paper tigers
For the reading of the dilettante in philosophy, though it may be extensive and enthusiastic, always proceeds along easy slopes. As he only reads what he finds interesting, the only arguments he is likely to come into close contact with—or, at any rate, into that extremely close contact which is necessary for the understanding of disputed points in this subject—will be those which approximate to its own position. […] There is, you perceive, nothing very admirable about this type of mind. There is, however, something to be said for it. In the end it probably gets everywhere, though as it always shrinks from precipices, and proceeds along easy slopes, through a hundred gradations of a1, a2, a3, before it gets from A to B—it will always require an unlimited time. As its interest change, it may read many different parts of the same book, at long intervals, until finally as the result of many enthusiasms, it has read the whole. This blind following of interest along long and intricate paths may indirectly approximate to the results which concentration achieves directly.