Liber cure pastoralis [Cura pastoralis; Regula pastoralis; Pastoral care]

by Pope Gregory I

Paris: Ulrich Gering and Berthold Rembolt, 18 July 1498

[63] of [64] leaves (without final blank) | 8vo | a-g^8 h^8(-h8) | 196 x 136 mm

An early edition of the sixth-century pope’s tremendously influential guide to priestly conduct, “a work which in its practical theology remained almost unique in the history of Christian literature until the modern period. While it may seem natural today to consider such pastoral care a normal part of the role of the Christian priesthood, Gregory was among the first to insist on its centrality and theorize about its practice. With its gentleness and psychological sensitivity, Gregory’s Rule of Pastoral Care rightly deserves its place among the Christian classics” (Neil and Dal Santo). ¶ The author broadly covers the cleric’s responsibilities and frequently grounds his guidance in scripture (our edition includes biblical citations in the margin). There’s little earth-shattering in his advice: demonstrate virtue, be humble and genuine, don’t obsess over status and power, don’t focus too much on pleasing others, balance the application of discipline and leniency, spurn vice, lead by example. In many ways, Gregory’s manual serves as a kind of medieval guide to leadership writ large. “The active life of the leader ought to transcend that of the people in proportion to how the life of a shepherd outshines that of his flock” (a8v; all translations from Demacopoulos). He even seems to anticipate the challenges of work-life balance facing leaders today: “He must not relax his care for the internal life while he is occupied by external concerns, nor should he relinquish what is prudent of external matters so as to focus on things internal” (b1r). Balancing “internal life” and “external occupation” is a recurring theme, and his assessment of the problem is at once disheartening and timeless: “When they are fortunate enough to have a moment of quiet, they become all the more wearied by the quiet itself. For they reckon it a pleasure to be exhausted by activity; they consider it laborious if they are unable to toil in earthly business. And so it happens that while they rejoice in being busied by worldly happenings, they remain ignorant of the internal life that they should have been teaching others” (b7v). And for leaders tasked with communication responsibilities, there’s this perennial gem: “Spiritual directors must be careful not only to guard against saying something wrong, but also to avoid offering the right words too frequently or unprofessionally, because often the virtue of what is said is lost when it is enfeebled in the hearts of the audience since the speech was offered hastily or carelessly. This type of speech defiles the speaker because it shows that he does not know how to serve the advanced needs of his audience” (b3v). While the product of a culture thoroughly suffused with Christian faith, Gregory’s work offers an abundance of advice that remains relevant to leaders both spiritual and secular today. ¶ This is among the last imprints bearing the name of Ulrich Gering, the most active partner in France’s first press (excluding the Strasbourg presses, then not part of France). With the support of two university humanists, Gering, Michael Friburger, and Martin Crantz issued France’s first printed book in 1470. Friburger and Crantz left the business in 1478, after which Gering worked under his own name, briefly partnered with Guillaume Maynial, and later with Bertold Rembolt. Gering and Rembolt themselves both studied at the Sorbonne, where the press itself was located. And in modern French fashion, our title includes their address: “Kept for sale at the Golden Sun of the Sorbonne quarter of Paris” (In sole aureo vici Sorbonici Parrhisiis venalis habetur). The device on our title, which may represent the first combination of the orb and cross with the traditional “Sign of Four” merchant’s mark, incorporates Rembolt’s initials. He was likely the primary agent of the partnership.

PROVENANCE: This copy probably found its way into Protestant hands at some point, as pape has been obliterated from the title, and rather weakly from the incipit. The same word has been struck through in the closing title (h6v) and head of the table of contents (h7r), though this was done with a different (and possibly modern) ink. ¶ A couple marginalia on b3r, in which a contemporary reader noted a passage on the importance of priests attaching bells to their vestments.

CONDITION: Recent quarter red leather and marbled boards. ¶ Title soiled and its upper third dampstained; upper margin dampstained throughout, faint to moderate, barely touching the text; title torn and repaired across the device; first eight leaves repaired at the inner margin, these probably once detached.

REFERENCES: ISTC ig00443000; Catalogue of Books Printed in the XVth Century Now in the British Museum (1949), v. 8, p. 30 (IA. 40688); Ludwig Hain, Repoertorium Bibliographicum (1827), v. 2, p. 513, #7989 ¶ Saint Gregory the Great (George E. Demacopoulos, trans.), The Book of Pastoral Rule (St. Vladimir’s Seminary, 2007); Bronwen Neil and Matthew J. Dal Santo, Preface to A Companion to Gregory the Great (Brill, 2013), p. xx; Hugh William Davies, Devices of the Early Printers (London, 1935), p. 558 (on the device, which had appeared by 1495: “This block is attractive in its very simplicity of shape, and it is the earliest device anywhere in complete and original form showing the orb and the cross now joined by a diagonal thus forming the ‘four’ or merchant’s mark”); Margaret M. Smith, The Title-Page: Its Early Development 1460-1510 (British Library, 2000), p. 95-96 (on addresses in titles: “Designation of the place of purchase could only have had an overtly commercial purpose. Hirsch quite rightly focuses above all on France in this matter, mentioning on the basis of his research no other geographical concentration of this kind of information. Printer’s and publisher’s marks are sometimes found on title-pages in other countries, although seldom the address of the bookseller.”); Konrad Haebler, The Study of Incunabula (Grolier Club, 1933), p. 126 (Haebler considered the address on the title another symptom of “the disappearance of typographical individuality in the productions of French printers at the turn of the century,” as they worked to the demands of increasingly influential publishers seeking stylistic consistency across the multiple printers they used. “Their [publishers] influence is further responsible for the fact that information as to the printing of the book became more and more inadequate, and was gradually suppressed entirely or supplanted by information as to the place where it was to be sold.”)

Item #387