The unknown author further says that John Gutenberg was one of the friends to whom Fust and Schœffer showed the wood types; that Gutenberg, professing to admire their ingenuity, took a great interest in their enterprise, and lent Fust and Schœffer money, thereby entangling them in an agreement, from which they could not extricate themselves until Gutenberg had acquired a right to use the invention, by which use he wrongfully enjoys the honor of first inventor. Here we may stop. It would be a waste of time to expose, one by one, the falsehoods of a statement so flatly contradicted by many unimpeachable evidences. It is very clear that the writer had no new facts to tell us about the invention. He has told us not how it was made, but how he wished it had been made that it might redound to the honor of the Fusts.
What later writers have said about the value of Schœffer's services need not be considered, for they also have produced no new facts: they have based their opinions entirely on the incorrect information of Faustus, Trithemius and Schœffer. We may pass, without further delay, to the examination of the claims made for other alleged inventors of printing.
- ↑ This version is found in Wolf's Monumenta Typographica, vol. i, pp. 466 and 469, under the heading of The Statement of an Unknown Author, and is attributed by Wolf to one Jo. Frid. Faustus of Aschaffenburg (who died in 1620), or to his son. Wolf admits (p. 452, note) that the identity of the author is not clearly established. It is probable that the statement was written by a descendant of John Fust, who was predisposed to magnify his services and those of his partner. Van der Linde calls the writer an arch liar. Bernard rejects the entire statement as unworthy of credit, or even of notice.
