-rfiences of this method, -and therefore an im- 
provement was suggested, which was, by 
making single letters distinct from one an- 
other, and these being first dune in wood, 
gave room for a second improvement, which 
was making them. of metal; and in order to 
that, forming moulds, matrices, &c. for cast- 
ing them. See Type. 
From this ingenious contrivance we ought 
to date the origin of the present art of print- 
ing, contradistinguished from the method 
■practised by the Chinese. And of this. 
Schoeffer, or Scheffer, first -servant, and after- 
wards partner and son-in-law of Fust, at 
Mentz, above-mentioned, is generally allow- 
ed to be the inventor; so that lie may pro- 
perly be reckoned the first printer, and the 
Bible which w-as printed with moveable let- 
ters in 1450, the first printed book ; the next 
was Augustine de Civitate Dei, thenTully’s 
Offices, printed about the year 1461. In these 
books they left the places of the initial letters 
blank, and gave them to the illuminers to 
have them ornamented and painted in gold 
and azure, in order to render the work more 
beautiful, and, as some think, to make their 
books pass for manuscripts. Thus at pre- 
sent, in some curious works, the initial letter 
at the beginning of a book or chapter, is 
sometimes left out, and a space is left for its 
being afterwards printed with various orna- 
ments from a copper-plate. 
Some authors tell us, that Fust carrying a 
parcel of Bibles w ith him to Paris, and" offer- 
ing them to sale as manuscripts; the French, 
upon considering the number of books, and 
their exact conformity to each other, even to 
a point, and that it was impossible for the best 
book-writers to be so exact, concluded there 
was witchcraft in the case, and by their actu- 
ally indicting him as a conjurer, or threaten- 
ing to do so, extorted from him the secret ; 
and hence the origin, of the popular story of 
Dr. Faustus. 
From Mentz, the art of printing soon 
spread itself throughout a good part of Eu- 
rope; ilaerletn and Strasburg had it very 
early ; from Haerlem it passed to Rome iii 
1467; and into England in 1468, by means of 
Thos. Bourchier, archbishop of Canterbury, 
who sent W. Turner, master of the robes, 
and W. Caxton, -merchant, to Haerlem to 
learn the art. These privately prevailing 
with Corseilles, an under-workman, to come 
ever, a press w-as set up at Oxford, and an 
edition of Rtiflinus on the Creed was printed 
the same year in oc tavo. From Oxford, 
Caxton brought it to London about the year 
3470, and the same year it was carried to 
Paris. Hitherto there had been nothing 
printed but in Latin, and the vulgar tongues; 
and this first in Roman characters, then in 
Gothic, and at last in Italic; but in 1480, the 
Italians cast a set of Greek types, and they 
have also the honour of the first Hebrew 
editions, which were printed about the same 
time with the Greek. Towards the end of 
the sixteenth century there appeared various 
editions- of books in Syriac, Arabic, Persian, 
Armenian, Coptic, or Egyptian characters, 
some to gratify the curiosity of the learned, 
and others for the use of the Christians of 
the Levant. Out of Europe, the art of print- 
ing has been carried into tlie three other parts 
of the world. 
Printing, method of : the printing-letters, 
types as they are sometimes called, are 
\ ol. LI,. * 1 
PRINTING., 
described, as well as the method of forming 
and casting them, under the article Type. 
The workmen employed in the art of print- 
ing are of two kinds; compositors, who range 
and dispose the letters into words, lines, 
pages, &c. according to the copy delivered 
them by the author; and pressmen, who ap- 
ply ink upon the same, and take off the im- 
pression. The types being cast, the compo- 
sitor distributes each kind by itself among 
the divisions of tw-o w-ooden frames, an upper 
and an under one, called cases, each of which 
is divided into little cells or boxes. Those 
of the upper case are in number ninety-eight ; 
these are all of the same size, and in them are 
disposed the capitals, small capitals, accented 
letters, figures, &c. the capitals being placed 
in alphabetical order. In the cells of the 
lower case, which are fifty-four, are placed 
the small letters with the points, spaces; &c. 
The boxes are here of different sizes, the 
largest being for the letters most used; and 
these boxes are not in alphabetical order, but 
the cells which contain the letters oftenest 
wanted, are nearest the compositor’s hand. 
Each case is placed a little aslope, that the 
compositor may the more easily reach the 
upper boxes. iThe instrument in which the 
letters are set is called a composing-stick, see 
Plate Miscel. fig. 193; which consists of a 
long and narrow plate of brass or iron, &c. c, 
on the right side of which arises a ledge bb, 
which runs the whole length of the plate, 
and serves tu» sustain the letters, the sides of 
which are to rest against it: along this ledge 
is a row of holes, which serve lor introducing 
the screw a in order to lengthen or shorten 
the extent of the line, by moving the sliders 
be farther from, or nearer to, the short ledge 
at the end d. Where marginal notes are re- 
quired in a work, the two sliding-pieces be 
are opened to a proper distance from each 
other; in such a manner as that while the 
distance between b and c forms the length of 
the line in the text, the distance between the 
two sliding-pieces forms the length of the 
lines for the notes on the side of the page. 
Before the compositor proceeds to compose, 
lie puts a rule, or thin slip of brass plate, cut 
to the length of the line, and of the same 
height as the letter, in the composing stick, 
against the ledge, for the letter to bear j 
against. Things thus prepared, the compo- ! 
sitor having the copy- lying before him, and ' 
his stick in his left hand, his thumb being 
over the slider c ; with the right lie takes up 
the letters, spaces, &c. one by one, and places 
them against the rule, while tie supports them 
with his left thumb by pressing them to the ! 
end of the slider c, the other hand being con- j 
stantly employed in setting in more letters : 
the whole being performed with a degree of 
expedition and address not easy to be ima- 
gined. 
A line being thus composed, if it ends with 
a word or syllable, and exactly fills the mea- 
sure, there needs no farther care; otherwise 
more spaces are to be put in, or else the dis- 
tances lessened between the several words, 
in order to make the measure quite full ; so 
that every line may end even. The spaces 
here used are pieces of metal exactly shaped 
like the shanks of the letters; these are of 
various thicknesses, and serve to support the 
letters, and to preserve a proper distance be- 
tween the words; but not reaching so high as 
the .letters, they make no impression when 
4 . 9 / 
the work is printed. ’’The first Hue being 
thus finished, the compositor proceeds to the 
next ; in order to which lie moves the brass 
rule from behind the former, 'and places it 
before it, and thus composes another line 
against it, after the same manner as before; 
going on thus till his stick is full, when he 
empties all the lines contained in it into thfc 
galley ; which is a frame formed of an oblong 
square board, with a ledge on three sides, 
and a groove to admit a false bottom. The- 
compositor then fills and empties his 
composing-stick as before, till a complete 
page is formed ; when lie ties it up with a cord 
or packthread, and setting it by, proceeds to 
the next, till the number of pages to be con- 
tained in a sheet is completed ; w hich done, 
he carries them to the iinposing-stone, there 
to be ranged in order, and fastened together 
in a frame called a chase, and this is termed 
imposing. The chase is a rectangular iron 
frame, of different dimensions according trt 
the size of the paper to be printed ; having 
two cross pieces of the same metal, called a 
long and short cross, mortised at each end, 
so as to be taken out occasionally. By the 
different situation of these crosses "the clfase is 
fitted for different volumes; for quartos ami 
octavos, one traverses- the middle length- 
wise, the other broadwise, so as to intersect 
each other in the -centre ; for twelves and 
twenty-fours the short cross is shifted nearer 
to one end of the chase; for folios the long 
cross is left entirely out, and the short one 
left in the middle; and for broadsides both 
crosses are set aside. To dress the chase, or 
range and fix the pages therein, the compo- 
sitor makes use of a set of furniture, consist- 
ing of siips of wood of different dimensions, 
and about half an inch high that they may 
be low er than the letters : some of these are 
placed at the top of the pages, and called 
head-sticks; others between them to form 
the inner margin; others on the sides of the 
crosses to form the outer margin, where the 
paper is to be doubled; and others in the 
lorm of wedges to the sides and bottom of 
the pages. Thus all the pages being placed 
at their proper distances, and secured from 
being injured by the chase and furniture 
placed about them, they are all untied, and 
fastened together by driving small pieces of 
wood called quoins, cut in the wedge-form, 
up between the slanting side' of the foot and 
j side-sticks and the chase, by means of a 
! piece of hard wood and a mallet; and all 
being thus bound fast together, so that none 
of tiie letters w ill fall out, it is ready to be 
committed to the pressman. In this condi- 
tion the work is called a form ; and as there 
are two of these forms required for every 
sheet, when both sides are to be printed, it is 
i necessary thatthe distances between the pages 
| in each form should be placed withsuch exact- 
ness, that the impression of the pages in one 
form shall fall exactly' on the back of the 
pages of the other, which is called register. 
As it is impossible but that there must be 
some mistakes in the work, either through 
the oversight of the compositor, or by the 
casual transposition of letters in the case, a 
sheet is printed off, which is called a proof, 
and given to the corrector, wrfo reading it 
over, and rectifying it by the copy, by, mak- 
ing the alterations in the margin," it is deli- 
vered back to the compositor to be correct- 
ed. For tire characters used in correcting p 
