CHAPTER XV - THE OLDER LIBRARIES OF ENGLISH TOWNS, AND THEIR MANAGEMENT BY MUNICIPAL CORPORATIONS

Summary

…. Hyde, Clifford, and Danby…. found a Parliament full of lewd young men, chosen by a furious people, in spite to the Puritans, whose severity had disgusted them…..Many knew not what they did, when they made the Act for Corporations, by which the greatest part of the nation was brought under the worst men in it, drunk or sober.

ALGERNON SYDNEY, Discourses on Government (Hollis' edition), p. 502.

BOOK III Chapter XV. The older Libraries of English Towens.

Several Town Libraries founded early in the 17th century

Several of the ancient Corporate Towns of England possess Libraries, which were originally founded—either by the munificence of individuals, or by a public and joint-stock contribution,—and then entrusted to the guardianship of the respective municipalities. Most of these Libraries date from the early part of the seventeenth century. At that period, studious and even learned men were occasionally seen to take their share in the business of Town Councils. Others, sitting with them, who laid no claim to distinction of this sort, were forward to show their respect for it. No very elaborate argument was thought necessary to prove that all the townspeople had a common interest in the provision of facilities for study; or that this common interest was wholly independent of gradations in social position.

But this recognition of a common want which we find to have been made in several towns at nearly the same period, was soon checked in its natural results by the political strife then fast gathering head. The temporary lull in the great struggle, which occurred between the death of Cromwell and the call of William of Orange, is too full of public infamy to admit of surprise that the municipalities of the day had little attention to bestow on trusts of this kind.