Scripture Manuscripts.

In this I may be wrong, but I appeal to all of you, is it not something to be able to say the people of the city of Auckland, have in our possession, as our property, a Library, such as, in one respect, nowhere else exists, in which all men may come and read the Scriptures in their own tongue— (cheers)—because even the great Bible Societies have nothing of this kind? Many of these portions of Scripture are in manuscript, never having been published; many of them have been printed in distant islands which the Bible Societies know nothing of; and the Bible Societies themselves have been careless in keeping copies of their own works, and are now with difficulty trying to recover works they have printed but have sold the whole of, and can hardly obtain copies of; and you here will have in your possession that which any one of these societies would give much to obtain for its own library. If I were to name any great glory of a particular public library which would be likely to endear it to all men, it would be to state that it is the one library in the world in which the Holy Scriptures may be read in more languages than in any other library upon the face of the earth. (Cheers.) All these various points give your Library an extreme degree of interest.