tailieunhanh - THE BEST of the WORLD'S CLASSICS RESTRICTED TO PROSE

Ever since civilized man has had a literature he has apparently sought to make selections from it and thus put his favorite passages together in a compact and convenient form. Certain it is, at least, that to the Greeks, masters in all great arts, we owe this habit. They made such collections and named them, after their pleasant imaginative fashion, a gathering of flowers, or what we, borrowing their word, call an anthology. So to those austere souls who regard anthologies as a labor-saving contrivance for the benefit of persons who like a smattering of knowledge and are never. | J THE BEST of the WORLD S Classics g RESTRICTED TO PROSE HENRY CABOT LODGE EJifor-in-Chief FRANCIS w. HALSEY ííữcỉữỉe Editor With an Introduction Biographical and Explanatory Notes etc. IN TEN VOLUMES Vol. I GREECE FUNK WAGNALLS COMPANY NEW YORK AND LONDON Ú hl 11 bbbìbiỂiỂỂỂ 11 mmiim THE BEST of the WORLD S Classics restricted TO PROSE HENRY CABOT LODGE Editor-in-Chief FRANCIS W. HALSEY Associate Editor With an Introduction Biographical and Explanatory Notes etc. IN TEN VOLUMES Vol. I GREECE FUNK WAGNALLS COMPANY NEW YORK AND LONDON COPYRIGHT 1909 BY FUNK WAGNALLS COMPANY The Best of the World s Classics VOL. I GREECE 484 . 200 . INTRODUCTION Ever since civilized man has had a literature he has apparently sought to make selections from it and thus put his favorite passages together in a compact and convenient form. Certain it is at least that to the Greeks masters in all great arts we owe this habit. They made such collections and named them after their pleasant imaginative fashion a gathering of flowers or what we borrowing their word call an anthology. So to those austere souls who regard anthologies as a labor-saving contrivance for the benefit of persons who like a smattering of knowledge and are never really learned we can at least plead in mitigation that we have high and ancient authority for the practise. In any event no amount of scholarly deprecation has been able to turn mankind or that portion of mankind which reads books from the .