AMONG the rich men who, in this country, have made wealth the means of the highest usefulness, and have gained an imperishable remembrance by their patronage of learning, none is more worthy to be named with special honor than the late William Bartlet of Newburyport. Others may have made legacies more munificent than his; but his great contributions to the cause of sacred learning were not bequests to be paid by his executors when his estate should cease to be his own, but gifts the application of which he himself superintended. In this respect, we believe, no other benefactor of public literary institutions in this country has equaled him. He gave not what had already been wrested from him by the grasp of death, but that which was in all human respects his own, while he was yet living to enjoy it. And, like a wise man as he was, he gave it that he might enjoy it. He was a plain New England man, with much soundness of judgment, and with habits and tastes decidedly utilitarian. His youth had not been blessed with any extraordinary advantages for intellectual cultivation; and he owed little to books, save what he owed to the Bible. But he had a great soul, capable of enter

ing into great designs; and his long career of enterprise and success in commercial pursuits, had accustomed him to take large views. He was not one of the original founders of the Theological Seminary at Andover, but he early came to its aid, and adopted it as a child. Without his princely munificence, that institution would hardly have become, what it has long been, a model institution for the whole country; and surely it would never have done what it has done, and is still doing, to raise the standard of theological education in all evangelical communions, and to advance in all quarters the accurate and thorough understanding, and the eloquent exposition of the sacred oracles. The largeness of the soul which God gave him, and the large views which he had acquired as a merchant, led him to regard his great wealth as investing him with great power to do good; and he used his wealth accordingly.

We have already remarked that this good and truly great man was not particularly indebted for what he was, or for what he did, to any great number of books. One of his favorite professors at Andover, the professor of sacred literature, was one day representing to him the de

ficiencies of the library. "Why," said the old merchant, in reply, "what can you want of more books ? You have twice as many books already as you can ever read through, even if you should do nothing else." "Mr. Bartlet," replied the professor, "Did you ever read your dictionary through ?" "No." Well, the library is to us like what the dictionary is to you. We do not expect to read it through; but we must consult it continually, looking out one subject and another which our duties call us to investigate."

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Few persons, besides scholars, understand the uses of a public li brary, such as is required in a public institution for liberal or professional education, or such as corresponds with the wants of a body of men devoted to literary and scientific pursuits. A library of popular and entertaining books, containing all the latest publications, like a shopkeeper's circulating library, is easily seen to be a public accommodation, as it enables readers to satisfy their curiosity, and provides for them a copious fund of entertainment at a comparatively slight expense. Such a library is expected to consist chiefly of the current literature of the day, the books for which there is the greatest demand, the books which every body wants to read, and of which there is therefore the most abundant supply in all quarters. But the books which give value to a great public library, are books which if not there will not be easily found any where scarce books-old books-books in learned or foreign languages-cost ly books-books which find few persons to look into them, and still fewer to read them. The value of such books depends chiefly upon their being brought together in some great collection, where all who have occasion to consult them may easily find them.

In our country we can have no

permanent collections of books save in public libraries. Here and there a man of wealth may have a fancy for collecting books, here and there a professional man may accumulate a valuable library in his own particular line, and may keep it together till he dies. But in the settlement of an estate, the most troublesome kind of property to administrators or executors, and the least satisfactory to heirs or to creditors, is a large library. Some part of the collection may be distributed as keepsakes, memorials of the departed, among children and particular friends, the remainder must sooner or later be sold under the hammer. We have no great families whose libraries can go on accumulating from generation to generation.

No man becomes learned without books; and on the other hand, a good collection of books will make some learned men. A man of genius may be a poet, or an orator, or a metaphysician, like Emmons or the elder Edwards, with few books. But "it takes all sorts of men to make a world ;" and in particular, it takes a great many learned men, in a great many kinds of learning, to make such a world as we have in this nineteenth century; and it will take a great many more to make such a world as our greatgrandchildren ought to have, in the century that is next to come. The parish that wants a learned minister, will do well to have a good parsonage library. A regular appropriation, so small as hardly to be felt in the annual assessment for parish expenses, will be sufficient not only to keep up such a library, but to increase it continually till it becomes of great value to a studious man. Such a library, when the parish is looking out for a pastor, would be likely to attract one of those men who are earnest and diligent in the studies appropriate to the ministry, and who make their profiting ap pear to all. Such a library would