How to Form a Library Part 1

How to Form a Library.

by H. B. Wheatley.

PREFACE.

_It will be generally allowed that a handy guide to the formation of libraries is required, but it may be that the difficulty of doing justice to so large a subject has prevented those who felt the want from attempting to fill it. I hope therefore that it will not be considered that I have shown temerity by stepping into the vacant place. I cannot hope to have done full justice to so important a theme in the small s.p.a.ce at my disposal, but I think I can say that this little volume contains much information which the librarian and the book lover require and cannot easily obtain elsewhere. They are probably acquainted with most of this information, but the memory will fail us at times and it is then convenient to have a record at hand._

_A book of this character is peculiarly open to criticism, but I hope the critics will give me credit for knowing more than I have set down. In making a list of books of reference, I have had to make a selection, and works have been before me that I have decided to omit, although some would think them as important as many of those I have included._

_I need not extend this preface with any lengthy explanation of the objects of the book, as these are stated in the Introduction, but before concluding I may perhaps be allowed to allude to one personal circ.u.mstance. I had hoped to dedicate this first volume of the Book Lover's Library to HENRY BRADSHAW, one of the most original and most learned bibliographers that ever lived, but before it was finished the spirit of that great man had pa.s.sed away to the inexpressible grief of all who knew him. It is with no desire to s.h.i.+eld myself under the shelter of a great name, but with a reverent wish to express my own sense of our irreparable loss that I dedicate this book (though all unworthy of the honour) to his memory._

HOW TO FORM A LIBRARY.

INTRODUCTION.

Although there can be little difference of opinion among book lovers as to the need of a Handbook which shall answer satisfactorily the question--"How to Form a Library"--it does not follow that there will be a like agreement as to the best shape in which to put the answer. On the one side a string of generalities can be of no use to any one, and on the other a too great particularity of instruction may be resented by those who only require hints on a few points, and feel that they know their own business better than any author can tell them.

One of the most important attempts to direct the would-be founder of a Library in his way was made as long ago as 1824 by Dr. Dibdin, and the result was ent.i.tled _The Library Companion_.[1] The book could never have been a safe guide, and now it is hopelessly out of date. Tastes change, and many books upon the necessity of possessing which Dibdin enlarges are now little valued. Dr. Hill Burton writes of this book as follows in his _Book-Hunter_: "This, it will be observed, is not intended as a manual of rare or curious, or in any way peculiar books, but as the instruction of a Nestor on the best books for study and use in all departments of literature. Yet one will look in vain there for such names as Montaigne, Shaftesbury, Benjamin Franklin, D'Alembert, Turgot, Adam Smith, Malebranche, Lessing, Goethe, Schiller, Fenelon, Burke, Kant, Richter, Spinoza, Flechier, and many others. Characteristically enough, if you turn up Rousseau in the index, you will find Jean Baptiste, but not Jean Jacques. You will search in vain for Dr. Thomas Reid the metaphysician, but will readily find Isaac Reed the editor. If you look for Molinaeus, or Du Moulin, it is not there, but alphabetical vicinity gives you the good fortune to become acquainted with "Moule, Mr., his _Bibliotheca Heraldica_." The name of Hooker will be found, not to guide the reader to the _Ecclesiastical Polity_, but to Dr. Jackson Hooker's _Tour in Iceland_. Lastly, if any one shall search for Hartley _on Man_, he will find in the place it might occupy, or has reference to, the editorial services of 'Hazlewood, Mr. Joseph.'"

Although this criticism is to a great extent true, it does not do justice to Dibdin's book, which contains much interesting and valuable matter, for if the _Library Companion_ is used not as a Guide to be followed, but as a book for reference, it will be found of considerable use.

William Goodhugh's _English Gentleman's Library Manual, or a Guide to the Formation of a Library of Select Literature_, was published in 1827. It contains cla.s.sified lists of library books, but these are not now of much value, except for the notes which accompany the t.i.tles, and make this work eminently readable. There are some literary anecdotes not to be found elsewhere.

A most valuable work of reference is Mr. Edward Edwards's Report on the formation of the Manchester Free Library, which was printed in 1851. It is ent.i.tled, "_Librarian's First Report to the Books Sub-Committee on the Formation of the Library, June 30, 1851, with Lists of Books suggested for purchase_." The Lists are arranged in the following order:--

1. Works--collective and miscellaneous--of Standard British authors; with a selection of those of the Standard authors of America.

2. Works relative to the History, Topography, and Biography of the United Kingdom, and of the United States of America.

3. Works relative to Political Economy, Finance, Trade, Commerce, Agriculture, Mining, Manufactures, Inland Communication, and Public Works.

4. Works relating to Physics, Mathematics, Mechanics, Practical Engineering, Arts, and Trades, etc.

5. Voyages and Travels.

6. Works on Zoology, Botany, Mineralogy, and Geology.

7. Periodical Publications and Transactions of Learned Societies (not included in Lists 2, 3, or 6), Collections, Encyclopaedias, Gazetteers, Atlases, Dictionaries, Bibliographies, Indexes, etc.

These draft lists include 4582 distinct works, extending to about 12,438 volumes, including pamphlets, but exclusive of 553 Parliamentary Papers and Reports, or _Blue Books_. Such a practically useful collection of lists of books will not easily be found elsewhere.

Mr. Edwards gives some rules for the formation of Libraries in the second volume of his _Memoirs of Libraries_ (p. 629), where he writes, "No task is more likely to strip a man of self-conceit than that of having to frame, and to carry out in detail a plan for the formation of a large Library. When he has once got beyond those departments of knowledge in which his own pursuits and tastes have specially interested him, the duty becomes a difficult one, and the certainty, that with his best efforts, it will be very imperfectly performed is embarra.s.sing and painful. If, on the other hand, the task be imposed upon a 'Committee,' there ensues almost the certainty that its execution will depend at least as much on chance as on plan: that responsibility will be so attenuated as to pa.s.s off in vapour; and that the collection so brought together will consist of parts bearing but a chaotic sort of relation to the whole."

Mr. Henry Stevens printed in 1853 his pretty little book ent.i.tled _Catalogue of my English Library_, which contains a very useful selection of Standard books. In his Introduction the author writes, "It was my intention in the outset not to exceed 4000 volumes, but little by little the list has increased to 5751 volumes. I have been considerably puzzled to know what t.i.tles to strike out in my next impression, being well aware that what is trash to one person is by no means such to another; also that many books of more merit than those admitted have been omitted. You may not think it difficult to strike out twenty authors, and to add twenty better ones in their place, but let me relate to you a parable. I requested twenty men, whose opinions on the Literary Exchange are as good as those of the Barings or the Rothschilds on the Royal, each to expunge twenty authors and to insert twenty others of better standing in their places, promising to exclude in my next impression any author who should receive more than five votes. The result was, as may be supposed, not a single expulsion or addition."

In 1855 Mons. Hector Bossange produced a companion volume, ent.i.tled _Ma Bibliotheque Francaise_. It contains a select list of about 7000 volumes, and is completed with Indexes of Subjects, Authors, and Persons.

For helpful Bibliographical Guides we often have to look to the United States, and we do not look in vain. A most useful Handbook, ent.i.tled _The Best Reading_, was published in 1872 by George P. Putman, and the work edited by F.B. Perkins is now in its fourth edition.[2] The books are arranged in an alphabet of subjects, and the t.i.tles are short, usually being well within a single line. A very useful system of apprais.e.m.e.nt of the value of the books is adopted. Thus: _a_, means that the book so marked is considered _the_ book, or as good as any, _at a moderate cost_; _b_ means, in like manner, the best of the more elaborate or costly books on the subject. In the department of FICTION, a more precise cla.s.sification has been attempted, in which a general idea of the relative importance of the _authors_ is indicated by the use of the letters _a_, _b_, and _c_, and of the relative value of their several works by the asterisks * and **."

Having noted a few of the Guides which are now at hand for the use of the founders of a library, we may be allowed to go back somewhat in time, and consider how our predecessors treated this same subject, and we can then conclude the present Introduction with a consideration of the less ambitious attempts to instruct the book collector which may be found in papers and articles.

One of the earliest works on the formation of a library was written by Bishop Cardona, and published at Tarragona in 1587, in a thin volume ent.i.tled _De regia S. Laurentii Bibliotheca. De Pontificia Vaticana_ [etc.].

Justus Lipsius wrote his _De Bibliothecis Syntagma_ at the end of the sixteenth century, and next in importance we come to Gabriel Naude, who published one of the most famous of bibliographical essays. The first edition was published at Paris in 1627, and the second edition in 1644.

This was reprinted in Paris by J. Liseux in 1876--"_Advis pour dresser une Bibliotheque, presente a Monseigneur le President de Mesme_, par G. Naude P. Paris, chez Francois Farga, 1627."

This essay was translated by John Evelyn, and dedicated to Lord Chancellor Clarendon. "_Instructions concerning erecting of a Library_; Presented to My Lord the President De Mesme. By Gabriel Naudeus P., and now interpreted by Jo. Evelyn, Esquire, London, 1661."

Naude enlarges on the value of Catalogues, and recommends the book-buyer to make known his desires, so that others may help him in the search, or supply his wants. He specially mentions two modes of forming a library; one is to buy libraries entire, and the other is to hunt at book-stalls.

He advised the book-buyer not to spend too much upon bindings.

Naude appears to have been a born librarian, for at the early age of twenty the President De Mesme appointed him to take charge of his library. He left his employer in 1626, in order to finish his medical studies. Cardinal Bagni took him to Rome, and when Bagni died, Naude became librarian to Cardinal Barberini. Richelieu recalled him to Paris in 1642, to act as his librarian, but the Minister dying soon afterwards, Naude took the same office under Mazarin. During the troubles of the Fronde, the librarian had the mortification of seeing the library which he had collected dispersed; and in consequence he accepted the offer of Queen Christina, to become her librarian at Stockholm. Naude was not happy abroad, and when Mazarin appealed to him to reform his scattered library, he returned at once, but died on the journey home at Abbeville, July 29, 1653.

The Mazarin Library consisted of more than 40,000 volumes, arranged in seven rooms filled from top to bottom. It was rich in all cla.s.ses, but more particularly in Law and Physic. Naude described it with enthusiasm as "the most beautiful and best furnished of any library now in the world, or that is likely (if affection does not much deceive me) ever to be hereafter." Such should be a library in the formation of which the Kings and Princes and Amba.s.sadors of Europe were all helpers. Naude in another place called it "the work of my hands and the miracle of my life." Great therefore was his dejection when the library was dispersed. Of this he said, "Beleeve, if you please, that the ruine of this Library will be more carefully marked in all Histories and Calendars, than the taking and sacking of Constantinople." Naude's letter on the destruction of the Mazarin Library was published in London in 1652, and the pamphlet was reprinted in the _Harleian Miscellany_. "_News from France, or a Description of the Library of Cardinall Mazarini, before it was utterly ruined._ Sent in a letter from G. Naudaeus, Keeper of the Publick Library.

London, Printed for Timothy Garthwait, 1652." 4to. 4 leaves.

In 1650 was published at London, by Samuel Hartlib, a little book ent.i.tled, "_The Reformed Librarie Keeper, with a Supplement to the Reformed School, as Subordinate to Colleges in Universities._ By John Durie. London, William Du-Gard, 1650."[3]

John Durie's ideas on the educational value of Libraries and the high function of the Librarian are similar to those enunciated by Carlyle, when he wrote, "The true University of these days is a Collection of Books." Of this point, as elaborated in the proposal to establish Professors.h.i.+ps of Bibliography, we shall have something more to say further on.

It is always interesting to see the views of great men exemplified in the selection of books for a Library, and we may with advantage study the lists prepared by George III. and Dr. Johnson. The King was a collector of the first rank, as is evidenced by his fine library, now in the British Museum, and he knew his books well. When he was about to visit Weymouth, he wrote to his bookseller for the following books to be supplied to him to form a closet library at that watering place. The list was written from memory, and it was printed by Dibdin in his _Library Companion_, from the original doc.u.ment in the King's own handwriting:

The Holy Bible. 2 vols. 8vo. Cambridge.

New Whole Duty of Man. 8vo.

The Annual Register. 25 vols. 8vo.

The History of England, by Rapin. 21 vols. 8vo. 1757.

Elemens de l'Histoire de France, par Millot. 3 vols. 12mo.

1770.

Siecle de Louis XIV., par Voltaire, 12mo.

Siecle de Louis XV., par Voltaire, 12mo.

Commentaries on the Laws of England, by Sir William Blackstone. 4 vols. 8vo. Newest Edition.

The Justice of the Peace and Parish Officer, by R. Burn. 4 vols. 8vo.

An Abridgement of Samuel Johnson's Dictionary. 2 vols. 8vo.