4 TRANSACTIONS. 1906-7. 



offered to the public, in connection with a hbrary supported by- 

 whole the people, and in which every citizen has a personal and 

 direct interest. 



The Council of our Society some years ago, recognizing the 

 fact that its annual course of lectures should be available for a 

 larger circle than that of its members, abolished the fees for the 

 course and made the lectures absolutely free and open to the public, 

 and this to some degree has been appreciated, although not to the 

 extent desired. It must be admitted that the great mass of the 

 people is not hungering for intellectual development, but is rather 

 in search of amusement, entertainment, such forms of diversions 

 as involve little or no mental exertion and stimulate only the 

 more primitive faculties of the mind. The wheels of progress of 

 the world are, it cannot be denied, kept in motion by the few. 

 And so it is that all public meetings and addresses that have an 

 educational object are patronized by a very much smaller number 

 than is to be found at a football match. 



The rooms of the Society being somewhat limited for public 

 meetings, it was decided to avail ourselves of the hall in the library 

 which has been kindly placed at our disposal, an accommodation 

 for which I wish at this first opportunity to express the thanks of 

 the Society. 



A word as to the situation created by the opening of the 

 Carnegie Library with reference to our Society. 



As until this year there was no public library in the City, the 

 Society felt it its duty to minister as far as its limited means per- 

 mitted, to the needs of the community and thereby became a 

 quasi public library, at the cost of departing to some extent from 

 the purpose for which it was declared to be founded, "the cultiva- 

 tion of literature and science. " It would seem therefore, that the 

 opening of the Carnegie Library should further the interests of 

 the Literary and Scientific Society by relieving it of the task of 

 supplying general reading matter, especially of the more ephemeral 

 kind, and thereby permitting more attention to be bestowed in 

 another direction. 



In a society like ours, it seems to me that the most important 

 object to accomplish is to cultivate the living element, rather than 

 to accumulate books; books should only be means to an end. I 

 have for years recognized that we have here in Ottawa more 

 literary and scientific men and women in proportion to population 

 than any other city in Canada, and on the other hand I have de- 



