Editio princeps

“ Folio. A fine sound copy, in the original binding.
SILIUS ITALICUS. Printed by Laver. 1471. Folio. A good, sound copy; and among the very rarest books from the press of Laver, in such condition.
CATULLUS, TIBULLUS, ET PROPERTIUS. 1472. Folio. The knowing, in early classical bibliography, are aware that this Editio Princeps is perhaps to be considered as only one degree below the first impressions of Lucretius and Virgil in rarity. The longest life may pass away without an opportunity of becoming the purchaser of such a treasure. The present is a tall, fair copy; quite perfect. ”

“ Never did the bibliomaniac's eye alight upon 'sweeter copies'—as the phrase is; and never did the bibliomaniacal barometer rise higher than at this sale! The most marked phrensy characterized it. A copy of the Editio Princeps of Homer (by no means a first-rate one) brought 92l.: and all the Aldine Classics produced such an electricity of sensation that buyers stuck at nothing to embrace them! Do not let it hence be said that black-letter lore is the only fashionable pursuit of the present age of book-collectors. ”

“ That every well disposed man may thereon look."
As Wynkyn de Worde was for long associated with Caxton in business and became after his death his successor, it seems impossible to put aside his very plain statement as entirely inaccurate. William Blades, in his Life of Caxton, utterly denies the whole story. "Are we to understand," he writes, "that the editio princeps of Bartholomaeus proceeded from Caxton's press, or that he only printed the first Cologne edition? ”

“ The syntax and metre are remarkably correct. It is uncertain whether the author was the famous physician and polymath, who was put to death in A.D. 212 at a banquet to which he had been invited by Caracalla, or his son, the tutor of the younger Gordian. The father, who was one of the most learned men of his age, wrote upon a variety of subjects, and possessed a library of 60,000 volumes, bequeathed to his son and handed on by the latter to Gordian.
The editio princeps (ed. Sulpitius Verulanus, before 1484) is Very rare ”

“ Editio princeps, by H. Stephanus (1559) ; of other editions the best are: P. Wesseling (1746) , not yet superseded; L. Dindorf (1828–1831) ; (text) L. Dindorf (1866–1868, revised by F. Vogel, 1888–1893 and C. T. Fischer, 1905–1906) . ”

“ So young Edith was saved; and, as is usually the case with men of his character, the Red King's humor changed completely. The victorious Godwine received the arms and lands of the dead Ordgar; Edgar the Atheling was raised high in trust and honor; the throne of Scotland, wrested from the Red Donald, was placed once more in the family of King Malcolm, and King William Rufus himself became the guardian and protector of the Princess Edith. ”

“ When Oedipus, king of Thebes, was ware that he had fulfilled the oracle uttered ere he was born, in that he had slain his father, king Laius, and wedded his mother Jocasta, he plucked out his own eyes in his shame and misery. So he ceased to be king; but, inasmuch as his two sons rendered to him neither love nor worship, he cursed them with this curse, "that they should divide their inheritance with the sword." But they essayed to escape this doom by covenanting to rule in turn, year by year. ”

“ Kennedy, so as to harass Phineas and Lady Laura and the Earl, but he was at once aware that it must not be published. An editor is bound to avoid the meshes of the law, which are always infinitely more costly to companies, or things, or institutions, than they are to individuals. ”

“ Scarcely has the king gone out and the count disappeared behind him, than a thick tapestry is raised and Edith enters on the scene. She has seen nothing save that the king is young and beautiful; heard nothing but that he loves her. Ethelwood's devotion, his refusal to marry the king's sister, the danger he is incurring, all glide over her heart like a breath on a mirror. She goes to the window. Ethelwood is on his knees holding the king's stirrup. In the office which, where nobility of spirit is present, is regarded as an honour, Edith sees nothing but shame ”

“ For which reason I would derive the name editor not so much from edo, to publish, as from edo, to eat, that being the peculiar profession to which he esteems himself called. He blows up the flames of political discord for no other occasion than that he may thereby handily boil his own pot. ”

“ Many men had his respect, even his homage, but as an editor—and I never knew him as anything else—he would allow no man to dictate to him; he served only the Public and ‘those few great principles.’ ‘An editor,’ he would say, tapping a sheet of paper with his glasses, ‘is the servant of the Public although his duty is to educate it.’ And his innocent vanity would swell out into such monstrous proportions, would bud and blossom into such foolish phrases, that his hearer would wonder if he had suddenly strayed into the rigid world of the third-rate comic novel. ”

“ Edith grows pale; she begins to understand. The parchment upon which Ethelwood has rapidly traced a [Pg 112] few lines will tell to every one that the count has taken refuge from the king's anger in death. As Edith lay in her grave, Ethelwood will be laid in his; and, as he watched over her, she, in her turn, shall watch by him; as he had the key of death, she shall have the key of life. Edith fights against this idea; she measures her own weakness, urges her ambition, but too late: Ethelwood, when he left the king, had taken the narcotic. ”

“ V. The "Oedipus Tyrannus" opens thus. An awful pestilence devastates Thebes. Oedipus, the king, is introduced to us, powerful and beloved; to him whose wisdom had placed him on the throne, look up the priest and the suppliants for a remedy even amid the terrors of the plague. Oedipus informs them that he has despatched Creon (the brother of his wife Jocasta) to the Pythian god to know by what expiatory deed the city might be delivered from its curse. Scarce has he concluded, when Creon himself enters, and announces "glad tidings" in the explicit answer of the oracle. ”

“ OEdipus replied, "Man, who in childhood creeps on hands and knees, in manhood walks erect, and in old age with the aid of a staff." The Sphinx was so mortified at the solving of her riddle that she cast herself down from the rock and perished.
The gratitude of the people for their deliverance was so great that they made OEdipus their king, giving him in marriage their queen Jocasta. OEdipus, ignorant of his parentage, had already become the slayer of his father; in marrying the queen he became the husband of his mother. ”

“ No editor can afford to nod for so long a period.
But then this tale, this novel of “Not so Black as he’s Painted,” this story of a human devil, for whose crimes no doubt some Byronic apology was made with great elaboration by the sensational Josephine, was not exactly bad. Our editor had wept over it. Some tender-hearted Medora, who on behalf of her hyena-in-love had gone through miseries enough to kill half a regiment of heroines, had dimmed the judge’s eyes with tears. What stronger proof of excellence can an editor have? ”

“ But in the moral, Oedipus is all the majesty of a power still royal. The oracle has invested one, so fallen and so wretched in himself, with the power of a god—the power to confer victory on the cause he adopts, prosperity on the land that becomes his tomb. With all the revenge of age, all the grand malignity of hatred, he clings to this shadow and relic of a sceptre. Creon, aware of the oracle, comes to recall him to Thebes. The treacherous kinsman humbles himself before his victim—he is the suppliant of the beggar, who defies and spurns him. ”

“ Edith, in spite of what is called her impenetrable mask, presents herself too well. I cannot use her; she uses herself too fully. Partly for the same reason I think, she fails to be an artist: she does not live at all upon instinct. The artist is part of him a drifter, at the mercy of impressions, and another part of him allows this to happen for the sake of making use of the unhappy creature. But in Edith the division is merely the rational, the cold and detached part of the artist, itself divided. ”

“ Her expression is so open and true and spontaneous that she deceives the poor lover. He thinks he is beloved and tells her everything. The king has seen her and is in love with her. Then, for the benefit of the audience only, under the guise of the loving girl, one of the characteristics of the ambitious woman begins to reveal itself. Ethelwood confesses his ruse to Edith: he tells her how he made her take a drug to put her to sleep; he discloses to her what he had hidden from her until now, that he is one of the highest nobles in the State; but this no longer satisfies Edith! ”

“ Said Odysseus, 'Ask me all thou wilt, lady, but inquire not concerning my name, or race, or country, lest thou shouldst fill my heart with more pains than I am able to endure. Verily I am a man of grief. But hast thou no tale to tell me? We know of thee, Penelope, for thy fame goes up to heaven, and no one of mortal men can find fault with thee.'
Then said Penelope, 'What excellence I had of face or form departed from me when my lord Odysseus went from this hall to the wars of Troy. ”

“ Come, Edith!"
As the ruin of Cleopatra tottered off whimpering, and wiping its eyes with a gingerly remembrance of rouge in their neighbourhood, the old woman hobbled another way, mumbling and counting her money. Not one word more, nor one other gesture, had been exchanged between Edith and the younger woman, but neither had removed her eyes from the other for a moment. They had remained confronted until now, when Edith, as awakening from a dream, passed slowly on.
"You ’re a handsome woman," muttered her shadow, looking after her; "but good looks won’t save us. And you ’re a proud woman ”

“ Eteocles, here represented as the younger, drove out Polynices, and seized the throne; Polynices takes refuge at Argos, where he prepares war against the usurper: an oracle declares that success shall be with that party which Oedipus joins, and a mysterious blessing is pronounced on the land which contains his bones. Thus, the possession of this wild tool of fate—raised up in age to a dread and ghastly consequence—becomes the argument of the play, as his death must become the catastrophe. It is the deep and fierce revenge of Oedipus that makes the passion of the whole. ”

“ Once Alec was married and I had made up my mind that I couldn't run away to New York and earn my way, or hire a house of my own and live by myself, I buckled down and did my level best to adjust my likes and habits to the conditions of Edith's reign. One can get used to anything, I believe. I accepted Edith as a person ought to accept any circumstance that can't be avoided. ”

“ He would have opened his eyes if I had told him that a young music-teacher in Columbus, Ohio, had a large share in conducting the journal. Over my desk in my rooms I had had framed, in illuminated text, the words she had spoken to me on the most memorable day of my life:
"The editor has exceptional opportunities, and might be the knight-errant of our age. If in earnest, and on the right side, he can forge a weapon out of public opinion that few evils could resist. He is in just the position to discover these dragons and drive them from their hiding-places." ”

“ The color deepens on Edith's dark cheek; she arises and takes his proffered arm. How gracefully deferential and courteous he is. It is all custom, no doubt, and means nothing, but it is wonderfully pleasant and flattering. For the moment it seems as though he were conscious of no other young lady in the scheme of creation than Miss Darrell—a flirting way a few young men cultivate.
They walk slowly down the long brilliant rooms, and many eyes turn and look after them. Every one knows the extremely blonde young baronet—the dark damsel on his arm is as yet a stranger to most of them. ”

“ She will not wed Haemon nor any of Creon's kin: her father shall not be cast out to die, for she will go with him and protect him. Polyneices shall not lie unburied, for she herself will return by stealth and bury him. There is still one human love that Oedipus yearns for most ”

“ The tragic poet needs only to awaken their memories. If I barely mention Oedipus, they know all the rest: that his father is Laius, his mother Jocaste, who are his sons and daughters, what he has done, and what will befall him.... This is not possible for us, but we must invent everything: new names, preceding events, the present circumstances, the catastrophe, and the exposition.
Furthermore, the Sicilian mime seems to have been unassociated with religious worship, and perhaps this fact has a share in explaining the irreverent, almost atheistic, tendency which Attic comedy manifested. ”

“ He breaks it open where he stands, and read this:
"NEW YORK, Oct. 28, '70. "Charley: Edith is lying dangerously ill—dying. Come back at once. BEATRIX."
He reads, and the truth does not come to him—he reads it again. Edith is dying. And then a grayish pallor comes over his face, from brow to chin, and he stands for a moment, staring vacantly at the paper he holds, seeing nothing—hearing nothing but these words: "Edith is dying." ”

“ And Editha, the handmaiden, too, made her find presently, for there, over the dead Prince’s feet, their left hands still clasping each as when they had died, were her father and her two stalwart brothers.
Never did silenter courtiers than we six sit at a monarch’s feet until the day should break; and then we who lived covered the comely faces with the hems of their Saxon tunics, and were away as fast as we could go to the Norman camp, that the poor Princess-girl might beg a trophy of her victorious father. ”