A partial answer to this question may be found in the prevail¬ 
ing custom of such graduates—if they have the means—to go to 
Europe, and sojourn for a time in those cities which afford them 
access to great libraries, to museums of all kinds, and galleries 
of painting and statuary. Scarcely an American has achieved a 
first position among those distinguished in literature, science or 
art, who has not availed himself of the advantages of European 
travel and study. American votaries of art arid science have, in 
many instances, become denizens of European cities simply be¬ 
cause they cannot find at home those external aids and influences 
without which they feel themselves unable to give perfection to 
their works. 
There is, it is believed, a demand for higher culture than now 
exists in the United States, springing up in all directions, and 
those who aspire to answer it are increasing, and consequently 
the numbers who seek European sites of learning are yearly 
augmenting. They return to spread among their fellow citizens 
the knowledge they have acquired. The whole country is 
benefitted; but still greater benefit would accrue to the nation if 
all such means of higher culture as are found in Europe w T ere 
established within our own domain, and made freely accessible. 
There should be no more necessity for our young men to go 
abroad to acquire the highest intellectual equipment, than there 
is to send our children to the schools of Great Britain for pri¬ 
mary instruction. 
In the necessity for enlarged accommodation and new location 
simultaneously experienced by several societies, incorporated at 
different times for the purpose of facilitating the labors of those 
who seek higher degrees of knowledge than are taught in our 
high school or university, is perceived a rare opportunity, which 
may never occur again, to begin an establishment which in its 
benificent effects will be analagous to the British Museum, the 
Garden of Plants, and other similar institutions of Europe. 
It is believed that the juxtaposition of the Academy of Fine 
Arts, which may include the School of Design, the Academy of 
Eatural Sciences, the Library Company of Philadelphia, possibly 
embracing the Atheneum, the Franklin Institute and American 
Philosophical Society, would in effect combine them for practical 
