Additional Notes. 355 



are all engaged in the study of literature, in the pursuit of 

 science, and in the practice of the arts : insomuch, that I do 

 not think it extravagant to affirm, that, if this invention had 

 not been made by the particular person to Avhom it is ascribed, 

 the same art or some analogous art, answering a similar pur- 

 pose, would have infallibly been invented by some other per- 

 son, and at no very distant period. The art of printing, 

 therefore, is entitled to be considered as a step in the natural 

 history of man, no less than the art of writing ; and they who 

 are sceptical about the future progress of the race, merely in 

 consequence of its past history, reason as unphilosophically as 

 the member of a savage tribe, who, deriving his own ac- 

 quaintance with former times from oral tradition only, should 

 affect to call in question the efficacy of written records, in ac- 

 celerating the progress of knowledge and of civilisation. 



" What will be the particular effects of this invention 

 (which has been, hitherto, much checked in its operation, by 

 the restraints on the liberty of the press in the greater part of 

 Europe) it is beyond the reach of human sagacity to conjec- 

 ture; but, in general, we may venture to predict with confi- 

 dence, that, in every country, it will gradually operate to 

 widen the circle of science and civilisation ; to distribute more 

 equally, among all the members of the community, the ad- 

 yaatages of the political union, and to enlarge the basis of 

 equitable governments, by increasingthe number of those who 

 understand their value, and are interested to defend them. 

 The science of legislation, too, with all the other branches 

 of knowledge which are connected with human improve- 

 ment, may be expected to advance with rapidity ; and, in 

 proportion as the opinions and institutions of men approach to 

 truth and to justice, they will be secured against those revo- 

 lutions to which human affairs have always been hitherto sub- 

 ject. * Opinionum enim commentu dtltt dies, naturce judicia con- 

 firmat.' 



" Nor must we omit to mention the value which the art of 

 printing communicates to the most limited exertions of literary 

 2 A2 



