The first consideration in establishing a museum, large or small, either in a town, institution, society or school is that it should have some definite object or purpose to fulfil; and the next is that means should be forthcoming not only to establish but also to maintain the museum in a suitable manner to fulfil that purpose. Some persons are enthusiastic enough to think that a museum is in itself so good an object that they have only to provide a building and cases and a certain number of specimens, no matter exactly what, to fill them, and then the thing is done; whereas the truth is the work has only then begun. What a museum really depends upon for its success and usefulness is not its building, not its cases, not even its specimens, but its curator.
...A museum is like a living organism - it requires continual and tender care. It must grow, or it will perish; and the cost and labour required to maintain it in a state of vitality is not yet by any means fully realised or provided for, either in our great national establishments or in our smaller local institutions.
Quotation from:Presidential Address to the British Association for the Advancement of Science, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 11 September 1889 by William Henry Flower, published in 'Essays on Museums and Other Subjects Connected with Natural History', 1898, Macmillan
