Subscription and Circulating Libraries: What did they collect?

After reading the articles on circulating and subscription libraries, I wanted to explore the books that the members read. After all, the articles listed many books and magazines and I haven't read them, or at least not recently. The authors also mentioned that this period, the 1700s to early 1800s, gave rise to the periodical and the newspaper. Haven't newspapers and magazines been around forever? The answer to that question is no, these forms of communication really start in the late 1600s and flourish in the 18th and 19th centuries. 

One magazine that I wanted to explore is "The Gentleman's Magazine" which began publication in 1731 and ended in 1922. Wikipedia has a nice entry on the magazine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gentleman%27s_Magazine along with some images of the front pages. Some of the issues are available through the Internet Archive and through Google Books. 

The Bodleian Internet Library of Early Journals http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/ilej/ provides full text / image access to Gentleman's Magazine and several others from the 18th and 19th centuries. 

I find these periodicals fascinating for their content and because the modern reader peaks into the past to see what others were reading.

What about books that were collected by these subscription and circulating libraries? What did people read? A combination of non-fiction books and treatises about philosophy, politics, science, technology, exploration and discovery, and of course religious sermons. The articles include many titles of early novels, including Pamela by Samuel Richardson http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Richardson and even books by Swift and Scott. The attitudes of subscribers concerning fiction are similar to today's library patrons, "why are libraries collecting low-brow fiction, why not just literature?"Then again, when is the last time you read literature when it wasn't required in Grad School?

Think about the variety of books in your private library or that you have read. Do you read a variety? Would you want the local library to acquire only books according to your taste and interests or do you want more to select from? Reading books that are outside your comfort zone will make you a better librarian, able to provide better readers' advisory services, and of course, makes you well rounded.  What have you read that was different lately?