; to give the
best counsel we are able to one who is in doubt or distress; which, says
he, "are things that do good to the person that receives them, and are
no loss or trouble to him that confers them." And he quotes, with
approbation, the words of Ennius:

"He that directs the wandering traveller
Doth, as it were, light another's torch by his own;
Which gives him ne'er the less of light, for that
It gave another."

A good book is a guide to the reader, and a well-selected library will
be a guide to many. And shall we give a little running water, and turn
aside or choke up the streams of knowledge? light the evening torch, and
leave the immortal mind unillumined? give free counsel to the ignorant
or distressed, when he might easily be qualified to act as his own
counsellor? In July 1856, Mr. Everett gave five hundred dollars toward a
library for the High School in his native town of Dorchester; and in
1854 Mr. Abbott Lawrence gave an equal sum to his native town for the
establishment of a public library. These are not large donations, if we
consider only the amount of money given; but it is difficult to suggest
any other equal appropriation that would be as beneficial, in a public
sense. These donations are noble, because conceived in a spirit of
comprehensive liberality. They are examples worthy of imitation; and I
venture to affirm, there is not one of our New England towns that has
not given to the world a son able to make a similar contribution to the
cause of general learning. Is it too much to believe that a public
library in a town will double the number of persons having a taste for
reading, and consequently double the number of well-educated people?
For, though we are not educated by mere reading, it is yet likely to
happen that one who has a taste for books will also acquire habits of
observation, study, and reflection.

Professional institutes and clubs also serve to increase the sum of
general learning. They have thus far avoided the evil which has waited
or fastened upon similar associations in Europe,--subserviency to
political designs. Every profession or interest of labor has peculiar
ideas and special purposes. These ideas and purposes may be wisely
promoted by distinct organizations. Who can doubt the utility of
associations of merchants, mechanics, and farmers? They furnish
opportunities for the exchange of opinions, the exhibition of products,
the dissemination of ideas,