348
HISTORY OF PRINTING.
the said almanack, they were all vended. Its sale was so great, that the society of booksellers in London bought off the copy for the future, in order to engross it in their own hands."
1673. The Empresi of Morocco. A tragedy with sculptures. As it is acted at the Duke's theatre. AVritten by Elkanah Settle, servant to his majesty.
Pritnoa da versibos annos. Fetr. Arb.
London : printed for William Cademan, at the Pope's Head, in the lower walk of the new exchange, in the Strand.
This play is much sought after, as being the first which 'was ever published with engravings, and which was sold for what was then thought the enormous sum of two shillings. The en- gravings were executed by W. Dolle, and were not improbably a representation of the scenes, in one of which the most shocking tortures are exhibited. Horace did not think it possible that it should enter into the human imagination to exhibit things so offensive. It was exhibited before the king, by the great personages of the court. Lord Mulgrave wrote the prologue, and lord Rochester the epilogue, both of which were spoken by lady Elizabeth Howard.*
Elkanah Settle had the distinguished honour of being poet laureat to the city of Loudon, and the misery of dying a poor pensioner in the charter house. He wrote seventeen plays.
1673. Robert Sanders who had succeeded Audrew Anderson about 1668, calls himself printer to the city and university of Glasgow. His work appears to be very neatly executed.
1673. Bloody News from Shrewsbury ; a true relation of a horrible villian, by name Thomas Reynolds, who before he was eighteen, murdered Alice Stephens and Iter daughter Martha, and set their house on fire. He likewise set on fire one Goodman Merick's house, and twice attempted to murder one Miss Corfuds. 4to.
1674. Printing introduced into Boston, the capital of the state of Massachusetts, in New England. This town was the second place throughout the United States of America to re- ceive the art of printing, which was first practised here under a special license from government, by John Forster, who printed the first book, 1 676.
1674. i>t«(f, Richard WuiTLocK,M.D., who, at the restoration, says Wood, took orders, and obtained a living in Kent, from archbishop Sheldon, where he died. In 1654 he published a work entitled, Zoolomia, or. Observations on the Present Manners of the English ; briefly anatomizing the Living by the Dead. With an Usefull Detection of the Mountebanks of both Sexes. By Richard Whitlock, M. D. late fellow of All Souls' college, in Oxford. London : Printed by Thomas Roycroft, Stc. 1654. 8vo. (610 pp. with a frontispiece.)
This worthy doctor labours to be witty and original, till he becomes unintelligible; expres-
- For ftirther anccdotcii on UUb eal^ect, sec Malone's
Li/e vf Dfgien.
sing a good meaning in terms so uuconnecttd and far-fetched, that it is often difficult to ds- cover his allusions. Yet his style and tumiiiwt of quoting much re.<«mble those of bis ootem- porary. Burton, in his Anatomy of Melai*eh^, this auso being an anatomy.
As a specimen of his style, the followiti|r ex- tract is taken from his Teares of the Presae.
"Now the causes of the enormities of the presse, are either in writers or readers.
" 1 . Among writers, first some that write to eat, as beggars examine not the vertaes of bese- factours, but such as they hope or finde able, or willing, they ply, be they good or bad, wisemas or foole, so do they beg of any theme that wiQ sell ; true or false, good or bad, in rime or prose, and that pitifull or passable, all is one, ink must eame ale and three penny ordinary's ; vritr they must against things or men, (if the spirit of contradiction prove saleable,) that they can neither master nor conquer; sparing' neither Bacons, ■ Harreys, Digbys, Brownes, or any the like of improvement colledge, (as I may terme them) though (beside some little somewLat for the venture) they get nothing, but such a credit as he did, that set Diana's temple on fire to per- petuate his name.
" 2. A second sort are discoverers of their affec- tions by taking the cudgels on one side or other, and it is come to that now, that author scarce passeth that writeth not controversies, ecclesiasti- call, politick, or philosophicall. Though tarn better it were for public good there were mite, deserving the name of Johannes de Indagine) progressive pioners in the mines of knowledge, than controverters of what is found ; it would lessen the number of conciliatours which cannot themselves now write, but as engagedly biassed to one side or other, but these are, Desiderata, vereor semper desideranda, things wanting, and to be desired (I feare) for ever.
"Second cause are buyers, the chapman's vanity and weakness of choice, maketh the mart of lesse worthy books the bigger, ^uch is the fate of books, of all other ware, .the courser the ware, the more the seller getteth by it; examine the truth of it at stationers' hall, and it will too truly appeare in these latter times, the bookseUer hath got most by those bookes, the buyer bath got the least, being not only the luck of Rablais bis bookseller, that was a looser by his book of sence and judgment, but abundantlv repaired by that ingenious nothing, the Life of Garagantut and Pantagruel. What age ever brought forth more, or bought more printed waste papers. to reach which, is the worst spending of time (next the making them) and the greater price given for them, and farre above their worth, Sec. But not to make our eyes sore by looking only on the hurt; let us turne them on the benefits of the well employed press ; and we shall see it a mint of solid worth, the good it hath done, (and yet may do) being inestimable ; it is truth's aimoiy, the bank of knowledge, and nursery of religion, never suffering a want of the sincere milk of the word, nor piety's practice to be out of print (and
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