"That the average man swallows everything he sees in print is far from being true. But it is true that in nine hundred and ninety-nine cases out of a thousand there is no keen desire to arrive at new conclusions; reading is to much of a recreation for that. Life to the average man with dcemestic and civic responsibilities does not allow muth scope for sustained reflexion. In als out of duty hours he is generally a tired man and reads a book in order to obtain change and rest. But even where daily duties are not exhausting and where, a little after 4.30 p.m. he finds himself free for the rest of the day (observe, the writer has in mind a class of people who would strongly resent the imputation of being merely "average") there is usually the same receptive attitude of mind. The author of the book is not met with a vigorous challenge, the arguments are not Jogically. analized, and there is no determined attempt on the part of the reader to think out his own conclusions.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.