Page:De Vinne, Invention of Printing (1876).djvu/210

200 The illustration on the preceding page, which is the exact size of the original, gives a faithful representation of the last page of the first edition of this curious book.

Unlike most of the block-books, the Bible of the Poor was designed with architectural symmetry. An open frame-work divides each page in nine distinct panels or partitions, five of which are devoted to pictorial illustrations, and four to their explanation in words. The three large panels in the middle of the page illustrate historical subjects drawn from the Bible, of which the central panel is, in theological phrase, the type, and is taken from the New Testament. The pictures on either side are known as the antitypes, and are oftenest taken from the Old Testament. The texts that explain the pictures are placed in the corners of the page, or in scrolls near the figures.

To most readers the explanatory text is undecipherable. The obscurity is not only that of a dead language: a trained Latin scholar will always grope and often stumble in attempting to make a translation. All the letters are carelessly drawn and cut; the words are badly spaced, and are deformed with abbreviations. These faults appear more noticeable when the letters are contrasted with the designs. Whoever designed the figures on the wood drew with the bold and free hand of an artist who had proper confidence in his ability. Whoever engraved the figures cut the clean firm line that can be made only by an expert. But the cutting of the letters, although probably done by the engraver of the figures, is really barbarous. It is obvious that the designer, skillful as he was with figures, had no experience in drawing letters, and that the engraver was equally unsuccessful at a new kind of work.

The text and translation appended are the version of Dr. Horne, author of the Introduction to the Study of Bibliography, who has corrected the contractions of the original Latin. It is copied from the Typographia of Hansard.