The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers. Thomas Jefferson
People say that life is the thing, but I prefer reading. Logan Pearsall Smith
To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life. Somerset Maugham
To read without reflecting is like eating without digesting. Edmund Burke
Desultory reading is delightful, but to be beneficial, our reading must be carefully directed. Seneca
Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body. Joseph Addison
Readers are plentiful: thinkers are rare. Anthony Burgess
Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge; it is thinking that makes what we read ours. John Locke
To love to read is to exchange hours of ennui for hours of delight. Montesquieu
Properly, we should read for power. Man reading should be man intensely alive. The book should be a ball of light in one’s hand. Ezra Pound
I have given up reading books; I find it takes my mind off myself. Oscar Levant
Reading is sometimes an ingenious device for avoiding thought. Arthur Helps
Reading a book is like re-writing it for yourself. You bring to a novel, anything you read, all your experience of the world. You bring your history and you read it in your own terms. Angela Carter
Reading, in contrast to sitting before the screen, is not a purely passive exercise. The child, particularly one who reads a book dealing with real life, has nothing before it but the hieroglyphics of the printed page. Imagination must do the rest; and imagination is called upon to do it. Not so the television screen. Here everything is spelled out for the viewer, visually, in motion, and in all three dimensions. No effort of imagination is called upon for its enjoyment. George F Kennan
No matter how busy you may think you are, you must find time for reading, or surrender yourself to self-chosen ignorance. Confucius
No entertainment is so cheap as reading, nor any pleasure so lasting. Mary Wortley, Lady Montagu
Always read stuff that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it. P.J. O’Rourke
Let us read and let us dance – two amusements that will never do any harm to the world. Voltaire
He has only half learned the art of reading who has not added to it the even more refined accomplishments of skipping and skimming. A J Balfour
The habit of reading is the only enjoyment in which there is no alloy; it lasts when all other pleasures fade. Anthony Trollope
We must form our minds by reading deep rather than wide. Quintilian