It is a vanity to persuade the world one hath much learning, by
getting a great library.

It is a vanity to persuade the world one hath much learning, by
getting a great library.

If truth is beauty, how come no one has their hair done in a library.

If truth is beauty, how come no one has their hair done in a library.

A library implies an act of faith

A library implies an act of faith

I love vast libraries; yet there is a doubt,
If one be better with them or without,--
read more

I love vast libraries; yet there is a doubt,
If one be better with them or without,--
Unless he use them wisely, and, indeed,
Knows the high art of what and how to read.

A circulating library in a town is as an evergreen tree of
diabolical knowledge.

A circulating library in a town is as an evergreen tree of
diabolical knowledge.

Thou can'st not die. Here thou art more than safe
Where every book is thy epitaph.

Thou can'st not die. Here thou art more than safe
Where every book is thy epitaph.

The richest minds need not large libraries.

The richest minds need not large libraries.

What a place to be in is an old library! It seems as though all
the souls of all read more

What a place to be in is an old library! It seems as though all
the souls of all the writers that have bequeathed their labours
to these Bodleians were reposing here as in some dormitory, or
middle state. I do not want to handle, to profane the leaves,
their winding-sheets. I could as soon dislodge a shade. I seem
to inhale learning, walking amid their foliage; and the odor of
their old moth-scented coverings is fragrant as the first bloom
of those sciential apples which grew amid the happy orchard.
- Charles Lamb (used pseudonym Elia),

Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were
only the history of pinheads.

Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were
only the history of pinheads.