GUPPY — VICTORIA INSTITUTE, ETC. 
179 
large number of Novels for a very small sum. However 1 do 
not wish to insist on any of these points. None of my argu- 
ments need stand in the way of a Government grant for the 
supply of Fiction. I wish to leave the decision of that point in 
the hands of those concerned. What we want and what I am 
now pleading for is a really public Library maintained for the 
public benefit and not for the benefit of a particular class or set 
such as the subscribers to the present Library are. Therefore let 
the novels and part of the subsidy remain with the Borough 
Council (if it be so decided) for the maintenance of a circulating 
Library and let the scientific and useful portion of the collection 
together with the remainder of the grant go to the Victoria 
Institute for the formation and maintenance of a library for 
public and national objects. 
From what I have stated you will see my object in supporting 
the union or amalgamation of the public Library with the 
Victoria Institute just as I formerly supported and advocated 
the union and amalgamation of the Field Naturalists’ Club and 
the Victoria Institute. It seems a tendency of human nature 
to prefer division and disunion and this tendency is encouraged 
by those who wish to profit by disunion and division. Union is 
almost always for the general benefit ; but the individual frequently 
inclines to the view that his influence or his glory or his indivi- 
dual something or another will lose by union. Hence it seems 
to be that union like the welding of steel mostly requires heat 
and some force of compression or of impact from outside to 
perfect it. Individual action seems almost always to lead to 
disintegration and dissolution. The Irish Union, the Scotch 
Union,” the American Union (twice) the Italian Union, the 
German Ur : m were all effected or perfected with the aid of force. 
An expression of George Washington’s lately quoted in a local 
newspaper shows that the great statesman appreciated the fact. 
He says “ Experience has taught us that men will not adopt and 
carry into execution measures, the best calculated for their own 
good, without the intervention of coercive power.” 
In reference to the discussion as to where the “ Challenger” 
Volumes .should be placed, if it were a question as to where it is 
most for the public interest that they should be placed there 
could be only one answer and that is at the Public Museum 
(called the Victoria Institute). At no other place could they be 
so freely accessible to students and at the same time under pro- 
per care. The valuable scientific books stored at the Public 
Library are utterly uneared for and are fast going to ruin. But 
the way this question has been discussed shows how every Insti- 
