University of Virginia Library

THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS TO THE UNIVERSITY OF
VIRGINIA UPON THE OCCASION OF ITS ONE
HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY

The most of the greetings conveyed to-day are from sister institutions
of learning. This, from a library, cannot claim quite equal rank; for a
library, though it contains certain of the elements of an institution of learning—an
essential apparatus, and, in a sense, a faculty—lacks others equally
essential; it neither prescribes a system of studies nor imposes authority in
their process, with deliberate selection, towards a definite end. Its greeting
cannot, therefore, bring the sympathy of a like experience in identical
problems.

But the Library so-called "of Congress" has a concern for learning far
beyond its immediate privileged constituency. It is a library "for research";
it has a paramount interest in the promotion of that research—everywhere—
whose end may be the widening of the boundaries of knowledge. And its
effort is to extend its resources freely and fully in aid of this. It does so
chiefly through the Universities; and its interest is keen in the prosperity
and progress of these. Having, itself, the duty to conserve and make useful
the records of the past, it especially rejoices in an institution who so persistently
honors and links itself with the past as does the University of
Virginia.

In addition to these general motives it has a unique sympathy with this
occasion from the fact that the universality of its collections and the seriousness
of its aims are preëminently due to Jefferson himself. The very foundation

of its present collections was Jefferson's own library; it was Jefferson
who named it "The Library of the United States"; and it was the comprehensiveness
of his selection, the largeness of his view, and his confident faith
in a democracy of learning, that, establishing thus early its character and
purpose, have assured its development into a library truly "national." It
therefore shares with you the shadow of the great Founder.

May that Shadow never grow less!