The dignified and reverential language of this colophon, so unlike the vainglorious imprints of Fust and Schœffer and the commonplace subscriptions of Pfister, is almost enough of itself to show that the printer of the Catholicon was John Gutenberg. That he should attribute the invention to the assistance and favor of the Almighty, might be expected from a man thoroughly imbued with religious sentiment, but why Gutenberg should, in this and in all other books, neglect to mention himself as the man through whom the invention was accomplished is an irregularity which cannot be explained. This neglect is strange, for Fust and Schœffer had boasted, in an imprint to the Psalter of 1457, of their skill as printers.
Five little pamphlets with texts in a new face of Round Gothic on English body, and with chapter headings in types resembling the text types of the Bible of 42 lines, have been attributed to Gutenberg. They are: A Treatise on the Celebration of the Mass,[1] a book of 30 leaves; A Calendar, or An Almanac for 1460, in Latin, a quarto of 6 leaves; The Mirror of the Clergy, by Hermann of Saldis, "happily perfected and printed at Mentz," a quarto of 16 leaves; A Treatise on the Necessity of Councils, etc., a quarto of 24 leaves; A Dialogue between Cato, Hugo and Oliver about Ecclesiastical Liberty,
- ↑ This work is attributed to Gutenberg, chiefly on the authority of this inscription, which was found in a copy in the possession of the Carthusian Friars at Mentz:
The Carthusian Friars near Mentz, through the liberality of John Gutenberg, own this book, which was made by his wonderful art, and by the skill of John Nummeister, clerk. In the year of our Lord 1463, on the 13th calend of July [June 19].
Helbig doubts the genuineness of this annotation, and intimates that it may be the work of Bodmann, a librarian at Mentz, who has been suspected of attempts to foist spurious documents on those who were eager to know more of the life and labors of Gutenberg. In his treatise on the Typographic Monuments of Gutenberg, Fischer, on the authority of Bodmann, printed the copy of a verbose document which set forth that John Gutenberg and Frielo Gensfleisch assented to the action of their sister Hebele in conveying to the Convent of Saint Clare, of which she was then a nun, her share in the paternal inheritance. It also recites that John Gutenberg will give to the convent a copy of every book to be printed by him. This document, which is dated 1459, is not accepted as genuine by discreet bibliographers.
