TWENTY-EIGHTH CONGRESS, 1848-45. 



Achievement; goes a little way, finds that a dozen books, 

 one book, perhaps, is indispensable, which cannot be found 

 this side of Gottingen or Oxford ; it tires of the pursuit, or 

 abandons it altogether, or substitutes some shallow conjec- 

 ture for a deep and accurate research, and there an end. 

 Let me refer to a, passage or two of the complaints of stu- 

 dious men on this subject: 



"An extensive library, answering to the wants of literary men who are 

 to use it, is essential to the public and effectual promotion of learning. In 

 this country the want of large libraries, is a serious discouragement of su- 

 perior attainments and accurate researches in almost every walk of study. 

 The time necessary for reading or examining a particular book is often 

 consumed in attempts to discover or obtain it ; and frequently, after every 

 effort, it cannot be procured. We are obliged to give over our inquiries on 

 subjects where we would arrive at fulness and exactness in our knowledge, 

 because destitute of the assistance which the learned, in the same track of 

 study, have furnished, or to continue them under the disadvantage of igno- 

 rance respecting what has been done by others. Thus we are liable to be 

 occupied in solving difficulties which have been already cleared, discussing 

 questions which have been already decided, and digging in mines of litera- 

 ture which former ages have exhausted. Every one who has been in the 

 way of pursuing any branch of study in our country beyond the mere ele- 

 ments, or the polite and popular literature of the time, knows how soon the 

 progress is often arrested for want of books. This is not the case merely 

 with persons of moderate means, who are unable to purchase a library of 

 their own, but it is a want felt under the most favorable circumstances. 



" It is also of great importance that the library of a university should 

 not only be good, but very good, ample, munificent ; a deposit of the 

 world's knowledge. It is a grievous thing to be stopped short in the midst 

 of an inquiry for perhaps the very book that throws most light upon it ; 

 and the progress of learning must be small indeed among us, so long as the 

 student must send across the Atlantic at every turn for the necessary aids 

 .to his pursuits. It is not with us as it is in Europe, where very many libra- 

 ries exist, and where what is not contained in one may be found in another ; 

 and the learned are able to aid each other's labors by furnishing mutually, 

 as desired, extracts and references to such books as may exist at one place 

 and fail at another. To say nothing of our two best libraries being remote 

 from each other and from manv parts of the country, they are themselves, 

 of course, inadequate. In making one tolerably complete department ex- 

 pressly chosen for that, and entirely devoted to it, we might easily comprise 

 the amount of books in our largest collection. When it is added that the 

 libraries mentioned are miscellaneous, their number of books small, as the 

 sum total is scattered over all the parts of knowledge, and many introduced 

 by separate contributions without mutual reference to each other, it is obvi- 

 ous that, comparatively speaking, the best must be extremely defective." 

 North American Review, vol. 8, p. 192. 



" What public library in this country contains the materials for an accu- 

 rate history of any one department of science? Take even the most lim- 

 ited, or rather one of the most recent of all, the science of political economy. 

 Here our researches are confined to one definite period. We have no dusty 

 archives to explore, no time-worn manuscripts to decipher. The origin of 

 the science is within the memory of our fathers, and we ourselves have 

 witnessed its sudden growth and rapid development. Yet how much is to 

 be done, how many authorities to be weighed, how many different treatises 

 to be analyzed and compared, before we can venture to say : Here is the 

 history ; for such was the rise, such the progress, such the changes of 

 opinions, such the received and such the rejected theories of political econ- 



