"To every man of our Saxon race endowed with full health and strength, there is committed the custody of a restless demon, for which he is doomed to find ceaseless excitement, either in honest work, or some less profitable or more mischievous occupation. Countless have been the projects of man to open up for this fiend fields of exertion great enough for the absorption of its tireless energies, and none of them is more hopeful than the great world of books, if the demon is docile enough to be coaxed into it." Since Burton's day the "great world of books" has taken on many phases of which he never dreamed. And we, as librarians, may reasonably believe that if not entirely a part and parcel of it, we are nevertheless called upon to deal with that "world" in almost every form, and are ourselves more or less important factors in it. We may not be called upon to adopt the "strenuous life," or seek to impart it to the conduct and activities of others. But necessarily we are and must be accustomed to "doing things"; and, by that very doing, will in some degree, each in our own field, inspire and influence others also. Furthermore, do we not find _our_ "restless demon of work" more agreeably inclined and contentedly occupied in the library field than in other lines of life which we may have previously entered into? I, for one, certainly think so, even though we may not have had that idea in mind at the outset, or when making the change. And, too, that we derive a certain feeling of encouragement akin to inspiration, that in itself renders _us_ contented and happy, when responding to the varied demands on our time and energy that are entailed by our positions as librarians. That is half the battle, the rest being but a question of persistence in the application of means and ability. Therefore, in the consoling words of one of Elbert Hubbard's salient sayings: "Blessed is that man who has found his work." It is not the purpose of these present remarks to set forth particularly the compensations in a librarian's work; neither the advantages or disadvantages, the opportunities or drawbacks therein. Those factors have all been frequently and well discussed in prior years, by some of our well-known associates and various contributors to library literature. I desire, rather, to suggest some features and relationships connected with our work as a profession, from which an occasional lesson may be taken, and possibly a word of encouragement, if such be needed.