The friendly intimacy that existed between Aldus Manucius and Grolier, while the latter was treasurer for the Duchy of Milan (about 1510), animated, if it did not originally promote, Grolier’s appreciation of “the art preservative.”
He was a member of the little academy which held its meetings at the learned printer’s house, apparently of a size to contain none but true friends, as a realization of the ideal of Socrates. There he met as colleagues Navagero, Marino Sanudo, the Greek Musurus, Giovanni Gioconde, Erasmus, poets, artists and savants.
In 1518 Grolier was a celebrated collector of books, and Erasmus prophesied that they would make him great. There were, says La Caille, three thousand volumes in his library, which remained intact for one hundred and ten years in the hotel de Vic. They were sold at auction in 1676, after the death of Dominique de Vic. The original buyers are not known, and three hundred and fifty volumes only have been found extant by M. Le Roux de Lincy.
There were many of the finest editions of the Aldine press, many in duplicate and in triplicate copies,