When entering even a quite modest library, if one pauses to contemplate the contents as a whole, it requires a feat of imagination to envisage all the patience and learning, the obsession and the insight, the agony, the sweat and the love, which went into creating such a storehouse of wisdom, pleasure and knowledge - and so much dross. Even the most ardent book-lover can accept that almost any collection of books contains much that is trivial, foolish, out-dated, repetitious, or misleading; that libraries are monuments to human folly and absurdity as well as to human achievement; but it requires a considerable degree of Philistinism or despair to conclude, after such an exercise, that overall the effort has not been worth the cost. One has to be a bit of a romantic to have a realistic vision of a library.