Page:A dictionary of printers and printing.djvu/504

 SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.

496

1640. Cardinal Richelieu,* prime minister of France, erected a private press, in his chateau, near Tours, from which several works, executed with great neatness, have proceeded, hearing date 1653, 1654, See, for a particular account of which, see Peipiol's DictionTiairedeBibliogie.

1640. Died, Robert Stephens the Third, who was the son of the second Robert Stephens. The time of his birth is not exactly ascertained, but Mr. Greswell supposes it to have taken place in 1563, he must therefore have been very young at the death of his father. Du Verdier describes him as a young man of very premising talents, and as resident in the family of M. des Portes, in the year 1584. Though he is allowed to have become conspicuous as a typographer, jet the time of his commencement of this art remains venr doubtful : Maittaire says in the year 1596; out La Caille asserts that he com- menced printing in the year 1588, several con- siderable works. As impressions of so late a date as 1640, bear his name, Maittaire believes him to have attained at least to the age of seventy. "Assuming," says Mr. Greswell, "my conjecture above, respecting the time of his birth, to be near the truth, he must have lived to the age of seventy-seven years."

This Robert Stephens had the title of "Poete et Interprete du Roy pour les Langues Grecque et Latin." All those poetical compositions cited by Maittaire as productions of his father, are proved by clear evidence to belong to the son.

To his brief notice of Robert Stephens the third, Maittaire has subjoined a variety of Greek and Latin " Epigrammata ;" which are further proofs of his facility and fruitfulness in this species of composition. To some of those poetic

< John ArmaDd Dn Plessis de Richelieu, a great cardi- nal, and minister of state in France, was born Sept. 5, I5S5. Being a man of prodigiooa capacity, and of a rest- less and insatiable ambition, he formed to himself vast designs, which made his whole life nothing but a series ut agitations and inqoietudes. He showed himself a patron of men of letters, and caused the arts and sciences to floorish in the kingdom. He abounded, however, rather with great qaalities than good ones, and therefore -was much admired, but not beloved. He was one of those ambitious men who foolishly attempt to rival every kind of genius; and seeing himself constantly disap. pointed, he envied, with all the venom of rancour, those talentd which are so frequently the ait that men of genius possess. He died, December *, 1648, before he had completed any of his designs ; leaving behind him a name aomewhat dazzling, but by no means dear and venerable. Cardinal Mazarine carried on Richelieu's plan, and com- pleted many of his schemes. Never was a gigantic baby of adulation so crammed with the soft pap of Dedicalioru oa cardinal Richelieu. French flattery even exceeded itself. There arc a vast number of very extraordinary dedications to this man. In which the divinity itself is dts- robed of its attributes to bestow them on this miserable creature of vanity. 1 suspect, says D'tsraeli, that even the following one is not the most blasphemous he received. " Who has seen your face without beinf; seized by those softened terrors which made the prophets shudder when God showed the beams of his glory ! But as be whom they dared not to approach in the burning bush, and in the noise of thnndere, appeared to them sometimes in the freshness of the zephyrs, so the softness of your anjEust countenance dissipa^ at the same time, and changes into dew the small vaponn which cover its majesty." — One of these herd of dedicators, after the death of Richellen, sup- pressed, In a second edition, bis hyperbolical panegyric) and as a punishment to himself, dedicated the work to Jesus Christ !

effusions he was accustomed to subjoin his name, Robertus Stcphanus, simply: but to others, Robertas Stepbanus, R. F. R. N. (Roherti Filius, Roberti Nepos); and the same distinction is sometimes found subscribed to the title-pages of his impressions.

Maittaire terms him " Typographus insignis, quamvis non Regius; in symbolis excogitandis ingeniosus, et Latins ac Grsecse linguee peritus." La Caille says, he had for his mark the Olive, which was that of his ancestors. With the Olive he adopted the words, variously, " Noli altum sapere, sed time." His several modes of subscription, " in librorum titulis," were : " ex typographia," or "ex officina Roberti Stephaoi :" or " Oliva," or "ad Olivam R. Stephani :" "de I'imprimerie de Robert Estienne :" " a I'Olivier de Robert Estienne." Maittaire observes that various impressions of his are found without any device: that John Jannon occasionally use^ his office and materials ; and that many other " libraires" of Paris frequently employed his press. As king's interpreter he translated into French the two first books of Arittotlt't Rhetoric.

1640. We are now come to that memorable epoch, in English history,

When civn dudgeon first grew tiigli.

Each party, whether political, or religious, now hoped to gain their object, by spreading their pretensions. From this source, the nation was soon over-run with tracts of every size, and of various denominations: hence, the Diurnal, which continued its hebdomadal round, notwith- standing the ridicule of Cleveland, from 1640 tu 1660: and hence too the different mercuries, which were sent abroad, to inflame by their vehemence, or to conciliate by their wit; to con- vince by their argument, or to delude by their sophistrr. Many of them were written widi extraordinary talent, and published with un- common courage. The great writers of these mercuries were Marchmont, Needham, sir John Birkenhead, and sir Roger L'Estrange.

When hostilities commenced, every event, during a most eventful period, had its own historian, who communicated Newt from Hull, Tntths from York, Warranted Tiding$ from Ireland, and Special Pattagei from tevenU Places. These were all occasional papers. Im- patient, however, as a distracted people were for information, the news were never distributed dailv. The various newspapers were published weekly at first; but in the progress of events; and in the ardour of curiosity, they were dis- tributed twice, or thrice, in every week. Such were the French Intelligencer, the Dutch Spue, the Irish Mercury, and the Scots Dove; the Parliament Kite, and the Secret Owl. Mercuriut Achernnticus brought them hebdomadal Newt from Hell, Mercurius Democritut communicated wonderful news from the World in the Moon, the Laughing Mercury gave perfect news from the Antipodes, and Mercurivn Mattix faithfully lashed all Scouts, Mercuriet, Posts, Spies, and other Intelligencert.

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