Beyond that impossibility, what you look for in a clip-art package are graphics flexible enough to be put to many different uses, and drawn in a style that doesn't make you cringe.

Flexibility can go one of two ways, modifiability or ease of use. If you have a knack for graphics yourself, you will probably want clip-art images that you can easily alter, recombine, crop, etc. Of the dozens of graphics formats out there -- Encapsulated PostScript (.EPS), Computer Graphics Metafile (.CGM), CorelDraw (.CDR), Windows Bitmap (.BMP), WordPerfect Graphic (.WPG), TIFF and PCX -- .EPS is probably the easiest to modify. Don't be misled by the "PostScript" in the description -- that designates the language the graphics are produced in, not the kind of printer they require.

One of the best economical .EPS series is Images with Impact (3G Graphics 800/456-0234, four packages for $449.80). Really a library of four separate packages -- People1, Accents & Borders1, Business1 and Graphics & Symbols1 -- Images with Impact is a good mix of pictures with understandable filenames: TRAIN.EPS, a picture of a train, is found in the subdirectory TRAVEL. For $129.95, the Business1 module contains 300 images.

Is that a good deal? Could be. Compare it, however, with the 3,500 images on all subjects in Presentation Task Force (New Vision Technologies, 613/727-8184, $199). Here is an excellent, very broad, well catalogued collection that I use nearly every day. It even offers you an option on each item -- color or black and white.

On the other hand, Presentation Task Force is in .CGM format -- easy to import into a frame in your word processor or desktop publishing program, but not at all easy to modify.

Which brings us to the other criterion, acceptability. The majority of clip-art images out there strike me as, well, dorky. Weirdly overstylized cartoons of people striking everyday business poses. Cartoons of grinning idiots holding up signs. Manic entrepreneurs holding up bags with dollar signs on them. Long-lashed female goldfish. You know what I mean.

Presentation Task Force is pretty good about this. All its images are done in the same roughly acceptable style. The pictures have a sober and intelligent look, without being dull.

Another package that has this same "image respectability" isn't really a clip-art package at all. Arts & Letters Graphics Editor (Computer Support Corp., 214/661-8960, $695) is a full-scale illustration program, a little like CorelDraw, but less expensive and much, much easier to use. Important in this context is that it comes with a set of 8,000 clip-art images, 90 typefaces, and an armful of tools for bending, combining, composing and otherwise manipulating both images and text.

As impressive as Arts & Letters is, it's also big and balky, and perhaps too much program for the occasional user of clip art. And its proprietary .YAL graphics cannot be accessed except through its own Activity Manager.

So what's best for you? You tell me. You know what programs (Microsoft Word, Corel Ventura, etc.) you currently use, and what image formats are easily imported into it. You also know if you want easy off-the-rack graphic solutions or a palette of possibilities you can play with.

My personal favorite here is Presentation Task Force. I haven't the talent or the time to create on-screen montages, and I like its wham-bam approach and excellent catalog. But the other two are also good.

Which brings up the final dimension to consider -- space. You will be hard pressed to ever come up with anything as disk-intensive as thousands of graphic images. As your library bulges, and your hard disk shrinks, you may find yourself forced to make the unpleasant choice of what stays and what goes.

My advice -- dump the big-eared guy holding up the SALE! sign.

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