Arnold de Bergel, in his _Encomion Chalcographiæ_, previously referred to, describes the first printing of books by John Gutenberg at Mentz in the year 1450. The idea originated, he says, by Gutenberg observing while at Strasburg the impression made by his signet ring in soft wax.[98] Sebastian Munster, in his _Universal Cosmography_, printed in 1571, states that in the years 1440 to 1450 the art of printing was invented and first practised in Mentz by John Gutenberg, afterwards assisted by John Faust and John Medinbach. Peter Van Opmer,[99] a fellow-countryman and contemporary of Junius, and a writer of repute, says with reference to the sudden outburst of learning at the commencement of the fifteenth century:--“This was effected by the assistance of that art, which from metal characters of letters ingeniously cast, disposed in the order in which we write, spread over with a convenient quantity of ink, and put under the press, has ushered into the world books in all languages, and multiplied their copies like a numerous offspring, and has obtained the name of TYPOGRAPHY. This Art of Printing was most certainly invented and brought to light by John Faust in the year 1440. It is amazing that the author of so important a discovery, and so generous a promoter of divine and human learning, should be unworthily forgotten, or only casually remembered as a mere artist. Surely such a person deserves a place amongst the greatest benefactors of mankind.”[100] A goodly number of similar testimonies might easily be collected, in not one of which is any reference made to either Coster or Haarlem. Not a single Dutch or Flemish annalist or chronicler or historian, previous to 1560, ever makes the slightest allusion to the man or the place in connection with the art of printing. Even Jan Gerbrant, Prior of the Carmelite Order at Haarlem, who died there in 1504, knew nothing of the matter. Yet he is the compiler of the Chronicle of the Counts of Holland and Bishops of Utrecht; and if printing had been the invention of his contemporary Coster, and practised in the city of Haarlem, he could not have been ignorant of the facts, nor would he have failed to record them in his Chronicle.