THE ART OF PRINTING. 85 



printed books. When the Bible was first printed in the vulgar 

 tongue, the clergy declaimed from the pulpit that there was a new 

 language discovered, called Greek ; and the scribes took uncommon 

 pains with their manuscripts to excel in point of neatness. Many 

 futile attempts were also made by men in power to destroy this ines- 

 timable blessing : Cardinal Wolsey said, " unless we knock down the 

 press, it will knock us down ;" Cardinal Richielieu was convinced, 

 that if the public had knowledge given to them, they would be as 

 dangerous as a beast with a hundred eyes ; " therefore," he said, 

 " the people must be blinded, if you would have them tame and 

 patient drudges; in short, you must treat them like pack-horses, not 

 excepting the bells about their necks, which, by their perpetual 

 jingling, may be of use to drown their cares." Wealth and power, 

 however, were not sufficient to suppress the multiplication of books ; 

 every effort that was made for their suppression only increased the 

 desire of possession ; consequently, every person who attempted to 

 destroy those books, undertook the task of no less than the destruc- 

 tion of the hydra. " The punishment of wits," says Milton, " en- 

 hances their authority: and a forbidden writing is a certain spark of 

 truth, that flies up in the faces of those who seek to tread it out." In 

 spite of all the sophisms which were industriously circulated, truth of 

 course gained the ascendancy, and knowledge, virtue, and the arts 

 began to flourish. The liberty of the press became the palladium of 

 the world, England was acknowledged to be " the mansion-house 

 of liberty." 



The type which Caxton used was a mixture of Secretary and 

 Gothic. It is uncertain who first used the Roman letter in England; 

 but it is admitted that Pynson was possessed of several sizes of type. 

 Towards the latter part of the sixteenth century, John Day, an emi- 

 nent printer and bookseller, introduced the Saxon character, and cast 

 a new set of Italian characters, which cost him forty marks ; from 

 which time till early in the eighteenth century, the art of printing 

 continued in a very low state. At this period, William Caslon com-, 

 menced business as a letter-founder, and made considerable improve- 

 ment in the shape of type, particularly in his Gothic letter, which for 

 symmetry stands unrivalled ; this celebrated founder caused the En- 

 glish to be exporters instead of importers of that article. The names 

 of the. most reputed type founders are as follow : 

 r Austin, 



London.... 



~i Caslon, 



(.Thorowgood. 

 Edinburgh.. Miller. 

 Glasgow . . . Wilson. 

 Sheffield . . . Blake and Garnett, the great Wm. Caslon' s 



legitimate successors. 



With the exception of the establishment of several new foundries, 

 and the gradual improvement in the general appearance of type, 

 nothing worthy of notice occurred till the year 1800, when the late 

 Lord Stanhope (with the assistance of Mr. Walker, an eminent ma- 

 chinist) invented an iron printing-press, which considerably in- 



