It is a great part of our education to know how to find facts. No man knows everything, but the man who knows how to find an indispensable fact quickly has the best substitute for such knowledge. We need a library to carry forward in a better manner the education of the children who leave school; to give them a better chance for self-education. We need it to give thoughts and inspiration to the teachers of the people, those who in the schoolroom or pulpit, on the rostrum, or with the pen attempt to instruct or lead their fellow citizens. We need it to help our mechanics in their employments, to give them the best thoughts of the best workers in their lines, whether these thoughts come in books or papers or magazines.
WISCONSIN FREE LIBRARY COMMISSION.
The public library is an adult school; it is a perpetual and life-long continuation class; it is the greatest educational factor that we have; and the librarian is becoming our most important teacher and guide.
SIR WALTER BESANT.
WHAT A LIBRARY DOES FOR A TOWN
1 Completes its educational equipment, carrying on and giving permanent value to the work of the schools.
2 Gives the children of all classes a chance to know and love the best in literature. Without the public library such a chance is limited to the very few.
3 Minimizes the sale and reading of vicious literature in the community, thus promoting mental and moral health.
4 Effects a great saving in money to every reader in the community. The library is the application of common sense to the problem of supply and demand. Through it every reader in the town can secure at a given cost from 100 to 1000 times the material for reading or study that he could secure by acting individually.
5 Appealing to all classes, sects and degrees of intelligence, it is a strong unifying factor in the life of a town.