THE PUBLIC AND ITS PUBLIC LIBRARY. 245 



or to the counter of the news stand and selects his own reading, 

 Tinder his own rules, in accordance with his own opinion of his 

 needs, and after an actual inspection of what the shelves can 

 afford him. He has learned, or is fast learning, that public 

 library treasures are in the main treasures no longer ; that the 

 only rational selection of reading is one made after the examina- 

 tion of many books ; and he is beginning to demand that he be 

 permitted to come in immediate contact with the volumes he is 

 invited to read. The public library, whether it be a library which 

 the people are taxed to maintain or a library which belongs to them 

 by gift, must, so the demand goes, be managed with as much con- 

 sideration for its patrons and with as much appearance of faith 

 in their honesty as the ready-made-clothing house or the book- 

 store. This demand is seconded by the new view of the functions 

 of a public library ; it is, in fact, a part of this new view. The 

 library is no longer looked upon as a storehouse of learning, to be 

 used by the few already learned ; it is thought of as a factor in 

 the growth of the community in wisdom, in social efficiency, and 

 a factor therein second only to the public schools, if second even 

 to them. It is accordingly widening its business of book distrib- 

 uting by the addition of the powers possible to it as a laboratory 

 of general learning. Of books it is as true as of the materials of 

 chemistry, botany, or biology and even the non-literary, wayfar- 

 ing man begins to see this that only by working among them 

 and with them can one get out of them their real worth. The 

 public to-day, in a word, sees the importance the absolute neces- 

 sity, in fact of the laboratory method in that study of books 

 which underlies, or at least accompanies, the study of all other 

 things. 



In its attractiveness to the would-be student, not to mention 

 the desultory reader, the library whose resources are open for 

 examination and selection is far superior to the one which keeps 

 its patrons on the outside of the delivery counter. The book 

 buyer finds delight in a personal inspection of the volumes he 

 would select from. It is by the unrestrained browsing through 

 a score of inviting volumes that the student, whether beginner or 

 expert, finds at last the one which meets his case. To all who are 

 drawn, whether in ignorant questioning or in enlightened zeal, to 

 visit a collection of books, the touch of the books themselves, the 

 joy of their immediate presence, is an inspiring thing. Those 

 who have had experience of both methods testify that the open 

 library gives more pleasure, encourages reading of a higher 

 grade, and attracts more readers than the library which is closed 

 to the public. 



The cheapness of books ; the growth of the public's feeling of 

 ownership in its library, and of the propriety of laying hands on 



