mon cause of bibliomania,
which is indeed the summum bonum of human life.

I have heard many decried who indulged their fancy for bookplates, as
if, forsooth, if a man loved his books, he should not lavish upon them
testimonials of his affection! Who that loves his wife should hesitate
to buy adornments for her person? I favor everything that tends to
prove that the human heart is swayed by the tenderer emotions.
Gratitude is surely one of the noblest emotions of which humanity is
capable, and he is indeed unworthy of our respect who would forbid
humanity's expressing in every dignified and reverential manner its
gratitude for the benefits conferred by the companionship of books.

As for myself, I urge upon all lovers of books to provide themselves
with bookplates. Whenever I see a book that bears its owner's plate I
feel myself obligated to treat that book with special consideration.
It carries with it a certificate of its master's love; the bookplate
gives the volume a certain status it would not otherwise have. Time
and again I have fished musty books out of bins in front of bookstalls,
bought them and borne them home with me simply because they had upon
their covers the bookplates of their former owners. I have a case
filled with these aristocratic estrays, and I insist that they shall be
as carefully dusted and kept as my other books, and I have provided in
my will for their perpetual maintenance after my decease.

If I were a rich man I should found a hospital for homeless
aristocratic books, an institution similar in all essential particulars
to the institution which is now operated at our national capital under
the bequest of the late Mr. Cochrane. I should name it the Home for
Genteel Volumes in Decayed Circumstances.

I was a young man when I adopted the bookplate which I am still using,
and which will be found in all my books. I drew the design myself and
had it executed by a son of Anderson, the first of American engravers.
It is by no means elaborate: a book rests upon a heart, and underneath
appear the lines:

My Book and Heart
Must never part.

Ah, little Puritan maid, with thy dear eyes of honest blue and thy fair
hair in proper plaits adown thy back, little thought we that
springtime long ago back among the New England hills that the tiny book
we read together should follow me through all my life! What a part has
that Primer played! And now all these other beloved companions b