Not only a distraction.

In a recent issue of Aeon Frank Furedi examined how bookshelves filled with books can be a sign of elitism. He offers a different quote from Seneca that suggests that the way that an abundance of books presents a problem isn't that there's too much to read, but that we use them as status symbols:

The Roman philosopher Seneca, who lived in the first century, directed his sarcasm at the fetish for grandiose display of texts, complaining that ‘many people without a school education use books not as tools for study but as decorations for the dining room’

For that purpose we really don't need too many books, we just have to know which are the right ones to keep on display.

Go to: Considerably more than "already", or
Go to: Hey, they were classics!, or
Go to: Ain't no need to hide, ain't no need to run.