ou to good fame and renommee. And for
to pass the time this book shall be pleasant to
read in, but for to give faith and belief that all
is true that is contained herein, ye be at your
liberty."

This wise, sane, gentle apostle of literature in England wrought well in
his day, and is justly honored alike by scholars and by printers, who
regard him, in England and America, as the father of their craft. Indeed
to this day in the printing trade a shop organization is sometimes
called a chapel, because according to ancient tradition Caxton's workmen
held their meetings in one of the chapels adjoining the abbey of
Westminster.

* * * * *

This survey of printing in its relations to the Renaissance is now not
finished but concluded. I have shown that the invention and improvement
of printing was not the cause but rather the effect of the revival of
learning, while on the other hand the wide dissemination of literature
made possible by typography of course accelerated enormously the process
of popular enlightenment. I have selected five typical printers of that
age:

Aldus, with his Homer.
Stephanus, with his Greek Testament.
Froben, with his Plato.
Koberger, with his Nuremberg Chronicle.
Caxton, with his Morte d'Arthur.

Here we find represented in the Aldus Homer the revival of Greek
learning, in the Stephanus Testament the application of this to the free
criticism of the scriptures, in the Froben Plato the substitution of
Platonic idealism for the scholastic philosophy based on Aristotle, in
the Nuremberg book the epitome of mediaeval superstition, credulity, and
curiosity on the verge of the new era, and in Morte d'Arthur the fond
return of the modern mind, facing an unknown future, upon the naive and
beautiful legends of Arthurian romance. An age full of contradictions
and strange delusions, but an age of great vitality, great eagerness,
great industry, patience, foresight, imagination. And in such an age it
was the good fortune of these wise craftsmen who handled so deftly their
paper and type to be the instruments of more evangels than angels ever
sang, more revolutions than gunpowder ever achieved, more victories than
ever won the applause of men or the approval of heaven. In the beginning
the creative word was =Fiat lux=--let there be light. In the new
creation of the human mind it was =Impr