The extent to which the state shall go in the matter of educating its citizens has been the subject of much discussion. There are those who maintain that as the education of the individual proceeds his concern in his own development increases, until finally, if his education proceeds far enough, his concern in his own development surpasses that of the state, and he must thenceforth be left to equip himself entirely at his own expense. If that point is marked by the line between primary and secondary, or between secondary and higher education, there is where the state is in duty bound to stop. The extent of the interest of the community as compared with that of the individual is held to grow less and less and finally to disappear as he advances.
But the better judgment of our time repudiates this theory, and holds apparently that there is no limit to the concern of the state in the mental progress of the individual. Ian Maclaren in his touching story of "Domsie" quotes John Knox as saying: "Ilka scholar is something added to the riches of the commonwealth." It can probably be demonstrated by the rules of accounts that as a business investment the state is wisely spending money in the education of the people. The cost is more than returned to it in the material development which an enlightened citizenship ensures. If we contrast our own country, where education is free, with some older countries where it is yet held to be a matter of minor concern, or if we contrast some of the states of this republic with others of corresponding age, we shall see at a glance a wide difference in material resources and prosperity. In one the industrial arts are far advanced, there is intellectual activity, the average citizen is well clothed, well housed, and enjoys many luxuries; in the other, the methods and life of a past century prevail and poverty and ill-living are the rule. This, if not the highest motive, is an incidental one of considerable importance for doing at the common expense that which is for the common good.
But the maintenance of the public library is not based on the communistic idea. A former president of this association, speaking at the Lake George Conference, said: "The socialists and communists are all friends of the library, for we give them the books they want, and they hold that it is not only the duty of the government to educate the people, but to furnish them with reading. If the library ever shall have enemies they will be the rich, who do not enjoy being taxed for the benefit of the public, and have libraries of their own. Its defenders will be men of broad views, scholarly people, and behind them, with votes, the middle and poorer classes."