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lthy households can no more supply this general need of books than the great private dinners which are given in the same households can keep the entire community from going hungry. Accordingly, the second stage in the evolution of libraries is away from mere private ownership and use, and is toward complete public ownership and use; but it stops far this side of it; it is the stage of special scholastic libraries, collected by colleges and other learned corporations, and intended for the particular use of the learned class--students, investigators, and specialists. The earliest library of that sort ever formed in this country was begun at Harvard College in 1638; near the close of the 17th century, another was begun at William and Mary College, and still another at Yale; thenceforward, and especially during the past eighty years, such libraries have been multiplying in the land, so that at the present moment there are more than three hundred of them, and a few of them are now really vast library collections. The value of these libraries--who can doubt? Yet their direct value is only for a class; they are scholars' libraries, not people's libraries. This will not suffice; society cannot rest satisfied, and will not rest satisfied until everywhere good books for all are placed within the reach of all. The complete popularization of books is the goal. So we come to the third stage of library evolution--that of libraries gathered and controlled by voluntary associations of people, _e.g._, joint stock associations, but of course for the use only of those who subscribe to them and share in the expense. Here we have a natural step forward; a goodly step; a step in the right direction, but still not far enough. We shall all agree that this is the strong and hearty modern method of doing difficult things--the method of clubbing together to do something; it is self-reliant, social, cooperative, mutually, helpful, What the individual cannot do alone a club of individuals can do together. Thus the hardest and grandest achievements of our time have been brought about--vast railroads, vast manufacturing and commercial enterprises. And so men and women, who could not singly get the books they wanted, have joined forces and have got them by combination. It is a notable fact, however, that this third stage of library evolution was not reached until more than a hundred years after the first colonies had been settled. Many of y
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