Plato was perhaps the first to propose that the reading of immoral and impious books be forbidden, but I am not aware that his suggestion was acted upon either in the states of Greece or in pagan Rome.

Examples of the rejection of certain books by the early church are not wanting.

Paul induced the Ephesian sorcerers to burn their books; certain fathers of the church advised against the reading of heathen authors; [Sidenote: c.

496] Pope Gelasius made a decree on the books received and those not received by the church, and Manichaean books were publicly burnt.
[Sidenote: Fourth century] The invention of printing brought to the attention of the church the danger of allowing her children to choose their own reading matter.
[Sidenote: Printing] The first to animadvert upon it was Berthold, Archbishop of Mayence, the city of Gutenberg.

On the 22d of March, 1485, he promulgated a decree to the effect that, whereas the divine art of printing had been abused for the sake of lucre and whereas by this means even Christ's books, missals and other works on religion, were thumbed by the vulgar, and whereas the German idiom was too poor to express such mysteries, and common persons too ignorant to understand them, therefore every work translated into German must be approved by the doctors of the university of Mayence before being published.
[Sidenote: June 1, 1501] The example of the prelate was soon followed by popes and councils.
Alexander VI forbade as a detestable evil the printing of books injurious to the Catholic faith, and made all archbishops official censors for their dioceses.