A Book for All Readers | Page 8

for guidance, as their parents are to
provide wholesome food for their bodies.
But the question returns upon us--what is wholesome food? In the first
place, it is that great body of fiction which has borne the test, both of
critical judgment, and of popularity with successive generations of
readers. It is the novels of Scott, Austen, Dickens, Thackeray, George
Eliot, Cooper, Hawthorne, Kingsley, Mulock-Craik, and many more,
such as no parents need blush to put into the hands of their daughters.
In the next place, it is such a selection from the myriads of stories that
have poured from the press of this generation as have been approved by
the best readers, and the critical judgment of a responsible press.
As to books of questionable morality, I am aware that contrary opinions
prevail on the question whether any such books should be allowed in a
public library, or not. The question is a different one for the small town
libraries and for the great reference libraries of the world. The former
are really educational institutions, supported at the people's expense,
like the free schools, and should be held to a responsibility from which
the extensive reference libraries in the city are free. The latter may and
ought to preserve every form of literature, and, if national libraries,
they would be derelict in their duty to posterity if they did not acquire
and preserve the whole literature of the country, and hand it down
complete to future generations. The function of the public town library
is different. It must indispensably make a selection, since its means are
not adequate to buy one-tenth of the annual product of the press, which
amounts in only four nations (England, France, Germany, and the
United States) to more than thirty-five thousand new volumes a year.
Its selection, mainly of American and English books, must be small,
and the smaller it is, the greater is the need of care in buying. In fact, it
is in most cases, compelled to be a selection from a selection. Therefore,
in the many cases of doubt arising as to the fit character of a book, let
the doubt be resolved in favor of the fund, thus preserving the chance

of getting a better book for the money.
With this careful and limited selection of the best, out of the multitude
of novels that swarm from the press, the reading public will have every
reason to be satisfied. No excuse can be alleged for filling up our
libraries with poor books, while there is no dearth whatever of good
ones. It is not the business of a public library to compete with the news
stands or the daily press in furnishing the latest short stories for popular
consumption; a class of literature whose survival is likely to be quite as
short as the stories themselves.
Take an object lesson as to the mischiefs of reading the wretched stuff
which some people pretend is "better than no reading at all" from the
boy Jesse Pomeroy, who perpetrated a murder of peculiar atrocity in
Boston. "Pomeroy confessed that he had always been a great reader of
'blood and thunder' stories, having read probably sixty dime novels, all
treating of scalping and deeds of violence. The boy said that he had no
doubt that the reading of those books had a great deal to do with his
course, and he would advise all boys to leave them alone."
In some libraries, where the pernicious effect of the lower class of
fiction has been observed, the directors have withdrawn from
circulation a large proportion of the novels, which had been bought by
reason of their popularity. In other newly started libraries only fiction
of the highest grade has been placed in the library from the start, and
this is by far the best course. If readers inquire for inferior or immoral
books, and are told that the library does not have them, although they
will express surprise and disappointment, they will take other and
improving reading, thus fulfilling the true function of the library as an
educator. Librarians and library boards cannot be too careful about
what constitutes the collection which is to form the pabulum of so
many of the rising generation.
This does not imply that they are to be censors, or prudes, but with the
vast field of literature before them from which to choose, they are
bound to choose the best.
The American Library Association has had this subject under

discussion repeatedly, and while much difference of opinion has arisen
from the difficulty of finding any absolute standard of excellence,
nearly all have agreed that as to certain books, readers should look
elsewhere than to the public free library for them. At one time a list of
authors was made out,