Had the discovery of printing occurred two or three centuries earlier, it would have been curious to see the results. But after all, an invention never lives until the world is ready to adopt it. It is impossible to say how many inventions are new inventions. "Ask and ye shall have," or the practical application of it, is the history of civilization. Necessity, the stern mother, compels her children to provide for their own physical and intellectual necessities, and in due time the hour and the man (with his invention) arrives. [Illustration: ITALIAN SCHOOL. XVTH CENTURY. STEPHANO CAESENATE PEREGRINI INVENTORE (S.C. P.I.). (VENICE, DE GREGORIIS, 1498.)] Classical mythology and Gothic mysticism and romance met together in the art and books of the early Renaissance. Ascetic aspiration strives with frank paganism and nature worship. The gods of ancient Greece and Rome seemed to awake after an enchanted sleep of ages, and reappear again unto men. Italy, having hardly herself ever broken with the ancient traditions of Classical art and religion, became the focus of the new light, and her independent republics, such as Florence and Venice, the centres of wealth, culture, refinement, and artistic invention. Turkish conquest, too, had its effect on the development of the new movement by driving Greek scholars and the knowledge of the classical writers of antiquity Westward. These were all materials for an exceptional development of art, and, above all, of the art of the printer, and the decoration and illustration of books. The name of Aldus, of Venice, is famous among those of the early Renaissance printers. Perhaps the most remarkable book, from this or any press, for the beauty of its decorative illustration, is the _Poliphili Hypnerotomachia_--"The Dream of Poliphilus"--printed in 1499, an allegorical romance of love in the manner of those days. The authorship of the design has been the subject of much speculation. I believe they were attributed at one time to Mantegna, and they have also been ascribed to one of the Bellini. The style of the designer, the quality of the outline, the simplicity yet richness of the designs, their poetic feeling, the mysticism of some, and frank paganism of others, places the series quite by themselves. The first edition is now very difficult to obtain, and might cost something like 100 guineas.