Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions. George S. Boutwell
and clubs for merchants, mechanics, and farmers, and, at last, free libraries and lectures for the operatives in the mills. Where these institutions can exist, there must be a high order of general learning; and where these institutions do exist, and are sustained, the learning of the people, whether high or low at any given moment, must be rapidly improved. Yet some of these agencies—lectures and libraries, for example—are not free from serious faults. It may seem rash and indefensible to criticize lectures upon the platform of the lecturer; but, as the audience can inflict whatever penalty they please upon the speaker, he will so far assume responsibility as to say that amusement is not the highest object of a single lecture, and when sought by managers as the desirable object of a whole course, the lecture-room becomes a theatre of dissipation; surely not so bad as other forms of dissipation, but yet so distinctly marked, and so pernicious in its influence, as to be comparatively unworthy of general support. Let it not, however, be inferred that wit, humor, and drollery even, are to be excluded from the lecture-room; but they should always be employed as means by which information is communicated. Between lecturers equal in other respects, one with the salt of humor, native to the soil, should be preferred; but it is a sad reflection upon public taste, when a person whose entire intellectual capital is wit, humor, or buffoonery, is preferred to men of solid learning. But it is a worse view of human nature, when men of real merit and worth depreciate themselves and lower the public taste, by attempting to do what, at best, they can have but ill success in, and what they would despise themselves for, were they to succeed completely. Shakspeare says of a jester:
"This fellow's wise enough to play the fool;
And to do that well, craves a kind of wit:
This is a practice
As full of labor as a wise man's art:
For folly, that he wisely shows, is fit;
But wise men, folly-fallen, quite taint their wit."
A kindred mental dissipation follows in the steps of progress, and demands aliment from our public libraries. In the selection of books there is a wide range, from the trashy productions of the fifth-rate novelist, to stately history and exact science. It is, however, to be assumed that libraries will not be established until they are wanted, and that the want will not be pressing until there is a taste for reading somewhat general. Where this taste exists, it is fair to assume that it is in some degree elevated. The direction, however, which the taste of any community is to take, after the establishment of a public library, depends, in a great degree, upon the selection of books for its shelves. Two dangers are to be avoided. The first, and greatest, is the selection of books calculated to degrade the morals or intellect of the reader. This danger is apparent, and to be shunned needs but to be seen. Books, of more or less intrinsic value, are so abundant and cheap, that common men must go out of their way to gather a large collection that shall not contain works of real merit. But the object should be to exclude all worthless and pernicious works, and meet and improve the public taste, by offering it mental food better than that to which it has been accustomed. The other danger is negative, rather than positive; but, as books are comparatively worthless when they are not read, it becomes a matter of great moment to select such as will touch the public mind at a few points, at least. It is indeed possible, and, under the guidance of some persons, it would be natural, to encumber the shelves of a library with good books that might ever remain so, saving only the contributions made to mould and mice.
Now, if you will pardon a little more fault-finding—which is, I confess, a quality without merit, or, as Byron has it,
"A man must serve his time to every trade
Save censure—critics all are ready made,"—
I will hazard the opinion that the practice of establishing libraries in towns for the benefit of a portion of the inhabitants only is likely to prove pernicious in the end. To be sure, reading for some is better than reading for none; but reading for all is better than either. In Massachusetts there is a general law that permits cities and towns to raise money for the support of libraries; yet the legislature, in a few cases, has granted charters to library associations. With due deference, it may very well be suggested, that, where a spirit exists which leads a few individuals to ask for a charter, it would be better to turn this spirit into a public channel, that all might enjoy its benefits. And it will happen, generally, that the establishment of a public library will be less expensive to the friends of the movement, and the advantages will be greater; while there will be an additional satisfaction in the good conferred upon others.
We shall act wisely if we apply to books a maxim of the Greeks: "All things in common amongst friends." Under this maxim Cicero has enumerated, as principles of humanity, not to deny one a little running water, or the lighting his fire by ours, if he has occasion; 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, and the knowledge of improvements, that are thus wisely made the property of all. Knowledge begets knowledge. What is the distinguishing fact between a good school and a poor one? Is it not, that in a good school the prevailing public sentiment is on the side of knowledge and its acquisition? And does not the same fact distinguish a learned community from an ignorant community? If, in a village or city of artisans, each one makes a small annual contribution to the general stock of knowledge, the aggregate progress will be appreciable, and, most likely, considerable. If, on the other hand, each one plods by himself, the sum of professional knowledge cannot be increased, and is likely to be diminished.
The moral of the parable of the ten talents is eminently true in matters of learning. "Unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath." We cannot conceive of a greater national calamity than an industrial population delving in mental sluggishness at unrelieved and unchanging tasks. The manufacture of pins was commenced in England in 1583, and for two hundred and fifty years she had the exclusive control of the trade; yet all that period passed away without improvement, or change in the process; while in America the business was revolutionized, simplified, and economized one-half, in the period of five years. In 1840