In a remarkable paragraph of Science and Health (p. 195) Mrs. Eddy offers helpful criticism and guidance concerning the reading of novels. She has just been discussing the value of such academic studies as promote the lifting of human thought, and has objected to "the tangled barbarisms of learning." She then states: "Novels, remarkable only for their exaggerated pictures, impossible ideals, and specimens of depravity, fill our young readers with wrong tastes and sentiments. Literary commercialism is lowering the intellectual standard to accommodate the purse and to meet a frivolous demand for amusement instead of for improvement."
What better characterization of the present situation could be written? Within her criticism might also be included many of the motion picture offerings, stage productions, and radio programs. Moreover, we may well say that not only the young, but adults also, are liable to be filled with wrong tastes and sentiments.
Now Christian Science, while offering guidance in the selection of spare-time opportunities, is not a kill-joy religion; quite the contrary. It brings the fullest and highest joys, and never takes from the individual any good thing. Mrs. Eddy does not raise objection to any of the normal activities of worth-while human living. She was herself well versed in literature, and she quotes from one novel, Sir Walter Scott's "Ivanhoe," in her textbook (p. 566). The enjoyment of literature is a wholesome and useful exercise; it is fostered by our Monitor—The Christian Science Monitor— in its book reviews, radio news, theater notes, and motion picture comments. When read wisely, critically, and in moderation, some novels are helpful in adding to our understanding of the problems of life and encouraging us in their solution.
