1964 Awake! - Theocratic Collector.com

information; and one encyclopedia is not
likely to be enough. Consult several, for
some will have excellent facts that are not
in others. And by consulting several, you
will be better able to check your facts for
accuracy and reliability.
Then there is the system of arrangement.
Some encyclopedias are arranged
alphabetically by large subjects; others
by minutely alphabetized small subjects.
When encyclopedias treat subjects as subtopics
Wlder a main heading, it is vital to
consult the index, and it is often a good
idea to use the index with any encyclopedia.
When using encyclopedias, it pays to
know the date when a particular edition
was issued. This will save you time. You
may be looking for information about an
event that took place after the publishing
of the encyclopedia. For instance, if you
were looking up information on a recent
archaeological discovery and the encyclopedias
in your library were several years
old, you would need to go to one of the
encyclopedia supplemental books, such as
the Americana Annual, the Britannica
Book 0/ the Year or Collier's Encyclopedia
Year Book. These books are issued
every year and contain information on
events that took place the year previous
to publication. Use of these volumes will
help you to keep your facts up to date.
If you happen to be doing religious research,
it is vital to know that the latest
editions of encyclopedias tend to whitewash
or leave out the failures of Christendom's
major religious organizations,
thus obscuring the truth." So with such
historical subjects, it pays to consult older
editions of encyclopedias, such as the Britannica's
excellent eleventh edition. Thus
older editions never go wholly out of date,
and they often include articles on subjects
• For examples see the Awake!, November 22. 1962.
pp. 11. 12.
JULY 22, 1964
no longer treated in current reference
books.
Further, if you are seeking information
on a particular religion, it pays to get the
official viewpoint of the religion involved.
If one wants to know the Catholic viewpoint
of certain religious doctrines, he
could consult The Catholic Encyclopedia;
or if he is interested in information on
Jewish history and customs, he would do
well to consult The Jewish Encyclopedia.
Then in large libraries there will likely be
the Encyclopedia Of Religion and Ethics,
with its twelve volumes and an index; it
has many articles on religious beliefs, cus·
toms, and so on.
Besides encyclopedias, there are books
often known as "almanacs," such as The
World Al-I-nanac and Book 0/ Facts, which
are crammed with facts and figures on just
about everything.
Newspapers, Magazines. Books
Often the facts you seek are not in almanacs
and encyclopedias but may be in
newspapers or magazines; this is especially
true with the latest statistics, such as
those on the rising rate of crime in a cer·
tain area. Newspaper and magazine articles,
however, tend to drop out of sight
more easily than books; yet their information
continues to be available through the
agency of newspaper indexes and periodical
indexes. Many libraries have newspapers
on microfilm and they may have indexes
such as The New York Times Index
and The Official Index to the Times (London).
Your library may also have a periodical
index, such as the most-used one in
the United States, the Readers' Guide to
Periodical Literature, and Britain's Library
Association's Subject Index to Periodicals.
Canada, Australia, South Africa,
Sweden, West Germany, Spain and other
countries have indexes to their more important
periodicals. The index will direct
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