Before proceeding to trace the progress of wood engraving in connection with typography, it appears necessary to give some account of the invention of the latter art. In the following brief narrative of Gutemberg's life, I shall adhere to positive facts; and until evidence equally good shall be produced in support of another's claim to the invention, I shall consider him as the father of typography. I shall also give Hadrian Junius's account of the invention of wood-engraving, block-printing, and typography by Lawrence Coster, with a few remarks on its credibility. Some of the conjectures and assertions of Meerman, Koning, and other advocates of Coster, will be briefly noticed, and their inconsistency pointed out. To attempt to refute at length the gratuitous assumptions of Coster's advocates, and to enter into a detail of all their groundless arguments, would be like proving a medal to be a forgery by a long dissertation, when the modern fabricator has plainly put his name in the legend. The best proof of the fallacy of Coster's claims to the honour of having discovered the art of printing with moveable types is to be found in the arguments of those by whom they have been supported.

Meerman, with all his research, has not been able to produce a single fact to prove that Lawrence Coster, or Lawrence Janszoon as he calls him, ever printed a single book; and it is by no means certain that his hero is the identical Lawrence Coster mentioned by Junius.