Note 117 — The Cabinet.

"Gabriele Naudæo nemo vixit suo tempore ἐμπειρίας Bibliothecariæ peritior:" Polyhist. Liter., vol. i., 187. "Naudæi scripta omnia et singula præstantissima sunt," Vogt, p. 611. "Les ouvrages de Naudé firent oublier ce qui les avoient précédé." Camus, Mem. de l'Institut., vol. i., 646. After these eulogies, who will refuse this author's "Avis pour dresser une Bibliothéque, Paris, 1627, 1644, 8vo." a place upon his shelf? Unluckily, it rarely comes across the search of the keenest collector. The other, yet scarcer, productions of Naudé will be found well described in Vogt's Catalog. Libror. Rarior., p. 610. The reader of ancient politics may rejoice in the possession of what is called, the "Mascurat"—and "Considerations politiques"—concerning which Vogt is gloriously diffuse; and Peignot (who has copied from him, without acknowledgement—Bibliogr. Curieuse, pp. 49, 50,) may as well be consulted. But the bibliographer will prefer the "Additions à l'Histoire de Louis XI.," 1630, 8vo., and agree with Mailchelius that a work so uncommon and so curious "ought to be reprinted." See the latter's amusing little book "De Præcipuis Bibliothecis Parisiensibus," pp. 66, 67, &c. Naudæus was librarian to the famous Cardinal Mazarin, the great Mæcenas of his day; whose library, consisting of upwards of forty thousand volumes, was the most beautiful and extensive one which France had then ever seen. Its enthusiastic librarian, whom I must be allowed to call a very wonderful bibliomaniac, made constant journeys, and entered into a perpetual correspondence, relating to books and literary curiosities. He died at Abbeville in 1653, in his 53rd year, on returning from Sweden, where the famous Christian had invited him. Naudæus's "Avis, &c.", [ut supr.] was translated by Chaline; but his "Avis à Nosseigneurs du Parlement, &c." 1652, 4to.—upon the sale of the Cardinal's library—and his "Remise de la Bihliothéque [Du Cardinal] entre le mains de M. Tubeuf, 1651," are much scarcer productions. A few of these particulars are gathered from Peignot's Dict. de la Bibliolologie, vol. ii., p. 1—consult also his Dict. Portatif de Bibliographie, p. v. In the former work I expected a copious piece of biography; yet, short as it is, Peignot has subjoined a curious note from Naudé's "Considerations politiques"—in which the author had the hardihood to defend the massacre upon St. Bartholomew's day, by one of the strangest modes of reasoning ever adopted by a rational being.