- hour glass - gives back everything it takes in, unchanged
- sponge - gives back everything it takes in, a little dirtier
- jelly bag - squeezes out what has value and keeps the worthless
- Golconda - runs everything through a sieve and keeps only the nuggets
1. This post is related to the previous one. "Incremental reading," even if taken in the most modest sense, does not, per se, differentiate between these four different kinds of reading. There is no criterion that would would allow the student to distinguish between what seems important and what is important. In fact, it favors what seems important.
2. Added Saturday, August 07, 2010: I have found the quote in Emerson's Journals at least: "House of Seem & house of Be. Coleridge's four classes of Readers. 1. the Hour glass sort, all in all out; 2. the Sponge sort, giving it all out a little dirtier than it took in; 3. of the Jelly bag, keeping nothing but the refuse; 4. of the Golconda, sieves picking up the diamonds only." (Joel Porte, ed., Emerson in His Journals (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University, 1982), p. 130.