History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume II (of 2) / Revised Edition

by John William Draper

Measure of the contemporaneous mental state of nations.Some authors have endeavoured to estimate the intellectual condition of different countries in Europe at the close of the fifteenth century by the literary activity they displayed in the preparation and printing of editions of books. Though it is plain that such estimates can hardly be rigorously correct, since to print a book not only implies literary capacity, but also the connexions of business and trade, and hence works are more likely to be issued in places where there is a mercantile activity, yet such estimates are perhaps the most exact that we can now obtain; they also lead us to some very interesting and unexpected results of singular value in their connexion with that important epoch. Thus it appears that in all Europe, between 1470 and 1500, more than ten thousand editions of books and pamphlets were printed, and of them a majority in Italy, demonstrating that Italy was in the van of the intellectual movement. Out of this large number, in Venice there had been printed 2,835; Milan, 625; Bologna, 298; Rome, 925; Paris, 751; Cologne, 530; Nuremberg, 382; Leipsic, 851; Bâle, 320; Strasburg, 526; Augsburg, 256; Louvain, 116; Mentz, 134; Deventer, 169; London, 130; Oxford, 7; St. Alban's, 4.

Italy compared with the rest of Europe.Venice, therefore, took the lead. England was in a very backward state. This conclusion is confirmed by many other circumstances, which justify the statement that Italy was as far advanced intellectually in 1400 as England in 1500. Paris exhibits a superiority sixfold over London, and in the next ten years the disproportion becomes even more remarkable, for in Paris four hundred and thirty editions were printed, in London only twenty-six. The light of learning became enfeebled by distance from its Italian focus. As late as 1550, a complete century after the establishment of the art, but seven works had been printed in Scotland, and among them not a single classic. It is an amusing proof how local tastes were consulted in the character of the [200] books thus put forth, that the first work issued in Spain, 1474, was on the "Conception of the Virgin."

Effect of printing on literature and the Church.The invention of printing operated in two modes altogether distinct; first, in the multiplying and cheapening of books, secondly, in substituting reading for pulpit instruction.

Cheapening of books.First, as to the multiplication and cheapening of books—there is no reason to suppose that the supply had ever been inadequate. As, under the Ptolemies, book manufacture was carried forward in the Museum at Alexandria to an extent which fully satisfied demands, so in all the great abbeys there was an apartment—the Scriptorium—for the copying and making of books. Such a sedentary occupation could not but be agreeable to persons of a contemplative or quiet habit of life. But Greece, Rome, Egypt—indeed, all the ancient governments except that of China, were founded upon elements among which did not appear that all-important one of modern times, a reading class. Information passed from mouth to mouth, not from eye to eye. With a limited demand, the compensation to the copier was sufficient, and the cost to the purchaser moderate. It is altogether a mistake to suppose that the methods and advantages of printing were unknown. Modifications of that art were used wherever occasion called for them. We do not need the Roman stamps to satisfy us of that fact every Babylonian brick and signet ring is an illustration. The want of paper. Damascus paper. Printing processes of various kinds were well enough known. The real difficulty was the want of paper. That substance was first made in Europe by the Spanish Moors from the fine flax of Valentia and Murcia. Cotton paper, sold as charta Damascena, had been previously made at Damascus, and several different varieties had long been manufactured in China.

Had there been more readers, paper would have been more abundantly produced, and there would have been more copiers—nay, even there would have been printers. An increased demand would have been answered by an increased supply. As soon as such a demand arose in Europe the press was introduced, as it had been thousands of years before in China.

Longevity of books curtailed. [201] So far as the public is concerned, printing has been an unmixed advantage; not so, however, in its bearing on authors. The longevity of books is greatly impaired, a melancholy conclusion to an ambitious intellect. The duration of many ancient books which have escaped the chances of time is to be hoped for no more. In this shortening of their term the excessive multiplication of works greatly assists. A rapid succession soon makes those of distinction obsolete, and then consigns them to oblivion. No author can now expect immortality. His utmost hope is only this, that his book may live a little longer than himself.

Multiplication of books.But it was with printing as with other affairs of the market—an increased demand gave origin to an increased supply, which, in its turn reacting, increased the demand. Cheap books bred readers. When the monks, abandoning their useless and lazy life of saying their prayers a dozen times a day, turned to the copying and illustrating of manuscripts, a mental elevation of the whole order was the result; there were more monks who could read. And so, on the greater scale, as books through the press became more abundant, there were more persons to whom they became a necessity.

The mode of communicating knowledge changes.But, secondly, as to the change which ensued in the mode of communicating information—a change felt instantly in the ecclesiastical, and, at a later period, in the political world. The whole system of public worship had been founded on the condition of a non-reading people; hence the reading of prayers and the sermon. Whoever will attentively compare the thirteenth with the nineteenth century cannot fail to see how essential oral instruction was in the former, how subordinate in the latter. Injury to pulpit instruction. The invention of the printing-press gave an instant, a formidable rival to the pulpit. It made possible that which had been impossible before in Christian Europe—direct communication between the government and the people without any religious intermedium, and was the first step in that important change subsequently carried out in America, the separation of Church and state. Though in this particular the effect was desirable, [202] in another its advantages are doubtful, for the Church adhered to her ancient method when it had lost very much of its real force, and this even at the risk of falling into a lifeless and impassive condition.

Influence of church services on the people.And yet we must not undervalue the power once exercised on a non-reading community by oral and scenic teachings. What could better instruct it than a formal congregating of neighbourhoods together each Sabbath-day to listen in silence and without questioning? In those great churches, the architectural grandeur of which is still the admiration of our material age, nothing was wanting to impress the worshipper. The vast pile, with its turrets or spire pointing to heaven; its steep inclining roof; its walls, with niches and statues; its echoing belfry; its windows of exquisite hues and of every form, lancet, or wheel, or rose, through which stole in the many-coloured light; its chapels, with their pictured walls; its rows of slender, clustering columns, and arches tier upon tier; its many tapering pendants; the priest emerging from his scenic retreat; his chalice and forbidden wine; the covering paten, the cibory, and the pix. Amid clouds of incense from smoking censers, the blaze of lamps, and tapers, and branching candlesticks, the tinkling of silver bells, the play of jewelled vessels and gorgeous dresses of violet, green, and gold, banners and crosses were borne aloft through lines of kneeling worshippers in processional services along the aisles. The chanting of litanies and psalms gave a foretaste of the melodies of heaven, and the voices of the choristers and sounds of the organ now thundered forth glory to God in the highest, now whispered to the broken in spirit peace.

Influence of village churches.If such were the influences in the cathedral, not less were those that gathered round the little village church. To the peasant it was endeared by the most touching incidents of his life. At its font his parents had given him his name; at its altar he had plighted his matrimonial vows; beneath the little grass mounds in its yard there awaited the resurrection those who had been untimely taken away. Connected thus with the profoundest and holiest sentiments [203] of humanity, the pulpit was for instruction a sole and sufficient means. Nothing like it had existed in paganism. The irregular, ill-timed, occasional eloquence of the Greek republican orators cannot for an instant be set in comparison with such a steady and enduring systematic institution.