SCHEMES OF RHODIUS AND CLEMENT. 769 BOOK III. Chapter II. Systems. predecessor, and reverts, more or less exactly, to the former arrangement. Thus, for instance, Laire added to Classificatory the three main classes of Bacon, of D'Alembert and of Regnault, these two:-(4) PHYSICAL WANTS, (5) MORAL WANTS. Peignot omits these; adheres to most of the modifications introduced by D'Alembert; suppresses from the section "Physics," all that bears on Natural History, other than that of the human frame, (veterinary medicine excepted); and prefixes an introductory section "Bibliography," by way of preface to the three grand divisions of human knowledge, the third of which he designates "IMAGINATION" instead of "POETRY," and in this third class includes not only "FINE ARTS," but "MECHANICAL ARTS"; so that a treatise on the art of Cotton Spinning finds itself to be allied with Hamlet and with the Iliad. Himself a Librarian and a bibliographer, it need scarcely be added that, in the arrangement of most of his details, he has far more regard than D'Alembert had to the requirements of a Library; but the system fails, and must fail, to adapt itself to the classification of books, be the amount of ingenuity expended upon the effort what it may. Rhodius, and of In 1631, John Rhodius proposed a scheme for the Schemes of John arrangement of the University Library at Padua, the Claud. Clement. original manuscript of which has found its way to the Town Library of Hamburgh, and has been recently communicated to the Leipsic Journal Serapeum, by Dr. F. L. Hoffmann, under the title of Ein bibliothekarisches Gutachten abgegeben im Jahre 1631. Rhodius was a Dane; had studied at Wittemberg, and in other German Vol. II. 49 BOOK III. Chapter II. Classificatory Systems. Universities; and finally established himself at Padua, where he died in 1659. His system comprises twelve principal classes, thus arranged: I. Theology. II. Jurisprudence. III. Medicine. IV. Philosophy. V. History. VI. Poetry. VII. Oratory. VIII. Rhetoric. IX. Logic. X. Philology. XI. Criticism. XII. Grammar.' In 1635, Claudius Clement published his work entitled, Musei, sive Bibliothecæ tam privatæ quam publica extructio, instructio, cura, usus, libri ir, in which he proposes to class books in a method very similar to that so shortly before suggested at Padua. His arrangement stands thus: I. Theology. II. Law. III. Philosophy. V. Physiology. VII. Sacred History. X. Oratory and Rhetoric. XII. Grammar, etc. But although the author could boast the dignified appellation Regius Professor Eruditionis in Collegio Imperiali Madritensi,' his work does little honour either to his learning or his power of exposition, and goes far to justify the criticism of his namesake, David Clement, of Göttingen, who says of him that he had "acquired at Madrid the habit of making diffuse orations on subjects which he did not understand." It is with small 1 Serapeum, 1856, (Intelligenz-Blatt), 17-21. BOOK 111. Chapter II. Systems. warrant, indeed, that some writers have spoken of this scheme as the model, to some extent, of that adopted Classificatory by Gabriel Naudé in his 'Bibliotheca Joannis Cordesi Catalogus' published in 1643. 1 Several years earlier, Naudé had published his Avis Naudé's Scheme. pour dresser une bibliothèque, which has a special interest for Englishmen, inasmuch as it received the honour of translation at the hand of John Evelyn. The author unfortunately is best known by that which is least honourable to his memory. He had the temerity to attempt a justification of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, on the miserable plea that it was like the act of the skilful surgeon who, having opened a vein, bleeds his patient even to fainting, in order to cleanse the system of its peccant humours. But his merits as a truly liberal promoter of learning, and as one who in that capacity was greatly in advance of his generation, are so considerable, that even a frenzy of partizanship carried to so sad a pitch may now, perhaps, claim to be pardoned, as the error of a man who, having travelled almost over the length and the breadth of Europe, in search of valuable and splendid books, until he had gathered together not alone the largest, but the most superb Library of that age, chiefly plumed himself, not upon the beauty, or the rarity, or the costliness of the collection, but on its free accessibility to all men. In his own vigorous words:-"It shall be open to all the world, without excluding a living soul," (not even the poor Huguenot,) "from eight o'clock in the morning 1 Considérations politiques sur les Coups d'Etats, 4to, (published in the same year as the Bibliotheca Cordesiana, 1643). BOOK III. Chapter II. until five in the evening: Classificatory resound that Systems. ... From its door shall resound that cry which has never yet been heard in the Republic of Letters: 'Come in, all you who desire to read, come in freely.'" 2 The principal classes proposed by Naudé are as follows: After mentioning some of the far-fetched schemes which super-subtle writers on this subject had pre'viously proposed, he observes that he would hold such complicated and labyrinthine methods in as little esteem as an unintelligible author, and adds, "I think that system best which is easiest, least complex, and most accordant with established usage." It is obvious, therefore, that whilst Naudé did, to some noticeable extent, improve on preceding systems, both as to the precision of his classes, and as to the order of their sequencean improvement which will be very manifest if, for instance, we compare his arrangement with Clement'she expressly disclaimed all desire to achieve reputation as a daring innovator. And in this respect, as we shall see in the sequel, his example has been followed by those of his countrymen who have rendered the most 1 Dialogue entre Mascarat et Saintange, as quoted by M. le Comte de Laborde in the fourth of his letters De l'Organisation des bibliothèques dans Paris, 20. truly efficient services to literature in this not very attractive field of labour. I come now to what is substantially the ordinary system of modern French bibliographers. The honour of originating it has been claimed, sometimes for the learned Jesuit Jean Garnier, and sometimes for Gabriel Martin, for so long a period the most eminent of the Paris booksellers; but the claim which is best authenticated seems to be that of Ismael Bouillaud, the compiler of the sale-catalogue of the famous Library of De Thou. Owing to the singular circumstance which retarded, without preventing, the dispersion of that noble collection, Bouillaud's catalogue had lain long in MS. before it was sent to press. It was not published until 1679, and then appeared under the editorship of Joseph Quesnel. The learned author makes no display of his erudition or of his ingenuity, by adding new classes, or by coining new and sonorous names for the old ones; but he lays hold of five classes, some of which will be found in all the preceding schemes, and all of them, with others, in that of Naudé, namely: I.-Theology; V.-Literature; and brings all the books with which he had to deal under one or other of these grand divisions. The more important of the details of this classification will be shewn most advantageously, and with most economy of BOOK III. Chapter II. Classificatory Systems. Bouillaud's |