614 Literary Property. [June, 
«‘ Amongst other arguments, or rather pretences, in support of the policy, 
if not the justice of the law, it has been strangely contended that the sale of 
valuable publications is favoured by an opportunity being offered of seeing 
such works in the public libraries, and thus awakening a relish for them! 
Nothing can exceed the puerility, untruthfulness, or misapprehension of such 
a suggestion. We take it, that, if the knowledge of the public with respect 
to new publications, were restricted to such information as they could obtain 
from their deposit in the libraries named in the Act of Parliament, very few 
of them would find purchasers. Indeed, a single advertisement or notice in 
a periodical work of extensive circulation, will evidently effect more in behalf 
of the work, than if it were bestowed upon every college in the empire. We 
may be sure there is no Jack of inclination to purchase able and useful publi- 
cations, and if the supply could be made at a cheap rate, it is scarcely pos- 
sible to estimate the extent of the demand. It is perfectly childish to talk of 
the excitement produced by seeing books in a public library, when compared 
with the effect of their exhibition in the shops of the booksellers. In London 
there is one copy deposited in the British Museum ; and another, for the benefit 
of the clergy, in Sion College: compare the number of persons who look at 
books of any kind in those two repositories, with those who are attracted by 
their exhibition in other ways, and we shall be satisfied of the fallacy of the 
notion. The fact is, that the British Museum (to which no one would object 
that a copy should be presented) is resorted to, generally, not for the purpose 
of reading new publications, but to consult those which are old and scarce ; 
and it is to the periodical press, and to the activity of publishers, that an 
author can alone look for ‘ awakening a relish,’ for any production that can 
now be offered to the public.” p.p. 203-4. 
Had Mr. Maugham been desirous of sparing himself the trouble of 
refuting so preposterous a vindication, he need only have quoted the 
short answer of the extensive publisher to whom we have previously 
alluded, to the same committee. ‘“ Do you conceive that your publications 
acquire any advantage by any such supposed notoriety ?”—<« We do not 
consider the supposition of notoriety, arising from the depositing of the 
books, to be well founded, or productive of any advantage ; if we did, WE 
SHOULD SEND THE BOOKS TO THE PUBLIC LIBRARIES WITHOUT ANY 
COMPULSION.” * 
We suppose the day is already set in on which bullism is to be wiped 
out from among the national characteristics of Ireland. We avail our- 
selves, however, of its brief existence to observe that the “ encouragement 
to literature,” as it is called, which we have been sketching must be an 
encouragement only of an Irish nature. Those were not the encourage- 
ments which called into existence the splendour that shone around the 
pontificate of Leo—nor was it by laying on men of learning “ burthens 
grievous to be borne,” that Louis in France, and Elizabeth in England, 
revived, each in their own times, the Augustan age of old Rome. Not, 
indeed, that we are exactly admirers of the pensioning system, With 
literature, as with much else, “ laissez faire,” and not “ encourage- 
ment,” is our motto—nor is the lesson which Mr. Burke pointed out 
with reference to political less applicable than to intellectual advance- 
ment, when he attributed the prosperity of our North American colonies 
to the circumstance, that, “ through a wise and salutary neglect, a 
generous nature had been suffered to take her own way to perfection.”t 
But whatever may be our notions on this subject, assuredly it is impos 
sible to dissent from Mr. Maugham :— 
* Mr. Baldwin’s Min. of Ev. p. 47. 
+ Speech on Conciliation with America. 
