"The people's university," the library has been called, but it would be as great a pity if the librarian so understood this term as to believe that people came to the library only to learn, as it would be if any went there who could not learn what they sought. That university which is a place to study rather than a place to live is missing its best possibilities, and in a similar way the library ought to be, first and always, a place to read rather than a place to study. I would not go so far as to say that I want to find it a place to "loaf," though I might be provoked into saying so; but certainly it must be a place where I can "invite my soul"--such a place as the world gives me elsewhere only in the church or in the silence of nature. Trade journals and technical works are of great use; books for women's clubs are good things; the children's room is a necessity; but these of themselves no more make a library than a kitchen, dining room and bedroom make a home. Out of such utilities as these you may get a boarding house, but nothing better; the family makes it a home. Those are wholly wrong who believe that standard books are so cheap that anyone can buy them, and therefore the library could conceivably get on without them. Without the best literature you might get a very useful institution, no doubt, but not a library, for in a library the great works of the great authors are the soul and theirs is the spirit which enables the library not merely to contribute to the advance of the community toward prosperity and intelligence, but also, in some degree, to touch its higher life to finer issues. THE BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY AN ADDRESS AT ITS DEDICATION This and the four addresses that follow it have little in common except that all were delivered at the opening exercises of libraries. Everett's address at the opening of the Boston Public Library appropriately heads the group. The reader will look in it in vain for any reflection of the conservative opinions expressed in the letter to George Ticknor printed on page 53 of this volume, unless perhaps in the total absence of anything radical. It is typical oratory of the day--ponderously graceful, if that is not a contradiction in terms. Edward Everett was born in Dorchester, Mass., April 11, 1794. He graduated at Harvard in 1811 and served there as professor of Greek in 1819-25. He was a member of Congress in 1825-35, governor of Massachusetts in 1836-40, minister to Great Britain in 1841-45, president of Harvard, 1846-49, U.S. secretary of state in 1852-53, and U.S. senator in 1853-54. He died in Boston, Jan. 15, 1865. His reputation as a scholarly orator was very high. MR. MAYOR:--