218 THE LIBRARY 



applied to the first rude canoes of the troglodytes. The first function 

 of the casa and of the boat still remains, but how differently are the 

 details carried out. So also the book, the liber, whose etymology 

 is preserved in the word library, was anciently the inner part of the 

 tree (liber) on which men used to write, and which is now unfortu- 

 nately again used in the making of paper no longer obtained from 

 rags but from woody pulp. The libraries of Assyria and Egypt, 

 those for instance of Assur-Bani-Pal and of Rameses I, consisted 

 of clay tablets of inscribed stones or of papyrus rolls; the libraries 

 of Greece, those of the Ptolemies and of the kings of Pergamos, the 

 libraries of Rome, first opened to public use by the efforts of Asinius 

 Pollio; the Byzantine libraries, which arose within Christian 

 churches or in monasteries; and lastly, the rich and splendid collec- 

 tions made at great expense by the patrons, by the builders, of the 

 culture of the Renaissance; all these, compared with the modern 

 libraries, of which the most perfect specimens may be found in 

 this land, are like an ancient trireme beside a twin-screw steamer. 

 And the essential difference between the ancient and the modern 

 library, between the conception of library as it existed up to the 

 times of Frederic, Duke of Urbino, and of Lorenzo il Magnifico, and 

 that existing in the minds of Thomas Bodley, or Antonio Maglia- 

 becchi, is to be found in the different objects represented by the 

 same word, liber. 



A study of the fate of this word would lead us step by step through 

 the varying forms of the library, from those containing clay tablets, 

 from those filled with rolls covered with cuneiform characters, to the 

 codices brilliant with the art of Oderisi da Gubbio, splendid with 

 gold and miniatures, to the first block books, to the printed books of 

 Faust and Schoffer and of Aldo Manuzio, of William Caxton, and 

 of Christopher Plantin. 



The invention of printing caused a great revolution in the world 

 of books. The new art was, as we well know, received at first with 

 scorn and indifference. The incunabula were but rough, vulgar 

 things as compared with the beautiful manuscripts, clearly written 

 on carefully prepared parchment, and glittering with brilliant colors. 

 They were fit at most to be used by the masses by women, by 

 children, to be sold at fairs, to be put into the hands of clean-jacks 

 and charlatans; but they were quite unfitted for the valuable 

 collections guarded with so much care in perfumed cases carved 

 from precious woods, in sculptured cabinets, on reading-desks cov- 

 ered with damask or with the softest of leathers, made from the skins 

 of sucking animals. We can easily understand that fastidious 

 art patrons such as the Duke of Urbino should scorn this new form 

 of book, and should proclaim it unworthy of a place in a respectable 

 library. But this tempest of scorn gradually subsided before the 



