Page:Library Administration, 1898.djvu/179

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LIBRARY ADMINISTRATION

which, the Slavonic group, are ranked next to the African and other uncivilised tongues.

The Bible is followed by Liturgies, through which the Church brought it into contact with society, arranged in order of the antiquity of the Churches. The Creeds and Catechisms, closely connected with Liturgy, serve as a link with Dogmatic Theology, which links on naturally enough with Controversial Theology. From this the transition is easy to Mythology and the non-Christian religions. This suggestion of the outer world brings in the Church Militant (Church History).

The last portion of this heading (Polynesia and the East) introduces Missions, and so leads to Religious Orders and Religious Biography. The bibliography of the subject comes at the end. To Divine Law succeeds Human Law (Jurisprudence), in which Ecclesiastical Law takes precedence. By such considerations as these some logical connection may be found pervading the whole scheme. One defect, at least, is striking, the intrusion of geography between the kindred subjects of history and biography. To many of the subdivisions also exception may well be taken, but no classification whatever can quite escape this reproach.

No two persons working independently would ever draw up similar classifications of human knowledge and endeavour, so that the main outlines as they appear to any body of average reasonable men will be as good as any other. But if classification is useful, one would like it minuter. There is