The Sun.
London, England, 1865-09-07 00:00:00

rooms, lectures, clubs, reading-rooms, and lending
libraries with a good supply <of wholesome fiction.
On this ground Lord STANLEY speaks with his
wonted good sense, and boldly declares he shall not
be at all disappointed if the report of the Bir-
mingham library proves that the greatest demand
is for works of fiction. This has been the result in
most other places where a free library has been in
active operation. We are very glad that Lord
STANLEY has spoken out clearly on this branch of
the question, because it gives an instance of a very
common mistake. Men of educated minds and
studious habits are apt to expect from the compara-
tively ignorant and uncultivated the same interest
in history, science, and biography that they feel
themselves. They are disappointed at the result of
opening a free library, and regard it as a failure
because works of a solid and standard character are
not in daily requisition. But if they take a
given number of their own class, and set
them down in a varied library for an evening's
reading with no particular object but amusement,
how many will they find turn to the history or the
treatise, and how many to the novel, the magazine,
or the newspaper ? We suspect the proportion
would not be so very different, and that if our West-
end libraries were supplied in accordance with the
theories that govern some of our Mechanics' Insti-
tutes, the financial result would be most unsatisfac-
tory. In spite of the Archbishop fiction will al-

ways be one of the most attractive of all forms of
reading ; and if it be but good, wholesome fiction it
is directly profitable. No one wishes to see our
rising generation studying romances based on the
school of PAUL DE KOCK and EUGENE SUE, but
the general tone of our modern English novels,
is something widely different. Lessons that are
yawned over by the young in the sermon or the
essay are taught emphatically in the lives and cha-
racters of men and women like themselves, and even
to those of older growth the moral is the same. It
is the old story of example being better than pre-
cept, and the enlistment of the sympathies, the
awakening of the better and deeper feelings of our
nature, are actual gains. Immersed in worldly
pursuits, unaccustomed to grave reflection, the men
and women of the day need strong lights and
shadows to impress them forcibly, and poetry, fic-
tion, and the drama are powerful auxiliaries in the

task of awakening and refining when rightly used.
The " Song of the Shirt" and" The Christmas Carol"
are a mere ballad and story, but they have preached
sermons from Christian texts to many thousands of
sympathetic readers nevertheless. Even when in
the the view of mere amusement, as Lord STANLEY
says, we must not quarrel with the tone of fiction.
" Don't let us grudge amusement to those who
come here for it. Let us be satisfied if it is harm-
less, as in 999 cases out of 1000 I believe it is. Life
is dull and monotonous to many of us, and with
our English climate and our English character, we
are all the better far any little additional sunshine,
moral or material, that we can obtain." This is

the true principle which should guide the origi-
nators of these institutions, and if the books
selected are less solid and instructive than
they deem desirable, they must remember that it is
a great thing to cultivate and encourage a taste for
reading at all, and that the books selected may be
improving to the moral nature if not to the mental.
Englishmen, as a rule, are not too imaginative, and
anything that takes the reader for a time out of his
own material surroundings is not to be despised.
This is one great good of our industrial exhibitions,
and the number of working men and women who
have exhibited works entirely foreign to their ordi-
nary employment shows how great is the need for
a variety of interesting or mental diversion. No one
would wish a great establishment like the
Birmingham Library to be entirely devoted to the
lighter branches of literature, and there is no fear
that such will be the case, or that the solid and
scientific departments will be neglected. We can
only hope that more of our great towns will follow
the example of Birmingham, and, availing them-
selves of the act of '55, open free public libraries,
which must prove as beneficial to the intellects as
they will be welcome to the tastes of the people.

The first meeting of the British Association for
the Advancement of Science took place yesterday
at Birmingham. Several interesting subjects were
treated of by the President, Professor PHILLIPS,
who assumed the office for the first time. His re-
marks appeared to give the greatest satisfaction to
the numerous assemblage present, and the vote of
thanks which was proposed by Sir RODERICK MUR-
CHISON, and seconded by the Mayor, was carried by
acclamation. He commenced by an eloquent allu-
sion to the circumstances which had called them
together. Assembled as they were in the " busy
centre of industrious England, how pleasant it was,"
he said, "to hear the accent of science, the friend
of art, and the guide of industry." Here, where
PRIESTLEY analysed the air, and WATT obtained
the mastery over steam, it well becomes the student
of nature to gather round the standard which they
carried so far into the fields of knowledge." There
is nothing in which the present generation is more
fortunate, than in the facilities which they possess
for combining science and art with the practical
affairs of every-day existence. The young life of
the British Association has been characterised by
great successes in various.clirections, and achieved a
renown that has never yet been surpassed. As the
Professor rightly termed it, the " fair alliance of cul-
tivated thought and practical skill" is indeed a boon
to any community, and should always be encou-
raged to the greatest possible degree.
Much may be learned by the perusal of this ela-
borate and comprehensive discourse, and we appre-
ciate in its perusal the great advantages which may
be derived from dwelling on themes that are treated
by a master hand. It is some check to the pride
and self-sufficiency of the present day to hear that
there are hardly any of the great branches of the
study of nature which were not considered in the
schools of Athens, as they are now in the details
of modern philosophy. Of course, they could
not be illustrated by experiment, because the
requisite instruments were not then discovered ;
measures of " time, space, force, and motion," are
of comparatively recent date, yet the individual
thhaedt ehl
talent seems to have been the same. It is truly
said that the discoveries on which the moderns pride
m s
iwinopuolrdtanhtave adjunctslong bbefeoerne
intaken
placeexistence.
Had the " first Galilean, or the smallest Newtonian
telescope" been in the hands of HIPPARCIIUS or
PTOLEMY, h t-e.r remote successors would not now
be left struggling in doubt as to exact dis-
tances and relative proportions. The Professor
dwelt upon the grand results which are now ob-
tained by spectral analysis, the powerful instru-
ment of chemical research, and characterised it as
the message which " comes to us with the light
which springs from the distant stars, and shoots
through the depths of space, to fall upon the
earth after tens or hundreds of thou-
sands of years." In his remarks on Geology the
Professor delivered some striking truths, and led
his hearers to contemplate the: vast scope which
such a theme offers for study, research, and
contemplation to the thoughtful tnd reflective
among us. Before the ALMIGHTY placed man
upon the earth, there was a long ;series of in-