Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

the first book ever printed in the English language. Caxton was engaged upon it for some time at Ghent, but finished it at Cologne, in 1471, on which he returned to Bruges, and presented it to the lady Margaret, who liberally rewarded him for his trouble. Having sold as many copies as he could on the continent, he returned in 1472, to England, bringing with him the remainder, as specimens of his skill; and hence is dated the introduction of the art of printing into this country. The art itself, however, was not practised here, either by himself, or any one else, till about two years after.

The first book printed in England was "The Game of Chess," dated 1474. And we learn from Stowe's Survey of London (edit. fol. 1633, p. 515,)" that in the Eleemosinary, or Almonry, at Westminster Abbey, (now corruptly called Ambry, for that the alms of the Abbey were there distributed to the poor,) John Islep, abbot of Westminster, erected the first, press of book-printing, that ever was in England; and Caxton was the first that practised it in the said Abbey." Stowe, however, is mistaken in the person who was abbot in the year mentioned. It was not Islep, but Dr.

Thomas Milling, a man famous for his knowledge of Greek in that period.

In 1479, a printing press was also established at Oxford; and not long after at St. Albans.

[ocr errors]

Printing was first performed by means of wooden types, fastened very incommodiously together. Caxton was the first who printed with fusile types. His successor, Wynkin de Worde, added some improvements to the art, and particularly introduced musical notes, and, as some suppose, the Roman numerals. Pynson, by extraction a Norman, was the first who used the Roman character. The introduction of the paper-manufactory also into England, in the reign of Henry VIII, or perhaps towards the close of the reign of Henry VII, contributed to facilitate and augment the improvements in the typographical art.

Caxton was a man of great modesty and -simplicity of character, joined with indefatigable industry. He commonly stiles himself “simple William Caxton." He continued to prepare copy for the press even to the last; and though his talents were not brilliant, his great, his incalculable services to mankind, in being the instrument of introducing an art, of all others the most widely and permanently bene

ficial, entitle him to the eternal thanks of the human race; and we would willingly afford him higher commendation, than the equivocal praise bestowed upon him by Bale, who says that he was—“ vir non omnino stupidus, aut ignaviû torpens; sed propagandæ suæ gentis memoriæ studiosus admodum." His last work was a translation from the French, of a large volume, entitled "The Holy Lives of the Fathers Hermits, living in the Deserts," a work which he finished, together with his life, on the same day, in the year 1491.

The books printed by Chxton, were very numerous, amounting in the whole to nearly sixty. A great number of these he translated, as well as printed; and those which he did not translate, he often revised and altered; so that in point of language, they may be considered as his own. Of a few of these books, I shall now proceed to give extracts, with a brief account of each. Those who are desirous of a more complete view than is compatible with the object of this work, may consult the Life of Caxton, by Lewis, or Ames's Typographical Antiquities; as likewise Bowyer's Essays, on the same subject, with other sources,

THE CHRONICLES OF ENGLAND.

THIS book was first translated from a French Chronicle (MSS. Harl. 200, 4to.) written in the beginning of the reign of Edward III. The French have also a famous ancient prose Romance, called Brut, which includes the history of the Sangreal; but I know not whether this is the same with the English copy.

These Chronicles were printed by Caxton, in 1480, in the 20th of Edward IV. They were also printed, together with the " Fruit of Times," in a thick short folio, in 1483, at St. Albans. Hence they have been called the Book of St. Albans, and the Chronicle of St. Albans. In this edition, which was re-printed by Wynkin de Worde, in 1497, the names of the authors, from whom it was chiefly compiled, are enumerated; viz. " 1. Galfridus. Monmouth, monk, in his book of Brute; 2. S. Bede, in the Acts of England, in his book of Times; 3. Gildas, in the Acts of Britain; 4. William of Malmsbury, monk; in the Acts of the Kings of England and Bishops; 5. Cassiodorus, of the Acts of Emperors and Bishops;

6. St. Austin de Civitate Dei; 7. Titus Livius de Gestis Romanorum; 8. Martin, penitentiary to the pope, in his Chronicles of Emperors and Bishops; 9. and lastly, Theobaldus Cartusiensis, containing in his book the progress of all notable fathers, from the beginning of the world unto our time, with the notable acts of the same."

This work is divided into seven parts; of which the last makes half the book, and begins at the conquest. In the prologue, the author proposes to continue these Chronicles, "from the Normans to our time, which is under the reign of king Edward IV. the 23d year, whose noble Chronicles, by custom, may not be seen." The writer, however, was probably prevented by death, from completing his design: for at the end of his Chronicle, he does not descend so low by nearly a dozen years; and the last paragraph ends with the popedom of Sixtus IV. who was elected in 1471, and was still living, "At the making of this book," which concludes by saying, "that John Abbot, of Habingdon, was the pope's legate in England, to dispose of the treasure of the church, to withstand the misbelieveable Turk," &c.

« ZurückWeiter »