We have now arrived through him at the reign of Francis I., who was called the father of letters, and who for various reasons favoured the arts. Doubtless grand paintings and the decoration of the royal palaces interested him more than vignettes in books and the efforts of printers; but, at the same time, books occupied him. He studied much, and in his travels accumulated many volumes. An account in the French National Archives shows that Claude Chappuis, his librarian, packed entire cases, which were sent to Dauphiné at the time of the wars of Piedmont, the carriage costing twenty livres tournois. Francis had, moreover, following sudden impulses, curious fits of wantonness and mischief. It was perceived a little later that the doctrines of Luther were propagated by the Book; and the Sorbonne was up in arms, on the pretence of imposing its own expurgated text of the Bible on the publishers and tolerating no other. Theodore Beza, enemy of the Sorbonnists, said with regard to this (we translate the antique French literally), "Our great doctors with cherubic visage have forbidden men to see the Holy Bible in vulgar language, of which every one has knowledge, because, they say, the desire of knowing everything engenders nothing but error, fear, and care. _Arguo sic_, if they so, for its abuse, wish to take away this book, it is clear also that it is their duty to put away the wine with which each of them makes himself drunk." [Illustration: Fig. 53.--Robert Estienne, after the engraving in the _Chronologie Collée_.]