It is one of the most noble institutions.
No expense is more magnificent and more useful.
The public library of the King of France is the finest in the whole
world, less on account of the number and rarity of the volumes than of
the ease and courtesy with which the librarians lend them to all
scholars. This library is incontestably the most precious monument there
is in France.
This astounding multitude of books should not scare. We have already
remarked that Paris contains about seven hundred thousand men, that one
cannot live with them all, and that one chooses three or four friends.
Thus must one no more complain of the multitude of books than of the
multitude of citizens.
A man who wishes to learn a little about his existence, and who has no
time to waste, is quite embarrassed. He wishes to read simultaneously
Hobbes, Spinoza, Bayle who wrote against them, Leibnitz who disputed
with Bayle, Clarke who disputed with Leibnitz, Malebranche who differed
from them all, Locke who passed as having confounded Malebranche,
Stillingfleet who thought he had vanquished Locke, Cudworth who thinks
himself above them because he is understood by no one. One would die of
old age before having thumbed the hundredth part of the metaphysical
romances.
One is very content to have the most ancient books, as one inquires into
the most ancient medals. It is that which makes the honour of a library.
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