Hoyt & Roberts, comps. Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations. 1922.
Printing
Memoriæ sacrum
Typographia
Ars artium omnium
Conservatrix
Hic primum inventa
Circa annum mccccxl.
Sacred to the memory of printing, the art preservative of all arts. This was first invented about the year 1440.
Inscription on the façade of the house once occupied by Laurent Koster at Harlem. “The art preservative of all arts,” probably taken from this.
He who first shortened the labor of Copyists by device of Movable Types was disbanding hired Armies and cashiering most Kings and Senates, and creating a whole new Democratic world: he had invented the Art of printing.
Carlyle—Sartor Resartus. Bk. I. Ch. V.
Transforms old print
To zigzag manuscript, and cheats the eyes
Of gallery critics by a thousand arts.
Cowper—The Task. Bk. II. The Time Piece. L. 363.
Every school boy and school girl who has arrived at the age of reflection ought to know something about the history of the art of printing.
Horace Mann—The Common School Journal. February, 1843. Printing and Paper Making.
Though an angel should write, still ’tis devils must print.
Moore—The Fudge Family in England. Letter III.
I’ll print it,
And shame the fools.
Pope—Prologue to Satires. L. 61.
Thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm in erecting a grammar school: and whereas, before, our forefathers had no other books but the score and the tally, thou hast caused printing to be used, and, contrary to the king, his crown and dignity, thou hast built a paper-mill.
Henry VI. Pt. II. Act IV. Sc. 7. L. 35.
The jour printer with gray head and gaunt jaws works at his case,
He turns his quid of tobacco, while his eyes blur with the manuscript.
Walt Whitman—Leaves of Grass. Walt Whitman. Pt. XV. St. 77.