Accordingly, shortly after, Gutenberg made another visit to the Cathedral to confer with the Superior. He met with a cordial greeting, and almost abruptly the Father began:--
“And what is thy decision, son Gutenberg; wilt thou prepare for us new copies of the ‘Biblia Pauperum?’”
“I shall rejoice to engage in the enterprise,” was the reply, “if I can do so without too much risk, but it will be a slow and toilsome undertaking, involving much expense”--
“Which you will be paid for when it is finished.”
“A goodly number of priests will need copies,” replied the Father. “The forty curious pictures of which the book is composed, were designed to illustrate a series of skeleton sermons. They are of great use in stirring the preacher’s imagination, and storing his memory with excellent texts. The book, therefore, is mainly suited to the different religious orders, and will have sale chiefly among them. Still, as it is taken from the Bible, and called the ‘Bible for the Poor,’ others will buy it besides the priests, and it may have a wide circulation. Numbers will be needed to give the monks each a chance to examine it as often as is desirable, although the different copies will be chained in cages, or on tablets, that no person may appropriate one solely to his own use.”
This was an era in the affairs of Gutenberg. His art was acknowledged and patronized by the Superior, and he himself really promoted above the monks, who were prominent not only among the book-makers or book-sellers, but the literati of their day. Still Gutenberg, as he called to mind the jealousy of Father Melchoir, feared fully to rely on patronage from the friars; and it was only the assurance of the worthy Superior that induced him to engage in the expensive enterprise of bringing out a new “Biblia Pauperum.”
“Tarry a little,” said the Abbot, as the lapidary was leaving; “I will lend thee our ‘Biblia,’ for a copy.” Then going to the side of the room where the light streamed in from a lofty painted window, he unlocked a cage, and taking the valued book from a gilded bracket, unfastened the chain which confined it to the wall, and, carefully wrapping it in paper, gave it to Gutenberg, who hastened away, intent on the new project before him.