The Book of Virtues: A Treasury of Great Moral Stories Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of The Book of Virtues: A Treasury of Great Moral Stories
Book Review: A breath of fresh air in literature for the whole family
Summary: 5 Stars
This interesting book is a brilliant concoction of poems and writings that illustrate virtues and makes for great wholesome reading. Virtues such as self-discipline, compassion, responsibility, friendship, work, courage, perserverance, honest, loyalty and faith come alive through narrative after narrative. It is excellent for character-building and will appeal to the whole family.Book Review: Truth shines in the eyes of its readers.
Summary: 5 Stars
This book's title has become proverbial, and I am glad for that recognition. You just need to look at the world around you to see the necessity of books like this. We have become moral imbeciles. Some people can't tell the difference between their right had and left hand, speaking poetically.Many people criticize this book as being too simplistic. That is an odd criticism. Not that this book is wrong, or factually in error. Even the accusation of impracticality would be a substantive point. But being too simplistic? Shakespeare wisely observed that simple truth is oftentimes miscalled simplicity (Sonnet 66). The accusation of being simplistic doesn't even rise to the dignity of a non-issue.
This book is a collection of moral stories and precepts that serve to supplement and buttress peoples moral sense, which is our conscience, or the spark within that tells us to do good. In the Apology, Socrates said that he had this spirit, which guided him. We all have something like this, and truthful books like this help refine this sense of right and wrong. Just look at the fallen towers to see the need for books like this.
Another accusation is that we can't turn back the clock. Well, if the clock is broken, then you are morally obligated to turn back the clock. By the way, are you giving you consent to the current state of things? It seems that we have made complaining a virtue. But it is complaining without corresponding action, which results mere noise pollution.
We have to do something to change things, and Bill Bennett has done his part in compiling this book, which is an easy read. This is a thick book, but each one of the chapters is small. It seems to have been geared towards first and second graders, but anyone can benefit from reading the truth. Truth shines in the eyes of the readers.
Book Review: More than Chicken Soup for the Human Soul
Summary: 5 Stars
One of my proudest moments regarding the release of my initial mystery novel occurred when I stepped into my neighborhood bookstore and found my book displayed on an endcap right inside the front door next to William Bennett's BOOK OF VIRTUES. I love Dr. Bennett's book, and I admire him for having the courage to pull this collection of stories from great literature, religious sources, and folklore together. The literary selections he has included in THE BOOK OF VIRTUES aim to provides examples of traditional values--values such as friendship, courage, and compassion. There is nothing wrong with those values in this cynical age, and I am most grateful William Bennett used his bully pulpit to draw attention to such important matters of human civilization.Book Review: where else will they learn to be moral ?
Summary: 5 Stars
Forget for a moment the disputatious issue of whether morality is even possible without God, and consider church as simply a structured environment wherein figures of some learning and accepted authority address moral issues. Now ask yourself, if many of us don't go to church/synagogue/mosque anymore, and parents aren't in the home much anymore, and schools can't teach morality (because we've banned religion from them), then where do we expect our kids to learn morality ? Where is the structured environment in which they will be taught, by someone with at least a semblance of authority, the differences between right and wrong ? Of course, as threshhold measures we should do things like re-emphasize morality and ethics throughout the society, cut taxes sufficiently for at least one parent to stay home with the kids, use school choice to allow parents to avoid public schools, allow public schools to use religious-based moral instruction, etc. But in the meantime, Bill Bennett has created an invaluable tool for parents who want to create such a structure, a McGuffey Reader for the modern age, The Book of Virtues. The book is an anthology of classic stories, essays and poems on moral themes. In sections on :
Self-Discipline Compassion Responsibility Friendship Work Courage Perseverance Honesty Loyalty Faith
Bennett starts with pieces for young children and works up to selections for teens and even adults. The choices are drawn from a wide variety of sources, with everyone from Hilaire Belloc to Oscar Wilde, P. T. Barnum to Martin Luther King, Chuck Colson to James Baldwin, being represented. And the book is enormous, so you can dip in almost anywhere with a high likelihood you'll find something new or long forgotten and little danger of growing bored. I've frequently found myself searching out the other works of authors cited here, in fact, it was hearing Bennett discuss C. S. Lewis on Booknotes that made me look for and read the inestimable Abolition of Man.
It is a curious thing to me that the Left has chosen to cede the field of morality to the Right. But if you look at comments about this book, or check out some of the alternatives that have been produced by liberal authors, the common theme seems to be that it is inappropriate to teach kids that there is only one, Judeo-Christian, version of morality, and that they should uinstead by taught that there are a whole range of choices that individuals can make when presented with ethical dilemmas, and each choice deserves an equal measure of respect. This is also the vision which prevails in the public schools these days, which teach that refusal to judge the actions of others is the mark of a well-rounded, worldly, compassionate citizen. In a moral climate in which they are increasingly taught that it is impossible, or at least inappropriate, to differentiate between "right" and "wrong", is it any wonder that each succeeding generation of children seems ever less capable of associating actions with consequences ?
Though not sufficient to counteract these tendencies, only good parenting is truly sufficient, Bill Bennett's Book of Virtues is an effective start towards restoring traditional morality to the center of young peoples' educations. The premise of the collection--that right and wrong/good and evil exist in the abstract, that kids can be taught to recognize them, and that they can be instructed to choose the one over the other--is apparently now just a quaint conservative idea, but if it is one that you think might still have some value, you owe it to yourself and your family to get the book, read it, and talk about it. A moral education doesn't just happen, particularly not in the soiciety we've created for ourselves; parents have to take responsibility for seeing that their own kids learn what it means to be a virtuous human being and that they strive to be such. This book won't do it for you, but it can help.
GRADE : A+
Book Review: For one and all, young & old, liberal or conservative...
Summary: 5 Stars
This book, without becoming bogged down in a sea of ideological or politcal debates, stands as a bright & shining moral beacon. A beacon for parents to use to guide and nuture their young with good, wholesome tales that teach a moral, and in a few cases,a couple of morals. Heck, every now and again I'll sit down and read a story or two - and I don't yet have any children! I think we all (of any age) may benefit occasionally, to be reminded of the morals and values that lie within this book.