“C’est mon désir
De Dieu servir
Pour acquérir
Son doux plaisir.”
Also in the instance of another early printer, Gilles De Gourmont, who chants—
“Tost ou tard
Pres ou loing
A le Fort
Du feble besoing.”
Perhaps the greatest number of all are those in which the printer proclaims his faith to God and his loyalty to his king. One of the early Paris printers enjoins us—in verse—not only to honour the king and the court, but claims our salutations for the University; and almost precisely the same sentiment finds expression in the Mark of J. Alexandre, another early printer of Paris. Robinet or Robert Macé, Rouen, proclaims “Ung dieu, ung roy, ung foy, ung loy,” and the same idea expressed in identical words is not uncommonly met with in Printers’ Marks. Of a more definitely religious nature are those, for example, of P. de Sartières, Bourges, “Tout se passe fors dieu”; of J. Lambert, “A espoir en dieu”; of Prigent Calvarin, “Deum time, pauperes sustine, finem respice”; and several from the Psalms, such as that of C. Nourry, called Le Prince, “Cor contritum et humiliatum deus non despicies”; of P. De Saincte-Lucie, also called Le Prince, “Oculi mei semper ad dominum”; and of J. Temporal (all three Lyons printers), “Tangit montes et fumigant,” in which the design is quite in keeping with the motto; in one case at least, S. Nivelle, one of the commandments is made use of, “Honora patrem tuum, et matrem tuam, ut sis longævus super terram.” Here, too, we may include the mottoes of B. Rigaud, “A foy entiere cœur volant”; S. De Colines, “Eripiam et glorificabo eum”; and of Benoist Bounyn, Lyons, “Labores manum tuarum quia manducabis beatus es et bene tibi erit.” Whilst as a few illustrations of a general character we may quote Geoffrey Tory’s exceedingly brief “Non plus,” which was contemporaneously used also by Olivier Mallard; J. Longis, “Nihil in charitate violentia”; Denys Janot, “Tout par amour, amour par tout, par tout amour, en tout bien”; the French rendering of a very old proverb in the mottoes of B. Aubri and D. Roce, “A l’aventure tout vient a point qui peut attendre”; J. Bignon, “Repos sans fin, sans fin repos”; the motto used conjointly by M. Fézandat and R. Granjon, “Ne la mort, ne le venin”; and the motto of Etienne Dolet, “Scabra et impolita ad amussim dolo, atque perfolio.” Among the mottoes of early English printers, the most notable, partly for its dual source, and as one of our earliest examples, is that of William Faques; one sentence, “Melius est modicum justo super divitias peccatorum multas,” is taken from Psalm xxxvii. verse 16; and the second, “Melior est patiens viro forti, et qui dominat,” comes from Proverbs xvi., verse 32. The motto of Richard Grafton has already been quoted; that of John Reynes was “Redemptoris mundi arma”; and John Wolfe, “Vbique floret.”