thereon some of the remarks with which it was introduced by its author, then a distinguished member of the other branch, but no longer there to adorn its debates with the gay flowers of his brilliant eloquence.

He objected to limiting the cost of the library building to one hundred thousand dollars; seeing, as he reminded the Senate, that the "largest class" of public libraries contain from a quarter of a million to upwards of a half a million of volumes. He said:

"Twenty thousand dollars a year for twenty-five years are five hundred thousand dollars; and five hundred thousand dollars directly expended, not by a bibliomaniac, but by a man of sense and reading, thoroughly instructed in bibliography, would go far, very far, towards the purchase of as good a library as Europe can boast."-Speech of Senator Choate, January 8, 1845.

He adds, a little further on, that "such a step taken, we should never leave the work unfinished;" and that when finished, it would "rival anything civilization has ever had to show."

He argues of the value and importance of such a library after this wise:

"I do not know, that of all the printed books in the world, we have in this country, more than fifty thousand different works. The consequence has been felt and lamented by all our authors and all our scholars. It has been often said that Gibbon's History could not have been written here for want of books. I suppose that Hallam's Middle Ages, and his Introduction to the Literature of Europe, could not. Irving's Columbus was written in Spain; Wheaton's Northmen prepared to be written in Copenhagen. See how this inadequate supply operates. An American mind kindles with a subject; it enters on an investigation with a spirit and ability worthy of the most splendid achievement; goes a little way, finds that a dozen books -one book, perhaps-is indispensable, which cannot be found this side Gottingen or Oxford; it tires of the pursuit, or abandons it altogether," &c.

And the Senator branches off, in his own brilliant style, into a dissertation on the value and importance of such a library: "a vast store-house," says he; "a vast treasury of all the facts which make up the history of man and of nature;"**"a silent, yet wise and eloquent teacher; dead, yet speaking; not dead! for Milton has told us: 'a good book is not absolutely a dead thing-the precious life-blood rather, of a master spirit; a seasoned life of man, embalmed and treasured up, on purpose to a life beyond life.'"

If the question were between a library and no library; between books and no books; the language thus employed, fervid as it is, would be all insufficient to shadow forth the towering magnitude of the subject. John Faust—if indeed, to the goldsmith of Mentz the world owe the art of typesetting--conferred on his race a greater boon than ever before did living man. There is no comparison to be made

between the effects of the art of printing and those of any other discovery put forth by human wit. There is nothing to which to liken it. It was a general gaol-delivery of the thoughts of the world. It was a sending forth of these winged messengers, hitherto bound down each in his own narrow sphere, emancipated, over the earth. And that was the great day, not of Intellect only, but of Freedom also. Then was struck the heaviest blow against law giving for the mind. The Strombolean Cave was opened; the longpent winds of opinion set free; and no edict-framing Eolus could crib and confine them to their prison-house again.

Yes! well might Faust incur the charge of demonocracy! for, almost to the letter, has his wondrous craft realized, in our day, the fables of eastern romance. Draw a chair before your library, and you have obtained the magical carpet of the Arabian tale; you are transported, at a wish, farther than to Africa's deserts or India's groves; not to other climes only, but to other times also. The speaking page introduces you, not to your cotemporaries alone, but to your ancestors, through centuries past. The best and the wisest of former generations are summoned to your presence. In books exists the by-gone world. By books we come into contact with the mankind of former ages. By books we travel among ancient nations, visit tribes long since extinct, and are made familiar with manners, that have yielded, centuries ago, to the innovating influences of time. Contracted, indeed, is his mental horizon, limited his sphere of comparison, whose fancy has never lived among the sages and heroes of the olden time, to listen to their teachings, and to learn from their achievements.

As far as the farthest, then, will I go, in his estimate of the blessings which the art of printing has conferred upon man. But such reasoning bears not on the proposal embraced in the Senate bill. It substantiates not at all the propriety of spending half a million, or two, or three half millions of dollars, to rival the bibliomaniacs of Paris and of Munich.

A library of Congress we already have; a library of forty or fifty thousand volumes; a library increasing at the rate of one or two thousand volumes a year. The Smithsonian bill before you permits, in addition, an expenditure not exceeding ten thousand dollars a year for this object. Say that but half that sum is annually expended by the managers; and still, in some twelve or fifteen years, the two libraries will probably number from eighty to a hundred thousand volumes. Are there a hundred thousand volumes

in the world worth reading? I doubt it much. Are there four thousand volumes published yearly worth buying? I do not believe there are. A small garner suffices to store the wheat; it is the chaff that is bulky and fills up the storehouse. Books are like wealth. An income we must have to live; a certain amount of income to live in comfort. Beyond a certain income the power of wealth to purchase comfort, or even wholesome luxury, ceases altogether. How much more of true comfort is there in a fortune of a million of dollars than in one of fifty, or say a hundred thousand? If more there be, the excess is hardly appreciable; the burden and cares of a millionaire outweigh it tenfold. And so also, of these vast and bloated book-gatherings, that sleep in dust and cobwebs on the library shelves of European monarchies. Up to a judicious selection of thirty, fifty, a hundred thousand volumes, if you will, how vast-yea, how priceless-is the intellectual wealth! From one to five hundred thousand, what do we gain? Nothing? That would not be true; a goblet emptied into the Pacific adds to the mass of its waters. But if, within these limits, we set down one book out of a hundred as worth the money it costs, we are assuredly making too liberal an estimate.

I pray you, sir, not to stretch these strictures beyond their precise application. I am not one of those who judge slightingly the learning of the past. We find shining forth from the dark mass of ancient literature, gems of rare beauty and value; unequalled, even to-day, in purity and truth. But, then, also, what clouds of idle verbiage! What loads of ostentatious technicalities! It is but of late years that even the disciple of science has deigned to simplify and translate; formerly his great object seems to have been to obscure and mystify. The satirist, in sketching an individual variety, has aptly described the species, when he says:

"The wise men of Egypt were as secret as dummies,

And even when they most condescended to teach,

They packed up their meaning, as they did their mummies,
In so many wrappers, 'twas out of one's reach."

But there are such noble enterprises as those of Gibbon and Hallam; valuable to all; doubly valuable to the moralist and statesman. And in regard to such it is argued that if one of our own scholars, fired with generous ambition to rival the historians of the Old World, enters on such a task, he may find that a dozen, or perhaps a single book, necessary for reference, " cannot be found this side of Gottingen or Oxford." Suppose he does, what is the remedy? A very simple one suggests itself: that he should order, through an importer

of foreign books, the particular work which he lacks. To save him the trouble and expense of so doing, the friends of the mammoth library scheme propose-what? That we should begin by expending half a million of dollars, which would "go far towards the purchase of as good a library as Europe can boast;" that such a step taken, we should never leave the work unfinished;" and that, when finished, it would "rival anything civilization has ever had to show."

It is prudent, before we enter this rivalship, to count its cost. Without seeking to reach the seven hundred thousand volumes of the Parisan library, let us suppose we try for the half million of volumes that form the boast of Munich, or fill up the shelves of the Bodleian. Our librarian informs me that the present Congressional library (certainly not one of the most expensive) has cost upwards of three dollars a volume; its binding alone has averaged over a dollar a volume. The same works could be purchased now, it is true, much more cheaply; but, on the other hand, the rare old books and curious manuscripts necessary to complete a library of the largest class would raise the average. Assuming, then, the above rate, a rival of the Munich library would cost us a million and a half of dollars; its binding alone would amount to a sum equal to the entire Smithsonian fund, as originally remitted to us from England.

And thus, not only the entire legacy which we have promised to expend so that it shall increase and diffuse knowledge among men, is to be squandered in this idle and bootless rivalry, but thousands on thousands must be added to finish the work from what source to be derived, let its advocates inform us. And when we have spent thrice the amount of Smithson's original bequest on the project, we shall have the satisfaction of believing that we may possibly have saved to some worthy scholar a hundred, or perchance a few hundred dollars, which otherwise he must have spent to obtain from Europe half a dozen valuable works of reference!

But there are other reasons urged for this appropriation of the Smithsonian fund.

"There is something to point to, if you should be asked to account for it unexpectedly; and something to point to if a traveler should taunt you with the collections which he has seen abroad, and which gild and recommend the absolutisms of Vienna or St. Petersburg.”—Senator Choate's Speech, as above.

This purchasing of a reply to some silly traveler's idle taunts, at a cost of a million and a half of dollars, includ

ing a fund sacredly pledged to human improvement, seems to me a somewhat costly and unscrupulous mode of gratifying national vanity. It is ineffectual, too; unless we are prepared to add a few millions more, to buy up-if money could buy!-the means of reply to other taunts, quite as just and quite as likely to be cast up to us. There is the Vatican, with its

"Statues but known from shapes of the earth,
By being too lovely for mortal birth."

There is the Florence Gallery, with its

"Paintings, whose colors of life were caught

From the fairy tints in the rainbow wrought-”

images of beauty, living conceptions of grandeur, refining, cultivating, elevating; worth all the musty manuscripts of Oxford, ten times told! How are we to escape the imputation that our rude land can show no such triumphs of art as these? Are we to follow Bonaparte's plan? Are we to carry war into the land of the olive and the vine; and enrich this city, as the French Emperor did his capital, with the artistical spoils of the world? Unless we adopt some such plan, must not Europe's taunts remain unanswered still?

And let them so remain! I share not the feelings of the learned and eloquent Senator to whose remarks I have taken liberty to reply, when he says:

"I confess to a pang of envy and grief, that there should be one drop or one morsel more of the bread or water of intellectual life tasted by the European than by the American mind. Why should not the soul of this country eat as good food, and as much of it, as the soul of Europe."

It grieves me not, that the fantastic taste of some epicure in learning may chance to find, on the book-shelves of Paris, some literary morsel of choice and ancient flavor, such as our own metropolis supplies not. I feel no envy, if we republicans are outdone by luxurious Europe in some high-seasoned delicacy of the pampered soul. Enough have we to console ourselves!-objects of national ambition, how much higher, how infinitely nobler than these!objects of national pride, before which these petty antiquarian triumphs dwarf down into utter insignificancy! Look abroad over our far-spreading land, then glance across to the monarchies of the Old World, and say if I speak not truth!

I have sojourned among the laborers of England; I have visited, amid their vineyards, the peasantry of France; 1 have dwelt for years in the midst of the hardy mountain