whatreason I know not, have ever been very sparing intheir applauses, and no other author has taken theleast notice
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1920, bookidjourneysthro, bookyear1922
