What shall the public library do for the young, and how? is a
question of acknowledged importance. The remarkable development
of "juvenile literature" testifies to the growing importance of
this portion of the community in the eyes of book producers,
while the character of much of this literature, which is now
almost thrust into the hands of youth, is such as to excite grave
doubts as to its being of any service, intellectual or moral. In
this state of things the public library is looked to by some with
hope, by others with fear, according as its management is
apparently such as to draw young readers away from merely
frivolous reading, or to make such reading more accessible and
encourage them in the use of it; hence the importance of a
judicious administration of the library in this regard.

One of the first questions to be met in arranging a code of rules
for the government of a public library relates to the age at
which young persons shall be admitted to its privileges. There is
no usage on this point which can be called common, but most
libraries fix a certain age, as twelve or fourteen, below which
candidates for admission are ineligible. Only a few of the most
recently established libraries have adopted what seems to be the
right solution of this question, by making no restriction
whatever as to age. This course recommends itself as the wisest
and the most consistent with the idea of the public library on
many grounds.

In the first place, age is no criterion of mental condition and
capacity. So varying is the date of the awakening of intellectual
life, and the rapidity of its progress, that height of stature
might almost as well be taken for its measure as length of years.