Here, again, we find, as we so
often do, that whatever view of this matter of popular literature we can
trust, we can trust least of all the comment and censure current among
the vulgar educated. The ordinary version of the ground of this
popularity for information, which would be given by a person of greater
cultivation, would be that common men are chiefly interested in those
sordid facts that surround them on every side. A very small degree of
examination will show us that whatever ground there is for the
popularity of these insane encyclopaedias, it cannot be the ground of
utility. The version of life given by a penny novelette may be very
moonstruck and unreliable, but it is at least more likely to contain
facts relevant to daily life than compilations on the subject of the
number of cows' tails that would reach the North Pole. There are many
more people who are in love than there are people who have any
intention of counting or collecting cows' tails. It is evident to me
that the grounds of this widespread madness of information for
information's sake must be sought in other and deeper parts of human
nature than those daily needs which lie so near the surface that even
social philosophers have discovered them somewhere in that profound and
eternal instinct for enthusiasm and minding other people's business
which made great popular movements like the Crusades or the Gordon
Riots.
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