200 THE LIBRARY 



and its applications so far ahead that they have almost lost sight of 

 social science in the rear. It would be no great disadvantage to the 

 world - - to the progress of mankind as a whole - - if the swift- 

 footed legion of applied science would merely mark time for a 

 period, while attention should be given to a better organization of 

 the vast human army. The objective point would be reached as 

 soon, for a nation is like a railway train, it can go no faster than its 

 hindmost car. But this is not likely to happen at present. Applied 

 science has every stimulus from within and without, every reward 

 intrinsic and extrinsic; while progress in the social and political 

 sciences must carry the dead weight of the inertia of conservatism 

 and also meet the active and intense opposition of vested interests, 

 which have ever the single purpose of preserving the status quo, no 

 matter how unjust or maleficent. 



' The solution of these all-important problems cannot be found in 

 the school, where immature minds are taught merely how to use the 

 tools of knowledge; these questions cannot be settled by the small 

 number of university students; they must be solved by the social 

 education of the masses, by instilling in them in their early school 

 years a desire for knowledge and a love for good reading, which will 

 lead them to continue their education by means of the library. The 

 education of the mass of the voters, who determine the character 

 of a democratic government, must not be left to the party organ 

 or the stump-speaker. The great social and political questions should 

 be studied and pondered in the quiet of the closet and not decided, 

 without previous thought, amid the hurrahs of the hustings. 



' To make the public library realize fully its possibilities as the 

 People's University calls for more than the opportunity which every 

 public library now offers; it requires active effort to reach out and 

 bring the people to the library by the fullest cooperation with the 

 school and by means of attractive lecture courses, which shall 

 stimulate reading and guide it in profitable channels. But the be- 

 ginning of this work - - the inculcation of a taste for good reading 

 lies with the school, with the library's cooperation, especially during 

 the years from six to ten or twelve, those years when nearly all the 

 children come under the school's influence and when the habit of 

 reading can be most easily formed. 



' If charged with placing undue stress on the value of the library, 

 I might urge its comparative newness and its consequent lack of 

 recognition; and as an evidence of the latter I might point to the 

 fact that in this great educational exposition, while one vast palace 

 is given up to exhibits of the school, the library has with difficulty 

 secured, through the courtesy of the Missouri Commission, a part of 

 a room in the State Building for an exhibit of its activities in the 

 great work of education, in which, as I am trying to show, its poten- 



