the school.
These are important relations. From the beginning the child is taught
the value of books. In the kindergarten period he learns that they
contain beautiful pictures; in the grammar grades they do much to make
history and geography attractive; in the high school they are
indispensable as works of reference.

Were it not for the library, the education of the masses would, in most
cases, cease when the doors of the school swung in after them for the
last time; but it keeps those doors wide open, and is, in the truest
sense of the word, the university of the people. The library is as much
a part of the educational system of a community as the public school,
and is coming more and more to be regarded with the same respect and
supported in the same generous manner.

The public library of to-day is an active, potential force, serving the
present, and silently helping to develop the civilization of the future.
The spirit of the modern library movement which surrounds it is
thoroughly progressive, and thoroughly in sympathy with the people. It
believes that the true function of the library is to serve the people,
and that the only test of success is usefulness.

JOSEPH LEROY HARRISON.

THE PEOPLE'S UNIVERSITY

There is no institution so intimately, so universally, so constantly
connected with the life of the whole people as the free public
library--no instrumentality that can do so much to civilize society. The
public schools alone cannot accomplish the task of elevating mankind to
even the most modest ideal of a well ordered society.

Our public schools have been the chief source of the greater general
intelligence and hence the industrial superiority of our citizens over
those of other countries. But the public schools cannot accomplish
impossibilities. They are not to blame for the fact that they can reach
the great majority during only six or eight years, or that only one and
one half per cent of the children in the United States go through the
high school. But wherever there is a public library, the teachers are to
blame if they do not graduate all their pupils, at whatever age they may
leave school, into the People's University.

General intelligence is the necessary foundation of prosperity and
social order.

The public library is one of the chief agencies, if not the most potent
and far-reaching agency, for promoting general intelligence.

Therefore, money devoted to the maintenance of a public li