Seek ye out of the best books...

I love to read...I always have. I was a voracious reader when I was young, and I still read whenever I get the time (which sadly is a lot less than it used to be). Maybe that's why I love this scripture from Doctrine & Covenants so much:

And as all have not faith, seek ye diligently and teach one another words of wisdom; yea, seek ye out of the best books words of wisdom; seek learning, even by study and also by faith. (D&C 88:118)

This counsel was important enough that it was repeated twice more (see D&C 109:7,14). So with that in mind, I thought I'd share just a few bits of wisdom from some of my favorite books:

First, from "A Wrinkle in Time" by Madeleine L'Engle:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident!" she shouted, "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

As she cried out the words she felt a mind moving in on her own, felt IT seizing, squeezing her brain. Then she realized that Charles Wallace was speaking, or being spoken through by IT.

"But that's exactly what we have on Camazotz. Complete equality. Everybody exactly alike."

For a moment her brain reeled with confusion. Then came a moment of blazing truth. "No!" she cried triumphantly. "Like and equal are not the same thing at all!"

And this from "Atlas Shrugged" by Ayn Rand:

It is said that that he [Robin Hood] fought against the looting rulers and returned the loot to those who had been robbed, but that is not the meaning of the legend which has survived. He is remembered, not as a champion of property, but as a champion of need, not as a defender of the robbed, but as as a provider of the poor. He is held to be the first man who assumed a halo of virtue by practicing charity with wealth which he did not own, by giving away goods which he had not produced, by making others pay for the luxury of his pity. He is the man who became the symbol of the idea that need, not achievement, is the source of rights, that we don't have to produce, only to want, that the earned does not belong to us, but the unearned does. He became a justification for every mediocrity who, unable to make his own living, has demanded the power to dispose of the property of his betters, by proclaiming his willingness to devote his life to his inferiors at the price of robbing his superiors. It is this foulest of creatures--the double-parasite who lives on the sores of the poor and the blood of the rich--whom men have come to regard as a moral ideal. And this has brought us to a world where the more a man produces, the closer he comes to the loss of all his rights, until, if his ability is great enough, he becomes a rightless creature delivered as prey to any claimant--while in order to be placed above rights, above principles, above morality, placed where anything is permitted to him, even plunder and murder, all a man has to do is to be in need. Do you wonder why the world is collapsing around us?...Until men learn that of all human symbols, Robin Hood is the most immoral and the most contemptible, there will be no justice on the earth and now way for mankind to survive.

And finally from "The Fellowship of the Ring" by J.R.R. Tolkien:

"I am sorry," said Frodo. "But I am frightened; and I do not feel any pity for Gollum."

 "You have not seen him," Gandalf broke in.

 "No, and I don't want to," said Frodo. "I can't understand you. Do you mean to say that you, and all the Elves, have let him live on after all those horrible deeds? Now at any rate he is as bad as an Orc, and just an enemy. He deserves death."

"Deserves it! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends..."

I love finding these types of hidden gems of wisdom when I read. It gives me an appreciation and awareness that kernels of truth can be found in many places, although we still need to be seeking for spiritual confirmation that what we've read and studied and learned is true. And we need to keep in perspective that no matter how much knowledge we gain through study and faith, when compared to God we are nothing. He is the ultimate source of truth and we would be wise to remember that. Or, as we read in the Book of Mormon:

O that cunning plan of the evil one! O the vainness, and the frailties, and the foolishness of men! When they are learned they think they are wise, and they hearken not unto the counsel of God, for they set it aside, supposing they know of themselves, wherefore, their wisdom is foolishness and it profiteth them not. And they shall perish.

But to be learned is good if they hearken unto the counsels of God. (2 Nephi 9:28-29)

Here's a list of some of my other favorite books/authors:

"Jesus the Christ" by James E. Talmage
"The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah" by Alfred Edersheim
"The Screwtape Letters" by C.S Lewis
"Mere Christianity" by C.S Lewis
"The Chronicles of Narnia" by C.S. Lewis
"The Prydain Chronicles" by Lloyd Alexander
"The Dark is Rising" by Susan Cooper
"The Fountainhead" by Ayn Rand
"Man's Search for Meaning" by Viktor Frankl
"1984" by George Orwell
"Animal Farm" by George Orwell
"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" by Douglas Adams
"Les Miserables" by Victor Hugo