Instead, at Trinity, there is the Long Hall.
   The Long Hall inspires reverence even in some who are not used to such emotions. It is a library, and a museum, and yet it transcends either of those things. The Long Hall is an enormous barrel-vaulted hallway, with aisle after aisle of floor-to-ceiling shelves of stout timber holding books that date back centuries. Age permeates these shelves, weighing down upon the mind directly, without passing through any of the quotidian five senses.
   Certainly, Trinity College also has a working library, in another building. Students use it on a regular basis, and it has many of the modern amenities to which folk nowadays have grown accustomed.
   But the Old Library preserves much of how things were hundreds of years ago. In this museum is the Long Hall.
   One should not go directly to the shelves in the upper gallery. One should instead prepare oneself for the experience, soak up the museum's ambience first. See the harp from the 1400's. View the Book of Kells in all its ninth-century illuminated glory.
   After the mood and the moment have seeped in, then let the Long Hall be a culmination of the awe and the sense of deep time that have been building up inside. Steps across that polished floor are steps down the corridor of History.