Lanterna Rally

Author: Henry Stevens

Publisher:

Published: 2015-07-19

Total Pages: 162

ISBN-13: 9781331802501

Excerpt from The Bibles in the Caxton Exhibition: Or a Biographical Description of Nearly One Thousand Representative Bibles in Various Languages Chronologically Arranged From the First Bible The Caxton Celebration Exhibition was opened at South Kensington on the thirtieth of June and closed on the first of September, 1877. During these nine short weeks the public had a rare opportunity afforded it of having some of its old popular notions respecting printing dissipated, others corrected, and not a few new ones inculcated. It is only fair, however, to the intelligent British public to state here frankly in their behalf that only a select few appear to have had any well defined ideas, convictions, notions, sentiments or intelligence, whatever, respecting the origin, development, progress, and present state of this 'Art preservative of all Arts, ' especially as it exists, and has existed in this country during the last four centuries. This circumstance is probably owing to the fact that in dear old merrie England reading and writing come by nature, while printing is no more considered an art or invention than breathing or drinking. We know it and that is enough. All these things are so familiar from in fancy that one scarcely ever thinks of accounting for them, or looking into their origin. As pleasure is said to be the absence of pain, darkness the absence of light, so printing may be simply the absence of primitive ignorance. The mind reads the newspapers and the Bible, feels, thinks, and knows intuitively. Like the eye the press sees not itself, yet is the organ by which all other things are seen, known, and organized. It was therefore a happy thought of Mr J. S. Hodson, Secretary of the Printers' Pension Corporation, to celebrate the four hundredth anniversary of the introduction, in 1477, of the art and mystery of printing into England, by a "Caxton Celebration" in the year 1877, just for a moment to hold the mirror up to printing, to let the eye see the eye, and the press the press. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.