85 introduction to the reliability of their opinions by placing my own signature and the seal of my office. Warsaw, August 30, 1663. James of St. Barbara, acting Provincial Superior” (signed by his own hand). “The Consent (approbatio) granted by the Noble and Reverend Lord Mateusz Jagodowicz I.V.D., apostolic protonotary, Canon of Płock, Warsaw, Pułtusk, vicar for internal affairs, [vicar] general’s office Warsaw and the entire Duchy of Masovia, secretary to the holy majesty of the King and Queen of Poland and Sweden, appointed book censor. I read the book Messenger of the Queen of the Arts, composed by a Religious, Fr. Stanislaus of Jesus andMary, priest [from the congregation] of Our Lady of the Pious Schools, and found it contains nothing contradictory to the rightful faith and good habits; therefore, for the benefit of academic youth, it should be sent to print, to which I give official consent. Matthew Jagodowicz I.V.D., Canon and Official of Warsaw” (signed by his own hand). The first edition was dedicated to “His Excellency Lord Antoine de Lumbres,” French ambassador to Poland7. However, we do not know if the copy of PRA dedicated to the French am7 Fr. Papczyński was aware of the qualities of his book and hoped to arouse interest for it abroad. It was not unusual in the 17th-century for the works of Polish masters of eloquence to have several editions also in the West: e.g., the book Institutionum rhetoricarum, pars I-II, Vilnius 1641–1643, by Casimir Kojałowicz, had several reprints in Antwerp and Cologne; the work of a Jesuit, Michael Radau of Braniewo, Orator extemporaneus, was published under his own name by a Georg Becher from Elbląg in 1650 in Amsterdam; in 1655, Adam Motkowski, a student of Radau, discovered Becher’s plagiarism and brought about many reprints of this book under its author’s real name in Poland, the Netherlands, Germany, Bohemia, Italy, and England. Papczyński must have known about it and was encouraged to seek the ambassador’s support in a possible release of PRA in France. He hoped that de Lumbres would kindly receive his gift, take it back home, and get the cultural elite of France interested in this book. It may be worthwhile to search the French libraries to see if one of them possesses a copy of this book brought over from Poland by ambassador Antoine de Lumbres, who was certainly a native of Lumbres – the main town of the Pas-de-Calais department in the Hauts-deFrance. Or, perhaps, the book was still in the family collection of the heirs of the Master to Herbinghen, Loz, and La Clay (probably the main city of the Seine-etMarne, in the district of Meaux). This copy would most certainly bear a handwritten dedication from the book’s author.
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