To this end he gave a million dollars, and was happy in the results. His birthday is celebrated each year as "Founder's Day." On one of these occasions he said, "This is almost more happiness than I can bear. This one day more than repays me for all I have done." And what of Thomas Guy, whose example led to Matthew Vassar's noble gift while the latter was alive? He was an economical, self-made bookbinder and bookseller, who became the "greatest philanthropist of his day." Thomas Guy was born in Horselydown, Southwark, in the outskirts of London, in 1644 or 1645. His father, Thomas Guy, was a lighterman and coalmonger, one who transferred coal from the colliers to the wharves, and also sold it to customers. He was a member of the Carpenters' Company of the city of London, and probably owned some barges. His wife, Anne Vaughton, belonged to a family of better social position than her husband, as several of her relatives had been mayors in Tamworth, or held other offices of influence. When the boy Thomas was eight years old, his father died, leaving Mrs. Guy to bring up three small children, Thomas, John, and Anne. The eldest probably went to the free grammar school of Tamworth, and when fifteen or sixteen years of age was apprenticed for eight years to John Clarke the younger, bookseller and bookbinder in Cheapside, London. John Clarke was ruined in the great fire of Sept. 2, 1666, which, says H. R. Fox Bourne in his "London Merchants," "destroyed eighty-nine churches, and more than thirteen thousand houses in four hundred streets. Of the whole district within the city walls, four hundred and thirty-six acres were in ruins, and only seventy-five acres were left covered. Property worth £10,000,000 was wasted, and thousands of starving Londoners had to run for their lives, and crouch for days and weeks on the bare fields of Islington and Hampstead, Southwark and Lambeth." What Thomas Guy was in his later life he probably was as a boy,--hard-working, economical, of good habits, and determined to succeed. When the eight years of apprenticeship were over he was admitted a freeman of the Stationers' Company; and having a little means, he began a business at the junction of Cornhill and Lombard Streets, where he resided through his whole life. His stock of books at the beginning was worth about two hundred pounds. At this time many English Bibles were printed in Holland on account of the better paper and types found there, and vast numbers were imported to England with large profits. Young Guy, with business shrewdness, soon became an importer of Bibles, and very probably Prayer-books and Psalms.