Andrew Maunsell, a bookseller living in Lothbury, was the first to publish (1595) a catalogue of English books, and this book is a very satisfactory bit of bibliographical work. The compiler only published two parts, the first on theological books, and the second on scientific books. Maunsell proposed the publication of others on more popular branches of literature, but unfortunately he left his work incomplete. In his dedication to Queen Elizabeth he says-- “What great account (most gracious Soueraigne) hath beene made of godly bookes, may euidently appeare by the value set uppon the bookes of curious actes brought to the Apostles feete to be burnt. For if those bookes were valued to two thousand markes, of what estimation shall wee account the bookes whose author is God himselfe ... all the goods upon the earth cannot value them.” It is remarkable how difficult it must have been in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries to obtain information respecting new books. There were no public libraries, and the booksellers, according to Maunsell, were not well acquainted with the titles of the books published, and he constantly refers to the scarceness of books issued only a few years before. He writes-- “And seeing also many singular Bookes, not only of Diuinitie, but of other excellent Arts, after the first impression, so spent and gone, that they lie euen as it were buried in some few Studies. That men desirous of such kind of Bookes, cannot aske for that they neuer heard of, and the Bookeseller cannot shew that he hath not: I have thought good in my poor estate to undertake this most tiresome business, hoping the Lord will send a blessing on my labours taken in my vocation. Thinking it as necessarie for the Bookeseller (considering the number and nature of them) to haue a Catalogue of our English Bookes as the Apothecaire his Dispensatorium or the Schoolmaster his Dictionarie. By means of which my poore trauailes I will draw to your memories Bookes that you could not remember and shew to the learind such Bookes as they would not thinke were in our owne tongues....” Besides dedicating his book to Queen Elizabeth, he addresses “the Companie of Stationers, and all other printers and booksellers,” to whom he says-- “I have in my vocation laboured to do somwhat: my purpose is to shew (in such sort as I can) what we have in print, in our own tongue, a thinge not regarded but of a few. For some soare so hie that they looke not so low, as on their owne countrie writers, and some regard not old Bookes, but aske what newes? or new writers?” To the reverend divines he says--