The poems themselves assume the properties of flesh and blood." [1915] But men have not merely been stimulated to undertake special literary pursuits by the perusal of particular books; they have been also stimulated by them to enter upon particular lines of action in the serious business of life.

Thus Henry Martyn was powerfully influenced to enter upon his heroic career as a missionary by perusing the Lives of Henry Brainerd and Dr.Carey, who had opened up the furrows in which he went forth to sow the seed.
Bentham has described the extraordinary influence which the perusal of 'Telemachus' exercised upon his mind in boyhood.

"Another book," said he, "and of far higher character [19than a collection of Fairy Tales, to which he refers], was placed in my hands.

It was 'Telemachus.' In my own imagination, and at the age of six or seven, I identified my own personality with that of the hero, who seemed to me a model of perfect virtue; and in my walk of life, whatever it may come to be, why [19said I to myself every now and then]--why should not I be a Telemachus ?....
That romance may be regarded as THE FOUNDATION-STONE OF MY WHOLE CHARACTER--the starting-post from whence my career of life commenced.
The first dawning in my mind of the 'Principles of Utility' may, I think, be traced to it." [1916] Cobbett's first favourite, because his only book, which he bought for threepence, was Swift's 'Tale of a Tub,' the repeated perusal of which had, doubtless, much to do with the formation of his pithy, straightforward, and hard-hitting style of writing.

The delight with which Pope, when a schoolboy, read Ogilvy's 'Homer' was, most probably, the origin of the English 'Iliad;' as the 'Percy Reliques' fired the juvenile mind of Scott, and stimulated him to enter upon the collection and composition of his 'Border Ballads.' Keightley's first reading of 'Paradise Lost,' when a boy, led to his afterwards undertaking his Life of the poet.