But this, after all, was a very small result. When books could
be produced so slowly, there could be no popular literature.
Books were still articles for the few, instead of for the many.
Steam power, however, completely altered the state of affairs.
When Koenig invented his steam press, he showed by the printing
of Clarkson's 'Life of Penn' --the first sheets ever printed with
a cylindrical press--that books might be printed neatly, as well
as cheaply, by the new machine. Mr. Bensley continued the
process, after Koenig left England; and in 1824, according to
Johnson in his 'Typographia,' his son was "driving an extensive
business."
In the following year, 1825, Archibald Constable, of Edinburgh,
propounded his plan for revolutionising the art of bookselling.
Instead of books being articles of luxury, he proposed to bring
them into general consumption. He would sell them, not by
thousands, but by hundreds of thousands, "ay, by millions;" and
he would accomplish this by the new methods of multiplication--by
machine printing and by steam power. Mr. Constable accordingly
issued a library of excellent books; and, although he was
ruined--not by this enterprise, but the other speculations into
which he entered--he set the example which other enterprising
minds were ready to follow. Amongst these was Charles Knight,
who set the steam presses of William Clowes to work, for the
purposes of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge.
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