Desalting Bibliographic Borrow Pits

WHATEVER MAN PERPETRATES, the printing press indelibly perpetuates. The salting of bibliographic borrow pits with glittery falsehoods is therefore a reprehensible imposition on posterity. When hoax, forgery, mischief, and fraud are buried in tomes, they enjoy an immortality seldom accorded truth. Tricks may, perhaps, be more illustrious and diverting than truth; they certainly are more difficult to crush to earth. They have one salutary utility, however. They can be used to test the credibility of books and reference sets.