This paper attempts no suggestion of new methods of attacking the problem. It is rather a restatement of an old perplexity. I harp once more on a worn theme because I think that unless we frequently lift our eyes from the day's absorbing duties for a look over the whole field, and unless we once and again make searching inventory of our convictions, our purposes, our methods, our attainments, we are in danger of letting ourselves slip along the groove of the taken-for-granted and our work loses in power as we allow ourselves to become leaners instead of leaders. May we not, as if it were a new idea, rouse to the seriousness of the mediocre habit indulged in by young people capable of better things? Should not our work with children reach out more to work with adults, to those who buy and sell and make books for the young? Is it not time for the successful teller of stories to children to use her gifts in audiences of grown people, persuading these molders of the children's future of the reasonableness of our objection to the third rate since it is the enemy of the best? May it not be politic, at least, for the librarian to descend from her disdainful height and make friends with "the trade," with bookseller and publisher who, after all, have as good a right to their bread and butter as the librarian paid out of the city's taxes? And then--is it not possible that we might be better librarians if we refused to be librarians every hour in the day and half the night as well? What if we were to have the courage to refuse to indulge in nervous breakdowns, because we deliberately plan to play, and to eat, and to sleep, to keep serene and sane and human, believing that God in His Heaven gives His children a world of beauty to enjoy as well as a work to do with zeal. If we lived a little longer and not quite so wide, the gain to our chosen work in calm nerves and breadth of interest and sympathy would even up for dropping work on schedule time for a symphony concert or a country walk or a visit with a friend--might even justify saving the cost of several A. L. A. conferences toward a trip to Italy!