Naudé appears to have been a born librarian, for at the early age of twenty the President De Mesme appointed him to take charge of his library. He left his employer in 1626, in order to finish his medical studies. Cardinal Bagni took him to Rome, and when Bagni died, Naudé became librarian to Cardinal Barberini. Richelieu recalled him to Paris in 1642, to act as his librarian, but the Minister dying soon afterwards, Naudé took the same office under Mazarin. During the troubles of the Fronde, the librarian had the mortification of seeing the library which he had collected dispersed; and in consequence he accepted the offer of Queen Christina, to become her librarian at Stockholm. Naudé was not happy abroad, and when Mazarin appealed to him to reform his scattered library, he returned at once, but died on the journey home at Abbeville, July 29, 1653.
The Mazarin Library consisted of more than 40,000 volumes, arranged in seven rooms filled from top to bottom. It was rich in all classes, but more particularly in Law and Physic. Naudé described it with enthusiasm as "the most beautiful and best furnished of any library now in the world, or that is likely (if affection does not much deceive me) ever to be hereafter." Such should be a library in the formation of which the Kings and Princes and Ambassadors of Europe were all helpers. Naudé in another place called it "the work of my hands and the miracle of my life." Great therefore was his dejection when the library was dispersed. Of this he said, "Beleeve, if you please, that the ruine of this Library will be more carefully marked in all Histories and Calendars, than the taking and sacking of Constantinople." Naudé's letter on the destruction of the Mazarin Library was published in London in 1652, and the pamphlet was reprinted in the Harleian Miscellany. "News from France, or a Description of the Library of Cardinall Mazarini, before it was utterly ruined. Sent in a letter from G. Naudæus, Keeper of the Publick Library. London, Printed for Timothy Garthwait, 1652." 4to. 4 leaves.
In 1650 was published at London, by Samuel Hartlib, a little book entitled, "The Reformed Librarie Keeper, with a Supplement to the Reformed School, as Subordinate to Colleges in Universities. By John Durie. London, William Du-Gard, 1650."[3]
John Durie's ideas on the educational value of Libraries and the high function of the Librarian are similar to those enunciated by Carlyle, when he wrote, "The true University of these days is a Collection of Books." Of this point, as elaborated in the proposal to establish Professorships of Bibliography, we shall have something more to say further on.
It is always interesting to see the views of great men exemplified in the selection of books for a Library, and we may with advantage study the lists prepared by George III. and Dr. Johnson. The King was a collector of the first rank, as is evidenced by his fine library, now in the British Museum, and he knew his books well. When he was about to visit Weymouth, he wrote to his bookseller for the following books to be supplied to him to form a closet library at that watering place. The list was written from memory, and it was printed by Dibdin in his Library Companion, from the original document in the King's own handwriting:
The Holy Bible. 2 vols. 8vo. Cambridge.
New Whole Duty of Man. 8vo.
The Annual Register. 25 vols. 8vo.
The History of England, by Rapin. 21 vols. 8vo. 1757.
Elémens de l'Histoire de France, par Millot. 3 vols. 12mo. 1770.