Excerpt from On the Classification of Books: A Paper Read Before the American Library Association, May, 1882

Whether the classification itself is more or less logical than that of others who have attempted this hard and thankless, but needful task, it is not for me to say. It has at least the merit Of not being made out of nothing, but rather of having been evolved from a pre-existing system which has the approval of the best bibliographers Of Europe, and which has been tried for centuries, and not found wanting. Nolumus leyes Anglia? Mutare. I believe the groundwork of the system to be good, but I know very well that the building I have raised upon it can be improved; and there fore any one who thinks of making use of either would do well to study - among others - the Table Methodique of Brunet, and the classification - which, however, is rather crude - of the British Museum. The latter can be consulted in Henry Stevens' Catalogue of the American booles in the Library of the British [museum (london, Mr. Dui's and Mr. Perkins' highly original systems are also full of valuable suggestions, though the former is, to my thinking. Not sufficiently worked out in detail, while the latter, with its six thousand classes - ten times as many as are used in the British Museum - is, if anything, too much so. The reference alphabet - first used by Mr. Dui - gives their systems of classification, in point of practical utility, a decided advantage over others; and Mr. Dui's decimal division brings in an 'element of simplicity which has, in theory at least, some Obvious advantages. It is also steadily making its way into practice, and I understand there are more American libraries now using that plan than any other. Mr. Perkins believes that his system accomplishes some good things which Mr. Dui's does not, and cures some defects in it and I agree with him. If I did not think that mine was on the whole better than either, I should not publish it. Nevertheless, I am free to say that in working out the details I consider Mr. Perkins' arrangement in some respects better than my own, and if I had seen it in time I could have improved mine in several ways. Mr. Swartz's Mnemonic System, and that of Mr. C'utter described in Vol. IV. Of the Library Journal-are also worthy of the highest consideration. Doubtless the true Classification of Books, at once rational and convenient in practice, is a thing yet to be established, but at any rate the materials for it exist; and if the present System with its Index - on which I have been work ing more or less for the past four years - contributes in any degree to make the labors of those who follow me more easy, it is all that I expect.

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