THE LIBRARY
Get good books; give them a home attractive to readers of good books; name a friend of good books as mistress of this home—and you have a library; all share in its support and all get pleasure and profit from it if they will; without divisions religious, politic or social, it unites all in the pursuit of high pleasure and sound learning, and gives that common interest in a common concern which is the basis of all local pride.
If you have rightly read a book, that book is yours.
You cannot always choose your companions; you can always choose your books. You can, if you will, spend a few minutes every day with the best and wisest men and women the world has ever known.
The people you have known, the things you have said and done, and the books you have read, all these are now a part of you.
You like yourself better when you are with people who are well-bred and clever; you respect yourself more when you are reading a bright and wholesome book, for you are then in the company of the wise.
J. C. DANA.
After the church and the school, the free public library is the most effective influence for good in America. The moral, mental and material benefits to be derived from a carefully selected collection of good books, free for the use of all the people, cannot be overestimated. No community can afford to be without a library.
THEODORE ROOSEVELT.