with martyrs and prophets, and kings; to kneel at the feet of the mighty lawgiver; to bend at the shrine of the eternal poet; to imbibe inspiration from the eloquent, to gather instruction from the wise, and pleasure from the gifted; to behold, as in a glass, all the majesty and all the beauty of the mighty PAST, to revel in all the accumulated treasures of Time-and this, all this, we have by reading the privilege to do. Imagination indeed, the gift of heaven, may soar elate, unchecked, though untutored through time and space, through Time to Eternity, and may people worlds at will; but that truthful basis which can alone give permanence to her visions, that knowledge which ennobles and purifies and elevates them is acquired from books, whether "Song of the Muses, says historic tale, The "word of Holy Writ," the BIBLE-we pass over its hopes, its promises, its consolations-these themes are too sacred even for reference on our light page-but here, we may remark, we see the world in its freshness, its prime, its glory. We converse truly with godlike men and angelic women. We see the mighty and majestic fathers of the human race ere sin had corrupted all their godlike seeming; ere the bequeathed and inherited sorrows of ages-had quite seared the "human face divine;" ere sloth, and luxury, and corruption, and decay, had altered features formed in the similitude of heaven to the gross semblance of earth; and we walk step by step over the new fresh earth as yet sorrow untrodden by foot of man, and behold the ancient solitudes gradually invaded by his advancing steps. Most gentle, most soothing, most faithful companions are books. They afford amusement for the lonely hour; solace perchance for the sorrowful one: they offer recreation to the light-hearted; instruction to the inquiring; inspiration to the aspiring mind; food for the thirsty one. They are inexhaustible in extent as in variety and oh! in the silent vigil by the suffering couch, or during the languor of indisposition, who can too highly praise those silent friends-silent indeed to the ear, but speaking eloquently to the heart—which beguile, even transiently, the mind from present depressing care, strengthen and elevate it by communion with the past, or solace it by hopes of the future! Listen how sweetly one of the first of modern men apostrophises his books: "My days among the dead are past; Where'er these casual eyes are cast, My never-failing friends are they, "With them I take delight in weal, 66 And while I understand and feel My cheeks have often been bedew'd, My thoughts are with the dead; with them I live in long past years; Their virtues love, their faults condemn, Partake their hopes and fears, Instruction with a humble mind. Yet how little are we of the present day, who have books poured into our laps, able to estimate their real value! Nor is it possible that they can ever again be estimated as they once were. The universal diffusion of them, the incalculable multiplication of them, seems to render it impossible that the world can ever be deprived of them. No. We must call up some of the spirits of the "pious and painful " amanuenses of those days when the fourth estate of the realm, the public press—was NOT to tell us the real value of the literary treasures we now esteem so lightly. He will tell us that in his day the donation of a single book to a religious house was thought to give the donor a claim to eternal salvation; and that an offering so valued, so cherished, would be laid on the high altar amid pomp and pageantry. He might perhaps personally remember the prior and convent of Rochester pronouncing an irrevocable sentence of damnation on him who should purloin or conceal their treasured Latin translation of Aristotle's physics. He would tell us that the holiest and wisest of men would forego ease and luxury and spend laborious years in transcribing books for the good of others; he will tell us that amongst many others, Osmond, Bishop of Salisbury, did this, and * Southey. perchance he will name that Guido de Jars, in his fortieth year, began to copy the Bible on vellum, with rich and elegant decorations, and that the suns of half a century had risen and set, ere, with unintermitting labour and unwearied zeal, he finished it. in his ninetieth. He will also tell us, that when a book was to be sold, it was customary to assemble all persons of consequence and character in the neighbourhood, and to make a formal record that they were present on this occasion. Thus, amongst the royal MSS. is a book thus described : This book of the Sentences belongs to Master Robert, archdeacon of Lincoln, which he bought of Geoffrey the chaplain, brother of Henry vicar of Northelkingston, in the presence of Master Robert de Lee, Master John of Lirling, Richard of Luda, clerk, Richard the Almoner, the said Henry the vicar and his clerk, and others: and the said archdeacon gave the said book to God and saint Oswald, and to Peter abbot of Barton, and the convent of Barden." These are a few, a very few of such instances as a spirit of the fourteenth century might allude to-to testify the value of books. Indeed, even so late as the reign of Henry the VI., when the invention of paper greatly facilitated the multiplication of MSS. the impediments to study, from the scarcity of books, must have been very great, for in the statutes of St. Mary's College, Oxford, is this order-"Let no scholar occupy a book in the library above one hour, or two hours at the most; lest others shall be hindered from the use of the same." The scarcity of parchment seems indeed at times to have been a greater hindrance to the promulga tion of literature than even the laborious and tedious transcription of the books. About 1120, one Master Hugh, being appointed by the convent of St. Edmondsbury to write a copy of the Bible, for their library, could procure no parchment in England. The following particulars of the scarcity of books before the era of printing, gathered chiefly by Warton, are interesting. In 855, Lupus, abbot of Ferrieres in France, sent two of his monks to Pope Benedict the third, to beg a copy of Cicero de Oratore, and Quintilian's Institutes, and some other books: for, says the abbot, although we have part of these books, yet there is no whole or complete copy of them in all France. Albert, abbot of Gemblours, who with incredible labour and immense expense had collected a hundred volumes on theological, and fifty on general subjects, imagined he had formed a splendid library. About 790, Charlemagne granted an unlimited right to hunting to the abbot and monks of Sithin, for making their gloves and girdles of the skins of the deer they killed, and covers for their books. At the beginning of the tenth century, books were so scarce in Spain, that one and the same copy of the Bible, St. Jerome's Epistles, and some volumes of ecclesiastical offices and martyrologies, often served several different monasteries. Amongst the constitutions given to the monks of England by Archbishop Lanfranc, in 1072, the following injunction occurs: At the beginning of Lent, the librarian is ordered to deliver a book to each of the religious; a whole year was allowed for the perusal of this book! and at the returning Lent, those |