A Book for All Readers: An Aid to the Collection, Use, and Preservation of Books and the Formation of Public and Private LibrariesSpofford, Ainsworth Rand
Science
A Book for All Readers: An Aid to the Collection, Use, and Preservation of Books and the Formation of Public and Private Libraries
Spofford, Ainsworth Rand
Books; Library science
In the relations existing between librarian and assistants there should
be mutual confidence and support. All are equally interested in the
credit and success of the institution which engages their services, and
all should labor harmoniously to that end. Loyalty to one's employers is
both the duty and the interest of the employed: and the reciprocal duty
of faithfulness to those employed, and interest in their improvement and
success should mark the intercourse of the librarian with his assistants.
He should never be too old nor too wise to learn, and should welcome
suggestions from every intelligent aid. I have suggested the importance
of an even temper in the relations between librarians and readers; and it
is equally important as between all those associated in the
administration of a library. Every one has faults and weaknesses; and
those encountered in others will be viewed with the most charity by those
who are duly conscious of their own. Every one makes mistakes, and these
are often provoking or irritating to one who knows better; but a mild and
pleasant explanation of the error is far more likely to lead to
amendment, than a sharp reproof, leaving hard feeling or bitterness
behind. Under no circumstances is peevishness or passion justifiable.
Library assistants in their bearing toward each other, should suppress
all feelings of censoriousness, fault-finding or jealousy, if they have
them, in favor of civility and good manners, if not of good fellowship.
They are all public servants engaged in a common cause, aiming at the
enlightenment and improvement of the community; they should cherish a
just pride in being selected for this great service, and to help one
another in every step of the work, should be their golden rule.
Everything should be done for the success and usefulness of the library,
and all personal considerations should be merged in public ones.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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