Rensselaer Standard, Volume 1, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 August 1879 — Uses of Fiction. [ARTICLE]

Uses of Fiction.

Three functions of fiction I conceive to exist: Instruction, rendered more palatable than it might otherwise be by a coating of figure and strophe; the conyeyance of moral teaching, by means of the oldest known form of illustration, the fable, by whioh the mind is attracted to the entertainment, or at least consideration, of truths arranged in pleasant garb, from the bare presentation of which it would turn away in indifference or disgust; and amusement, pure and simple. Let it be here remarked that people are too apt to esteem this last the only or at least the most important function of fiction. These are no arbitraiy distinctions: the first two are founded on Biblical precedent and authority, for our blessed Lord made use of fiction in the conveyance both of instruction aud moral teaching. Witness the parables of the talents, the virgins, the fig tree, the sower, Peter’s vision of the sheet, the drag-net and the grain of mustard seed. The third function, while I would not esteem it the greatest, neither do I lessen its importance as compared with the others. The mind of man can no more keep up a strain of labor without cessation, than his feet and hands can be bound, Sisyphus-like, to unremittent tasks. So instruction must interchange with amusement, and to lead a healthy moral and intellectual life our reading should be chequered after this manner.—[Rev. B. E. Warner in Sunday Afternoon.