On the Importance of Reading
If we look to Mein Kampf (Prof. Dr. Thomas Dalton, Ph.D. translation) Hitler said in volume 1, chapter 1, that,
“The art of reading and studying consists in this: Remember the essentials and forget what is inessential.”
In chapter 2 in the same volume he also states,
“I read a great deal then, and I thought deeply about what I read. All my free time after work was devoted exclusively to study. Thus within a few years, I was able to acquire a stock of knowledge that I find useful even to this day.”
Hitler goes on to write a whole section on this very topic on the art of reading in ch. 2,
“Every book that I bought meant renewed hunger. . . Apart from my architectural studies and rare visits to the opera–for which I had to go hungry–I had no other pleasure in life except my books. . .
. . . I read a great deal then, and I thought deeply about what I read. All my free time after work was devoted exclusively to study. Thus within a few years, I was able to acquire a stock of knowledge that I find useful even to this day.
But even more than that:
During those years, a view of life and a definite worldview took shape in my mind. These became the granite foundation of my conduct at that time. Since then, I have extended that foundation only very little, and I have changed nothing in it. . .. . . I studied for pleasure.
Thus I was able to acquire theoretical knowledge of the social problem, something that was a necessary complement to what I was learning through daily experience. I studied all the books I could find that dealt with this question, and I thought deeply about what I read. . .
. . . Reading, however, had a different meaning for me than it has for the average run of our so-called ‘intellectuals.’
I know people who read endlessly, book after book, from cover to cover, and yet I would not call them ‘well-read.’ Of course they ‘know’ an immense amount; but their brain seems incapable of sifting and organizing the information they have acquired. They don’t have the ability to distinguish between what is useful and what is useless. They may retain the former in their minds and, if possible, skip over the latter while reading it–and if that’s not possible, they will throw it overboard as useless ballast.
Reading is not an end in itself, but a means to an end. Its chief purpose is to help towards filling in the framework that comprises each person’s talents and abilities. Thus each one acquires for himself the tools and materials needed for the fulfillment of his life’s work–regardless whether this is the elementary task of earning one’s daily bread or a calling that responds to higher human aspirations. Such is the first purpose of reading. And the second purpose is to provide an overall worldview.
In both cases, however, the information acquired through reading must not be stored up in the memory, corresponding to the successive chapters of the book. Rather, each little piece of knowledge thus gained must be treated as if it were a stone to be inserted into a mosaic, so that it finds its proper place among all the other elements that form a general worldview in the readers mind. Otherwise only a confused jumble of chaotic notions will result from all this reading. That jumble is not merely useless, but it also tends to make the unfortunate possessor of it conceited. He seriously thinks himself to be well-educated, and that he understands something of life. He believes that he has acquired knowledge, whereas the truth is that every increase in such ‘knowledge’ draws him further away from real life–until he finally ends up either in some sanatorium or in parliament.
Such a person never succeeds in making practical use of his knowledge when the moment calls for it. His mental equipment is not organized to meet the demands of everyday life. His knowledge is stored in his brain as a literal transcript of the books he has read, and in the order in which he has read them. And if fate should one day call upon him to use his book knowledge, it will have to give him the title and page number–otherwise he will never be able to recall the needed information. But if the page is not mentioned at the critical moment, the bright boy will find himself in a state of hopeless embarrassment. Highly agitated, he searches for comparable cases, and it is almost certain that he will finally deliver the wrong prescription.
If that’s an incorrect description, then how can we explain the political achievements of our parliamentary heroes, who hold the highest positions in government? Otherwise we would have to attribute their actions to malice and chicanery, rather than to pathology.
On the other hand, one who has cultivated the art of reading will instantly perceive, in a book or journal or pamphlet, what should be remembered–either because it meets one’s needs or it has value in general. What he thus learns is incorporated into his mental picture of a problem or a thing, further correcting or enlarging it, so that it becomes more exact and precise. If some practical problem suddenly demands examination or a solution, memory will immediately select the appropriate information from the mass that has been acquired through years of reading. Memory will also place this information at the service of one’s powers of judgment, so as to get a new and clearer view of the problem in question, or to produce a definitive solution.
Only thus can reading have any meaning or purpose.
For example, a speaker who does not have at hand the sources of information that are necessary to a proper treatment of his subject is unable to defend his opinions against an opponent, even though those opinions may be perfectly solid and true. In every discussion, his memory will abandon him. He cannot summon up arguments to support his statements, or to refute his opponent. As long as the speaker only has to defend himself, the situation is not serious; but the evil comes when fate places such a know-it-all– who in reality knows nothing–in charge of a state.
From my earliest youth, I tried to read books in the right way, and I was fortunate to have good memory and intelligence to assist me. From that point of view, my time in Vienna was particularly useful and profitable. My experiences of everyday life there were a constant stimulus to study the most varied problems in new ways. Inasmuch as I was in a position to put theory to the test of reality–and reality to the test of theory–I was protected from the danger of pedantic theorizing on the one hand and, on the other, from being too impressed by superficial aspects of reality.
The experience of everyday life at that time forced me to make a fundamental theoretical study of the two most important questions-apart from the social question.
It is impossible to say when I might have begun to make a thorough study of the doctrine and characteristics of Marxism, were it not for the fact that I ran head-first into the problem!”
In the same chapter he writes,
“From my earliest youth, I tried to read books in the right way, and I was fortunate to have good memory and intelligence to assist me.”
As Dr. Goebbels said,
“Knowledge is Power.”[1]
Other quotes of interest:
“Hitler’s greatest joy is his library of about 6,000 volumes. He has read them, not just paged through. The larger share consists of books on architecture and history. In both areas Hitler has masterful authority. For him, art is essential, music above all.”[2]
“It has been said that a library is not a luxury but one of the necessities of life. Indeed, a private and personal library is far from a commodity of luxury and inconsequential trivial materialism – it is the blood that runs through the veins of a healthy man; the water that nourishes the roots of a healthy tree; the air that fills the lungs of a healthy child; and the exquisite beauty of the female figure that graces healthy eyes. As a temple of knowledge and learning a library is a haven of sanity in an insane world that can light the way in the darkest of times. A sanctuary of philosophy, wisdom and entertainment, your collection of books is not only a tool for the now and the self, but for the future and your children. Collect for and educate oneself, but also do so in order to pass that most important of weapons to the legacy that you leave in this world.”[3]
“I couldn’t live a week without a private library — indeed, I’d part with all my furniture and squat and sleep on the floor before I’d let go of the 1500 or so books I possess.”[4]
“Out of your savings buy a book today, tomorrow get another and build yourself a library. A small legionary library. Let it be the jewel and pride of your home. It will light your thinking and it will always guide you onto the right path.”[5]
“If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.”[6]
“The library is the temple of learning, and learning has liberated more people than all the wars in history.”[7]
“But those libraries were out in the open, run by volunteers. They weren’t in a dark cellar, behind a steel door.
Dr. Wansbrough understood what the boy was thinking. ‘These are special books. Books of truth. Books that the government tried to hunt down and destroy as the battle for ideas intensified in the 2020s and 2030s. They would still destroy them now, if they could. Because these books give you the real story of why England is in the position it’s in today, in this, the year of our Lord, 2060. It is the material record of the crimes that have been committed against the English people, and the record of who we are. As the monk Orderic lamented a thousand years ago, when the books perish, the deeds of the men of old fall into oblivion. Therefore it is vital that the books do not perish.'”[8]
“This library is our control of that past. It’s why knowledge of the library’s location, even its existence, is strictly limited. Very few people know about this library, and it needs to stay that way. . . To give you an idea of how precious these books are, some of the books on these shelves may be the very last copies in existence. At least in Western Europe. The great libraries began to be purged on their problematic material in the 2020s. Not all purges were successful. In 2031, a principiled librarian at the National Library of the Netherlands managed to smuggle out some books which were destined for the furnace, and he got them into safe hands. He was shot for his trouble, and that shot rang out around the civilised world. As the communists started to lose more and more of the culture war, they started to bomb national libraries, out of spite more than anything else.”[9]
“Books are not enough if no-one ever opens them. Books allow knowledge to be held in cold storage across the centuries, but this knowledge only truly lives if it is given expression in a breathing human body.”[10]
“Can anything be accomplished through fiction? Uncle Tom’s Cabin has been credited with starting the Civil War, and The Turner Diaries has been given credit for inspiring The Order as well as other things, so the power of the written word shouldn’t be underestimated.”[11]
NOTES
1] Dr. Joseph Goebbels [Source: Irving, David; Goebbels: Mastermind of the Third Reich, Focal Point Publications, (Parforce (UK) Ltd.), 1996. Reprinted December 1997. Part II: The Gauleiter of Berlin, Subsection 14: A Blonde in the Archives, p. 112. See also note 38 on page 563 which gives the reference as, “Otto Wagener, MS (IfZ archives); Henry A. Turner, Hitler aus nächster Nähe: Aufzeichnungen eines Vertrauten 1929-1932, 377.”]
2] Baldur von Schirach, Introduction to The Hitler No One Knows by Heinrich Hoffmann (Hitler wie ihn keiner kennt, Berlin: “Zeitgeschichte” Verlag, 1932.) More on Hitler’s private library can be read here, here, here and here.
3] Nikarev Leshy Sanghrajkara
4] H. P. Lovecraft in a letter to Mr. Harris, February 25 to March 1 1929.
5] Corneliu Codreanu, Circulars and Manifestos (1927-1938)
6] Cicero
7] Carl T. Rowan
8] S. B. Saunders, From the Land All the Good Things Come, Pp. 65-66, 2019.
9] S. B. Saunders, From the Land All the Good Things Come, Pg. 68, 2019
10] S. B. Saunders, From the Land All the Good Things Come, Pg. 71, 2019
11] H. A. Covington.
Will you take that step and put your hand to pro-White fiction…?
