"Just as one spoils the stomach by overfeeding and thereby impairs the whole body, so can one overload and choke the mind by giving it too much nourishment. For the more one reads the fewer are the traces left of what one has read; the mind is like a tablet that has been written over and over. Hence it is impossible to reflect; and it is only by reflection that one can assimilate what one has read. If one reads straight ahead without pondering over it later, what has been read does not take root, but is for the most part lost."

Reading, Reflection, Mind, Knowledge

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"Just as one spoils the stomach by overfeeding and thereby impairs the whole body, so can one overload and choke the mind by giving it too much nourishment. For the more one reads the fewer are the traces left of what one has read; the mind is like a tablet that has been written over and over. Hence it is impossible to reflect; and it is only by reflection that one can assimilate what one has read. If one reads straight ahead without pondering over it later, what has been read does not take root, but is for the most part lost."

Exlpore more Reading quotes

"She'd obviously read the book many times before, and so she read flawlessly and confidently, and I could hear her smile in the reading of it, and the sound of that smile made me think that maybe I would like novels better if Alaska Young read them to me."

John Green, American Author

Reading, Joy, Novel, Emotion

"Some readers read a book as if it were an instruction manual, expecting to understand everything first time, but of course when you write, you put into every sentence an overflow of meaning, and you create in every sentence as many resonances and double meanings and ambiguities as you can possibly pack in there, so that people can read it again and get something new each time."

Hilary Mantel, British Novelist

Reading, Writing, Meaning, Interpretation

"When you read a book put all of your effort into staying present and focus your energy towards the comprehension of each and every word and how you can apply it into your daily life."

Matthew Donnelly, American Author

Reading, Focus, Presence, Learning

"A woman reading Playboy feels a little like a Jew reading a Nazi manual."

Gloria Steinem, American Activist

Reading, Woman

"No entertainment is so cheap as reading, nor any pleasure so lasting."

Mary Wortley Montagu, English Writer

Reading, Entertainment, Pleasure

"When I write, I'm still imagining a kid reading it on paper. I read e-books when I travel, but in general I still prefer holding an old-fashioned book in my hands. There's a special, tactile experience."

Rick Riordan, American Novelist

Reading, Happiness, Truth, Wisdom, Power

"More than a half million books, all of them smelling like dust and ink, two terrible smells that blend mystically to make something beautiful. Powells is another church to me, a paperback sort of heaven."

Donald Miller, American Author

Reading, Books, Knowledge, Joy

"The unread story is not a story; it is little black marks on wood pulp. The reader, reading it, makes it live: a live thing, a story."

Ursula K. Le Guin, American Writer

Reading, Wood

"By reading a lot of novels in a variety of genres, and asking questions, it's possible to learn how things are done - the mechanics of writing, so to speak - and which genres and authors excel in various areas."

Nicholas Sparks, American Author

Reading, Questions, Variety, Writing

"There are books full of great writing that don't have very good stories. Read sometimes for the story... don't be like the book-snobs who won't do that. Read sometimes for the words--the language. Don't be like the play-it-safers who won't do that. But when you find a book that has both a good story and good words, treasure that book."

Stephen King, American Author

Reading, Truth, Power, Happiness, Today

Explore more quotes by Arthur Schopenhauer

"To buy books would be a good thing if we also could buy the time to read them."

Time

"If we were not all so interested in ourselves, life would be so uninteresting that none of us would be able to endure it."

Life

"Almost all of our sorrows spring out of our relations with other people."

People

"A man can be himself only so long as he is alone."

Man

"They tell us that suicide is the greatest piece of cowardice... that suicide is wrong; when it is quite obvious that there is nothing in the world to which every man has a more unassailable title than to his own life and person."

Life

"The word of man is the most durable of all material."

Man

"Great men are like eagles, and build their nest on some lofty solitude."

Man

"We can come to look upon the deaths of our enemies with as much regret as we feel for those of our friends, namely, when we miss their existence as witnesses to our success."

Friendship

"Wicked thoughts and worthless efforts gradually set their mark on the face, especially the eyes."

Thought

"The difficulty is to try and teach the multitude that something can be true and untrue at the same time."

Time