ury without recognizing the wonderful change. It had
become obviously useless any longer to assert an immobility of humanity
when men were standing face to face with the new forms into which it had
been transposed. New ideas had driven out old ones. Natural phenomena
could not again be likened to human acts, nor the necessities of man
regarded as determining the movements of the universe. A better
appreciation of the nature of evidence was arising, perhaps in part
through the influence of the lawyers, but in part through a commencing
taste for criticism. We see it in such facts as the denial that a
miracle can be taken as the proof of anything else than the special
circumstances with which it is connected; we see it in the assertion
that the martyrdom of men in support of a dogma, so far from proving its
truth, proves rather its doubtfulness, no geometer having ever thought
it worth his while to die in order to establish any mathematical
proposition, truth needing no such sacrifices, which are actually
unserviceable and useless to it, since it is able spontaneously to force
its own way. [Sidenote: Disbelief setting in in Italy.] In Italy, where
the popular pecuniary interests were obviously identical with those of
the Church, a dismal disbelief was silently engendering.

And now occurred an event the results of which it is impossible to
exaggerate.

[Sidenote: Invention of printing: its early history.] About A.D. 1440
the art of printing seems to have been invented in Europe. It is not
material to our purpose to inquire into the particulars of its history,
whether we should attribute it to Coster of Haarlaem or Gutenberg of
Mentz, or whether, in reality, it was introduced by the Venetians from
China, where it had been practised for nearly two thousand years. In
Venice a decree was issued in 1441 in relation to printing, which would
seem to imply that it had been known there for some years. Coster is
supposed to have printed the "Speculum Humanae Salvationis" about 1440,
and Gutenberg and Faust the Mentz Bible without date, 1455. The art
reached perfection at once; their Bible is still admired for its
beautiful typography. Among the earliest specimens of printing extant is
an exhortation to take up arms against the Turks, 1454; there are also
two letters of indulgence of Nicolas V. of the same date. In the
beginning each page was engraved on a block of wood, but soon movable
types were introduced. Impressions of the for