John Macfarlane

“ It is fortunate that the execution of a work on library administration should have fallen into the hands of one familiar with the organisation of the largest, or almost the largest, library in the world, the one where questions of library management have probably been more actively canvassed than anywhere else, where discussions have been most fully recorded, and where the results of reform and innovation are visible upon the largest scale. ”

“ Macfarlane's constant reference to the British Museum imparts a kind of historical unity to his volume, and is a practical as well as a literary gain if two essential cautions are borne in mind—that not every detail of the management of a great library is suitable for adoption in a small one; and that, the Museum system having long ago taken definite shape, many modern discoveries and suggestions have not, and cannot have, been there subjected to the experimental tests to which, on abstract grounds, they would have been justly entitled. ”

“ It may be regarded as established, for instance, that the alphabetical arrangement of entries in a catalogue is the best that can be adopted; and no less so that the alphabetical catalogue gains enormously in value by the addition of a good index of subjects. If, however, advancing a step further, we inquire into the best form of subject-index, we find ourselves involved in controversy, which may continue long, inasmuch as so extensive and heterogeneous a subject is not capable of reduction to precise rules. ”