INTRODUCTION
technical sense they are libraries but used flatly the words would mislead and it is better, therefore, to use the neutral word "collections."
The real rub, however, is as to what is the proper use of a word. Assyriologists claim that the "proper and ordinary sense" of the word library is a "large literary collection" of not less than a thousand volumes, while others say that even if a man should remark that "Smith's library consisted solely of an odd volume of Shakespeare" he would be quite well understood by the average man while he would not be understood if he should say that Smith had a "small literary archive" consisting of an odd volume of Shakespeare. The only way to judge any such case is to confront the two uses and compare them with the facts as to usage past and present, and the first thing in this case is to set forth fully the Assyriological usage.
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