For a highly motivated learner, it's not like knowledge is secret

In the words of Bill Gates: “For a highly motivated learner, it’s not like knowledge is secret and somehow the Internet made it not secret. It just made knowledge easy to find. If you’re a motivated enough learner, books are pretty good.” These words strike at the very heart of human growth. They remind us that the treasure of knowledge has always been present, written in scrolls, carved in tablets, preserved in volumes, waiting for the hand of the seeker. The Internet is not the fountain itself, but a swifter path to it. The true question has never been whether knowledge exists, but whether one has the hunger to pursue it.

The ancients understood this hunger. In the Library of Alexandria, countless books gathered from across the known world, holding wisdom on medicine, astronomy, poetry, and philosophy. Yet these treasures did not whisper themselves into the ears of the idle. They opened only to those who labored to read, to reflect, to wrestle with meaning. A scroll unopened was as silent as the stone it was written on. In this, Gates speaks truth: it is not the availability of knowledge that determines the learner’s greatness, but the motivation to seek it out.

Consider the life of Abraham Lincoln, born in a humble log cabin, far from universities or libraries. His childhood was one of scarcity, yet he carried within him a flame of relentless learning. He walked miles to borrow books, read by the dim firelight, and studied every word as if it were gold. The Internet was centuries away, yet Lincoln’s motivation transformed poverty into greatness. His leadership in the darkest days of America was not born of privilege, but of an unstoppable thirst for knowledge.

So it has always been. Galileo gazed through his telescope not because knowledge was handed to him easily, but because he hungered to see with his own eyes. Marie Curie poured over research long before laboratories were well-stocked with information, discovering truths hidden in matter itself. These lives prove what Gates reminds us: the true power lies not in the tools, whether scrolls, printing presses, or the Internet. The power lies in the learner, whose motivation makes every tool a weapon against ignorance.

Yet let us not be deceived: the abundance of knowledge today can lull us into passivity. The Internet offers rivers of information, but without motivation, one only skims its surface, drinking nothing of depth. The book, though older, demands a deeper discipline: to sit, to dwell, to wrestle with thought. In this way, the book is not outmoded; it is a test of the soul. For he who can master the book can master the endless sea of the Internet, while he who cannot read deeply will be lost, even amid infinite abundance.

The lesson, then, is clear: cultivate motivation. Do not wait for wisdom to come to you in easy form. Seek it, in books, in mentors, in experience. When you encounter the vast sea of the Internet, do not drift aimlessly—dive with purpose, guided by questions that burn in your heart. Remember that even the greatest treasures remain useless to the one who will not open them.

Therefore, O seeker, do not marvel only at the ease of modern tools. Marvel instead at the fire within you that pushes you toward growth. Read books with discipline, explore the Internet with discernment, and above all, never let your hunger for knowledge grow cold. For in every age, from stone tablets to glowing screens, it is the same truth that endures: the motivated learner transforms every tool into a path to greatness, while the unmotivated will remain surrounded by treasures and yet die poor in wisdom.