Encourage and pursue an inclination to reading early in life; it is laying up a treasure for the latter part of it… – Countess Dowager of Carlisle, Thoughts in the Form of Maxims addressed to Young

Books that have become classics — books that have had their day and now get more praise than perusal — always remind me of retired colonels and majors and captains who, having reached the age limit, find themselves retired on half pay. – Thomas Bailey Aldrich

Through all of my youth these books were my companions, and now, as I write these lines, after sixty years, they still look down upon me with their old friendliness. – James L. Whitney, “Reminiscences of an Old Librarian,” November 1909