(2) A person's life can only experience his own share of happiness and suffering, and perhaps he can add his own experiences and experiences. However, people can enter many other people's worlds in different time and space through reading. In this way, people who have the ability to read have virtually gained infinite possibilities beyond their limited lives. Reading not only makes him know more about the names of plants, fish and insects, but also can trace back to ancient times and the future and enjoy strange customs that exist and do not exist.
More importantly, the benefits of reading are not only broadening knowledge, but also spiritual edification. People learn to be human by reading, and learn the personality of others from the writings of sages and contemporary talents. People learn wisdom and thinking from The Analects of Confucius, serious historical spirit from Historical Records, personality fortitude from Song Zhengqi, passion for life from Marx, critical spirit from Lu Xun and moral persistence from Tolstoy. Goethe's poems are engraved with wise life, while Byron's poems call for the enthusiasm of struggle. A scholar, a lucky one who has the opportunity to surpass his personal life experience.
Once a person becomes attached to books, he is likely to be bound to be associated with lofty pursuit and noble taste. By "great possibility", we mean that meanness and treachery among literati are not ruled out. Besides, not all books are good. In the books circulated, not all of them are works to persuade the good, but some of them are worthless and even have negative effects. However, what we call reading is always spread with its excellent quality, and the influence of such books on people is always benign. The reason why I often feel happy in reading stems from my personal love for literary books. Once addicted to this hobby, most people yearn for the lofty category. The aversion to violence and sympathy for the weak make people's hearts pure and full of justice, and people often become elegant and avoid the secular. Or love, or warmth, or resistance, generally always guides people from childhood to adulthood and step by step to a better world. Descartes said: "reading a good book is talking to many noble people." This is that reading makes people do good; Hugo said: "all kinds of stupid things, under the influence of reading good books every day, gradually melt like baking on a fire." This is reading to ward off evil spirits.
Therefore, I say that scholars are happy people.