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Zürich & Winterthur, Literarischen Comptoirs, 1843. 8vo. Bound in one nice later half calf binding in contemporary style with gilt title and blindstamped ornamentation to spine. Faded inscription of "Eigenthus des Literar. Museum" to both title-pages and last leaf of bot volumes. Stamps of the same Litarary Museum to volume 1, at both title-page, last leaf and a few leaves inbetween. Neat pencil annotations to a few leaves of volume 1. Neatly washed and with a few tiny closed tears to second gathering. A small spot to lower blank margin of pp. 195-8 of vol. 1. Contents generally clean and crisp. All in all a evry nice copy. IV, 320 + IV, 288 pp. [Marx' paper: Vol. I, pp. 56-88]. Extremely scarce first edition of this two-volume periodical, which contains the first printing of Marx' first newspaper article, being the first political article written by Marx for publication, namely his "Comments on the Latest Prussian Censorship Instruction". This important debut work, which constitutes the foundation of Marxian dialectic and his formulation of Critical Hegelianism, was written between January 15 and February 10, 1842, but due to censorship restrictions, it first appeared here, in Ruge's "Anekdota", in Switzerland in 1843, to avoid German censorship. "The young Marx and the young Engels ridiculed the Prussian Censorship Law of 1841. The attack of the young Mark, "Comments on the Latest Prussian Censorship Instruction," was written in 1842 but published a year later in Ruge's "Anekdota"."Comments on the Latest Prussian Censorship Instruction" is an early exercise by the young Marx in the application of the categories of Hegelian critique. In this essay, the young Marx employed the Hegelian modalities of substance and essence to demonstrate the authoritarian nature of the Prussian Censorship Instruction. The young Marx utilized the concepts of substance and essence in the defence of free press. "Comments on the Latest Prussian Censorship Instruction" defines the essence of a free press as free mind, or the essence of reason as freedom. The young Marx argues that it was impossible for reason to act in accordance with its essence unless it was totally free, because without absolute freedom, reason cannot follow its own insights to their logical conclusion. Consequently, when the Prussian Censorship Instruction limits the freedom of reason, when it sets boundaries beyond which reason cannot go, the Prussian Government annihilates the essence of reason. The strategy of the young Marx is his essay is to adopt Hegelian logic in the cause of liberalism. He wished to show how Hegelian categories could be adjusted, could be transformed into weapons in the cause of political reform. In this essay, the young Marx proved two things, that he interpreted Hegel as a critical Hegelian and that he himself continued this Critical Hegelian tradition. In 1842, the young Marx explored, experimented with the use of Hegelian categories, essence, and appearance as devices by which to advance the cause of political progressivism, and this was the meaning of Critical Hegelianism in the generation of Gans." (Norman Levine: Divergent Paths: Hegel in Marxism and Engelsism, pp. 142-43)."Karl's [i.e. Marx] politics had closely followed those of Ruge ever since the end of the 1830s. In 1842 and 1843, their responses to immediate events, not least the "frivolous diatribes of the "Free", had remained very close. An established author, and in the possession of independent means, "Papa Ruge" - as Jenny called him - was clearly the senior partner in this collaboration. The banning of the "Deutsche Jahrbücher" in January 1843 as the result of Prussian pressure, together with the suppression of the "Rheinische Zeitung", meant the effective silencing of Young Hegelianism within Germany. The aim of the criticism, as it was applied among Young Hegelians, was to highlight the gap between the demands of reason and the behavior of the government, but its failure to make any significant headway against the Prussia of Friedrich Wilhelm IV had also pushed them both towards an open criticism of Hegel's political philosophy. (Gareth Steadman Jones: Karl Marx, Greatness and Illusion, p. 142).Although another anonymous essay "Luther als Schiedsrichter zwischen Strauß und Feuerbach" (Vol. II, pp. 206-208) has long been attributed to Marx, the preface to MECW I now states that "recent research has proved that it was not written by Marx (Draper, register, p. 58). The piece might be by Feuerbach himself.

Geneve, Barrillot (sic!) & Fils, [1748]. 4to. Two lovely contemporary uniform full calf bindings with richly gilt spines, gilt title- and tome-labels and single gilt line-borders to boards. Edges of boards blindtooled. Very neatly restored at hinges and corners, barely noticeable. 19th century book-plate ("FAMA") to inside if front boards. Old handwritten notes in ink to front free end-papers. Some leaves evenly browned, as usual. Vol. I with contemporary owner's inscription "B. Heiman/ 1756/ S. st." to verso of title-page. Light inkspotting to half-title and occasional light brownspotting. Vol. II with very small owner's name to verso of front free end-paper: "Mr. Gustavo Horta" and with a worm tract. The worm tract is mostly very small and only in the very top corner of the upper blank margin or as a tiny hole in the inner blank margin towards the hinge. From pp. 493 to 544, the worm tract is larger, but still situated in the blank margin (outer) and far from affecting text at any point. With both half-titles, preface (vol. 1), and tables of contents. No errata at the end of volume one, and no folded map. Woodcut printer's devices to title-pages. (8), XXIV, 522; (4), XVI, 564 pp. The very rare first edition, first issue of Montesquieu's seminal main work, "[i]n many ways one of the most remarkable works of the eighteenth century" (PMM 197), in which the author presents his theory of constitutional monarchy, advocating constitutionalism and the separation of powers, and explains human laws and social institutions. The very first printing, i.e. the first edition, first issue, of the present work is of the utmost scarcity. Numerous editions and issues of the work were printed in the months following the first appearance. The present copy has the first issue pointers (the two "r"s in "Barrillot" on the title-page, no errata). It does not have a folding map, as mentioned by Brunet, but whether this is actually supposed to be present or not in the first printing, has not been established - some bibliographers say that it should not be there.Montesquieu began writing this his magnum opus in 1743, by the end of which year he had almost finished the first draft of it. The same year he began the first of two great revisions of it, which he finished in 1746. In 1747 he finished his second revision, adding several new chapters, and chose J. Barrillot from Geneva to publish the work, which finally appeared for the first time in November 1748, in two quarto volumes, with no mention of author or year. Numerous editions and issues appeared the following months and years, and by 1751 22 editions of the work had appeared. Already in 1750 the work was published in English, the English editions amounting to 10 by 1773, and by 1801 the work had appeared in both German (1789), Dutch, Danish, Polish, Italian, and Russian (1801). The work exercised the greatest of influence, both negative and positive, and numerous anti-Montesquieu-pamphlets and articles appeared during the last half of the 18th century. Because of the work, Montesquieu was also attacked by the Sorbonne, as well as in the general assembly of the French clergy, and in Rome. In 1751 the work was placed on the Index.As the number of editions, translations etc. bears witness to, the work provided the greatest of impact on 18th century political thought as well as actual politics and law. In fact, few other works can be claimed to possess the same power of influence as this one, directly affecting the likes of Tocqueville and Catherine the Great. Although Montesquieu had to defend himself against great thinkers like Voltaire, "his theories underlay the thinking which led up to the American and French revolutions, and the United States Constitution in particular is a lasting tribute to the principles he advocated." (PMM 197). "Montesquieu was one of the great political philosophers of the Enlightenment. Insatiably curious and mordantly funny, he constructed a naturalistic account of the various forms of government, and of the causes that made them what they were and that advanced or constrained their development. He used this account to explain how governments might be preserved from corruption. He saw despotism, in particular, as a standing danger for any government not already despotic, and argued that it could best be prevented by a system in which different bodies exercised legislative, executive, and judicial power, and in which all those bodies were bound by the rule of law. This theory of the separation of powers had an enormous impact on liberal political theory, and on the framers of the constitution of the United States of America." (SEP).Kress: 4920; Tchemerzine: VIII, 459; PMM 197.

Königsberg, Martin Eberhard Dorn, 1746. 8vo. Nice newer full vellum with gilt spine. Title-page a bit soiled and with neat reapair to blank margins, far from affecting text. A bit of occasional browning and soiling. one plate repared from verso, no loss. Title-page + 16 pp. + pp. (3) - 240 + 2 folded engraved plates. Fully complete. The exceedingly scarce first edition of Kant's debut, the first work that he ever published, at the mere age of 22. The work constitutes a milestone in the modern discussion of dimensionality.Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) - now considered, along with Plato and Aristotle, the most important philosopher of all time -, entered the university of Königsberg at the age of 16, in 1740. Here he studied mainly mathematics and physics under Martin Knutzen and Johann Teske, until his father's death in 1746. These years proved formative for the young philosophical genious, and his profound interest in the philosophy of science stems from this period. When his father died, however, Kant was forced to break off his studies to help provide for the family, which he did by working as a private tutor for three different families over a period of about nine years. Finally in 1755 he was able to resume his studies at the university, and the same year he received his doctorate of philosophy; in 1770 he was finally given a permanent position, as professor of logic and metaphysics at the University of Königsberg. It is here that he writes the works that have changed the entire trajectory of modern thought - his three seminal critiques, that of pure reason, that of practical reason, and that of judgment. The foundation of Kant's philosophy is laid during his early years of studying, which culminate is this his first publication, "Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces", which constitutes an attempt to determine space dimensionality from a physical law. Kant initially adapted Leibnitz's view and tried to explain the nature of space by means of the forces of monads that cause such substances to interact. Although its basic idea was abandoned during his critic period, Kant's first work nonetheless constitutes amilestone in the modern discussion of dimensionality. "The two main influences on Kant in his philosophical reflections on science were Leibniz and Newton. During his first period of study at the University of Königsberg, from 1740 to 1746, Knutzen taught that version of Leibniz's metaphysics which the German philosopher Christian von Wolff had made popular. He also taught the mathematical physics which Newton had developed. He revealed to the young Kant the various oppositions, puzzles, and contradictions of these two great natural philosophers. The nature of space and time was what interested the young Kant most in these disputes between Leibniz and Newton. He studied the famous exchange of letters between Leibniz and Samuel Clarke, a defender of Newton's philosophy. [...] In his early years Kant pondered the nature of space and time first from the point of view of Leibniz and then of Newton, but eventually he found both positions unsatisfactory." (Ellington, in DSB: VII, pp. 225-26). The nature of space and space dimensionality that Kant attempts to uncover and explain in this his first work comes to found a basis for all his later thought. The role that physics, especially the concepts of space and time, plays for his view of the world and for the development of his philosophical thought is immense, and his earliest thoughts on the subject understream all of his later thought.Warda nr. 1.

[China, Hung-wu era, Printed during the reign of the first Ming emperor, Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang (Ming Taizu) (1368-98)] Folio (340 x 225 mm). Woodblock printed on grey mulberry paper. Uncirculated condition (UNC). Ornamentation and text faded, which happens naturally over time with mulberry paper, but legible. Lower left corner slightly rounded, which is also due to the quality of the paper and not due to use.1. Two red (vermilion) seal handstamps, one at each side, are located on the note. These stamps are typically not so clear, because they naturally fade over time. The seals of the notes are what signatures are to modern notes.The red imperial seal is applied on the reverse.2. At the top are six chinese characters "Ta Ming t'ung Hsing Pao Cha's (Treasure Note of the Great Ming) in regular (K'ai Shu) style. Text is in black.3. The outer frame is ornated with dragon patterns surrounding the text. Ornamentation is in black.4. The upper center is printed with the face value "1 Kuan" (One string) in regular (K'ai Shu) style. "One String" was at this time equivalent to 1000 copper cash or one tael of purse silver or one-fourth tael of gold.5. The middle center is printed with diagram of ten piles containing ten copper coins, each coin representing the value of 10 cash (this equals 1000 copper cash).6. On both sides of the center are eight chines characters "Ta Ming Pao Ch'ao, Tien Hsia T'ung Hsing" (The Great Ming note, circulates everywhere) in real (Chuan Shu) style.7. The lower center is written in chinese and could be translated to "This Ta Ming Pao Cha'o is printed with the approval of the Emperor through the Hu Pao and used side by side with the copper cash. Those who counterfeit Ta Ming Pai Cha'o will be beheaded while an informant will be rewarded with 250 taels of silver with confiscated property of the convicts into the bargain".The size of the 1 Kuan note is the largest paper-money ever issued. Uncirculated condition, and by far the best preserved specimen we have ever handled, of this Ming dynasty 1 kuan note - the earliest obtainable commercial printing on paper, and nearly the earliest obtainable printing of anything - a full lifetime before Gutenberg. The oldest paper-money that are preserved until today are those from early Ming dynasty, dated year 1375. These notes are the earliest numismatic printings. Only a small number of these paper-money are still available for the numismatic or printing collector. The significance of the first 1 kuan banknote was emphasized by the fact that it featured as one the world-changing inventions in the British Museum project, A History of the World in 100 objects, selected by the Museum's Director, Neil MacGregor (Broadcasted by BBC 4 in 2010). No copies of the 1 kuan note was known until around 1900 where a cache of notes in the base of an overthrown statue of Buddha was discovered. The second find was made in Peking in 1936, when a pile of notes was uncovered during the demolition of one of the city walls. The beginning of the 15th century saw a high rise in inflation, primarily of the over-printing of notes. Because of the inflation and the silver bullion obtained through Chinese trade with the Spanish in Manila, the use of paper money gradually diminished. The first banknotes were not issued in the Western world until 1661, when Sweden printed kreditivsedlar (credit notes) as an alternative to their massive copper coins.

Napoli, Musca, 1720 & 1721. 4to. Bound together in one contemporary full vellum bindingwith old, faded title in ink to spine. A vertical crack to the spine, but binding fine and tight. A bit of wear to extremities. A bit soiled, but all in all good and completeley unrestored. Some quires quite browned and some quires with brownspotting. Book-plate to inside of front board (LA Law Library) and contemporary owner's signature to title-page (De Marinis). Some contemporary underlinings and marginal pointers to the first leaves. First title printed in red and black. (4), 195, (1) pp. + (4), 260 pp. The exceedingly scarce first edition of what is arguably Vico's magnum opus, his great work on law, which is now generally accepted as the first version of his New Science, due to which Vico is now considered one of the most important philosophers of all times. The work consists in the two books known as "De Uno" and "De Constantia" that were published separately in 1720 and 1721 respectively. They are almost always bound together and we know that all copies of that Vico gave away contain both works. Having finished his magnum opus, he couldn't put it away and began making extensive notes and revisions - evident from the extremely annotated copy that he himself had, where not a single margin was left blank. These annotations were later published as his "Notae" and sometimes accompany the first two books to make up what is known as the "Diritto Universale" (or "Universal Right"). . It is in this magnificent work of law - these two books that constitute the most comprehensive work that Vico ever wrote - that the thoughts that lie at the heart of Vico's philosophy are formulated for the first time. "The new Science" is an extension of that invented in his "De Constantia", and it is here that we find for the first time Vico's philosophy of history. It is thus in the present work, not in the "New Science" as often thought, that we find the groundbreaking interpretation of history as the product of the actions of men - the "Verum-factum"-identity, which is at the core of not only the "New Science", but of all his later thought. Though most scholars today agree that the present work is the most important of all of Vico's work, outshadowing even "The New Science", the work has been neglected and overlooked for decades. In many ways, the reason for this could be found with Croce and his work on Vico from 1923. "Croce minimized Vico's contributions in the domain of the philosophy of law. Gianturco is firmly convinced that the most certain result of the Crocean monograph on Vico was to direct on the "New Science" such a dazzling light and to make of it such a seducing, glowing star as to establish it in the center of the firmament of Vichian research. Thus, the "New Science" eclipses the extraordinary achievements in the juridical sphere that are found in the "De Uno". As Gianturco began to develop his thesis with arguments derived from the history of juridical thought, he advises readers to free themselves of this kind of favoritism for the "New Science" and to clear the eyes of their mind of the blindness that does not allow them to see where other, perhaps even greater, merits of Vico are to be found... It is necessary for us to perform a kind of "Copernican" turning, a reorientation of our categories. It is necessary to assume that the North Star of our research, the cynosure of our attention, is no longer the "Scienza nuova", but "Diritto universale... (From the preface to the English translation of Vico's "Universal Right", Pinton & Diehl, edt., p. xlv).And this is a notion backed by virtually all modern Vico-scholars - the "De Uno" and the "De Constantia" (together "Diritto Universale") are considered absolutely central in Vico's philosophy and as the starting point of all of his unique and monumental ideas. "Michael Mooney, from the beginning of his work of 1985 on Vico's rhetoric, points out the correlation that exists between "Institutiones Oratoriae" and "Diritto universal" in regard to the importance of philology as the leit-motif of all, let us say, using Gianturco's image, the Vichian firmament. Mooney confirms that the merit goes to Vico for having developed philology not merely to an art, but to a science, by means of all the groundwork done in "Diritto universal", working out a system of civilization, of commonwealths, laws, poetry, history - in a word, of the whole human culture. Thus, Vico carefully thought out a scientific philology." (Pinton & Diehl, p. xlv).The present work marks a significant step in the redefinition of the relationship between metaphysics and philosophical questions of law. Vico connects natural and historic law and creates a new notion of the natural right of people that theorizes the historic right of nations. Uinifying human and divine knowledge, Vico creates a new theory of law, philosophy, and history."Giambattista Vico is often credited with the invention of the philosophy of history. Specifically, he was the first to take seriously the possibility that people had fundamentally different schema of thought in different historical eras. Thus, Vico became the first to chart a course of history that depended on the way the structure of thought changed over time.To illustrate the difference between modern thought and ancient thought, Vico developed a remarkable theory of the imagination. This theory led to an account of myth based on ritual and imitation that would resemble some twentieth century anthropological theories. He also developed an account of the development of human institutions that contrasts sharply with his contemporaries in social contract theory. Vico's account centered on the class struggle that prefigures nineteenth and twentieth century discussions.Vico did not achieve much fame during his lifetime or after. Nevertheless, a wide variety of important thinkers were influenced by Vico's writings. Some of the more notable names on this list are Johann Gottfried von Herder, Karl Marx, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, James Joyce, Benedetto Croce, R. G. Collingwood and Max Horkheimer. References to Vico's works can be found in the more contemporary writings of Jürgen Habermas, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Alasdair MacIntyre and many others.There is no question that his work is difficult to grasp. Vico's style is challenging. Further, he is heavily influenced by a number of traditions that many philosophers may find unfamiliar: the natural law tradition of thinkers like Grotius; the Roman rhetorical tradition of authors like Quintillian; and the current science and anthropology of his day. Nevertheless, Vico's theories on culture, language, politics and religion are deeply insightful and have excited the imaginations of those who have read him." (IEP).The work is of the utmost scarcity, with merely one copy appearing at auction within the last 50 years and with very few copies in libraries world-wide (especially containing both parts).

Paris, (Clousier imprimeur), 1781-86. Folio. (51 x 33,5 cm.). Bound to style in 5 uniform full light brown sprinckled full calf (bound in the 1970 ties). Blindtooled lineborders and blindtooled dentelles with blindtooled cornerpieces on covers. 7 raised bands. bands with gilding. Compartments gilt with flowers. Inner hinges in leather. Marbled endpapers. No wear to bindings. 5 halftitles, 5 title-pages with engraved vignette. I: (4),XIII,(3),252 pp. Without an engraved dedication-leaf (called for by Brunet "épitre dédicatoire gravée). II: (4),XXVIII,283 pp. III: (4),XL,201,22 pp. IV: (4),II,(6),XVIII,266 pp. V: (4),(2),267-429,(1) pp., 434 engravings on 317 sheets, including the 14 plates with medals and coins (doubles médailles) + 13 mostly double-page engraved maps, plans and charts. More than 100 larger and smaller vignettes, head-and tailpieces, ornaments etc., 25 in 2 colours. Wide-margined with very few brownspots (a small brownspot on the phallus-plate in volume II), a few leaves with small closed tears in margin, 1 leaf having a printed line repaired (a weakness in the paper) but no loss of letters. Foot of last leaves in volume II with very light foxing. Plates and text fine a clean, gently washed. First edition of this renowned travelbook, one of the most successful travel books ever published - "the completed work is one of the most beautiful that a private person has ever produced, and it is unparalleled among the sumptuous voyage pittoresque publications". (Millard French,148).In 1759, Claude Richard Saint-Non (1727-1791) was relieved of his duties as a deacon and lawyer, and undertook a cavalier tour through Italy in the years 1759-1761 with the painters Jean-Honoré Fragonard and Hubert Robert. His publication project of a Voyage pittoresque initially envisaged five volumes on the whole of Italy and a volume on Switzerland, but then limited itself to only southern Italy. For the etchings Saint-Non on the one hand on some older pictures by Robert and Fragonard among others. On the other hand, the 61 employed engravers worked mainly on documents which had been supplied by a group of artists traveling on his behalf under the direction of Dominique Vivant Denon, secretary of the French Ambassador in Italy, in 1777/78. Volume I deals with the history, buildings, artists and customs of Naples and Vesuvius with its outbursts. Volume II is dedicated to Herculaneum and Pompeii; Volume III deals with Southern Italy (including Paestum and Capri). Sicily is treated in volumes IV and V. Brunet V,55-56. - Cohen-de Ricci, 928-29. - Ray, French Illustr. Books, 34.

München, Hyperion Verlag Hans von Weber, 1912. 4to. Bound uncut in a very nice, exquisite full morocco binding with five raised bands, gilt title and single gilt lines to spine. A single gilt line-border to boards. Top edge gilt. Minor wear along hinges. Internally very nice and clean, with only a few occasional very minor light brown spots. Printed on thick, heavy paper (Büttenpapier) with watermarks. With the bookplate of "Feuerbacher Heide" to inside of front board. The very scarce first edition, nr. 32 of 100 copies, of Thomas Mann's disturbing masterpiece, probably the most famous story of obsession ever written. "The Death in Venice" is considered one of the most important literary productions of the 20th century. This first edition of the book was printed in merely 100 copies, which are all numbered. In 1913 the first trade edition appeared.

Milan, Por el Heredero de Pedromartir Locarni y Iuan Bautista Bidello, 1610. 8vo. In contemporary full limp vellum with title in contemporary hand to spine. Extremities with wear. Repair and a small hole to front board and missing vellum on upper outer corner of back board. Previous owner's name in contemporary hand to title-page. First 8 leaves lightly washed. Damp stain throughout, however mainly affecting pp. 169-340. The paper is still good and solid. A good copy in its original binding. [Blank], 16 ff, 722 pp, [blank]. [mispaginated between pp. 704-707, as called for]. Scarce first edition of 'Don Quixote' to be printed in Italy, being the 10th overall printing of part one, preserved in its first binding. The editor changed Cervantes's dedication to the Duque de Béjar for that of Vizconde Vitaliano, otherwise the text follows that of the second edition printed in Madrid by Juan de la Cuesta in 1605. This masterpiece, which established the novel genre in Western literature, was first published by Cuesta in Madrid in 1605 and became an instant success. The first edition, published in Madrid in 1605, was followed by three pirated editions later the same year and two further authorized editions. The first part of Don Quixote was revised by Cervantes up to and including the third Cuesta edition of 1608. The second part was not published until 1615. “The first part of Don Quixote came out in 1605. What had begun as a simple satire on the tedious chivalric romances of the time broadened into a sweeping panorama of Spanish society; and it was this, the variety, the liveliness, and the gibes at the famous, which won it instant fame. Its larger claims, the subdued pathos, its universal humanity, were slower to be appreciated. But within months Don Quixote and Sancho Panza had become legendary […]. Don Quixote is one of those universal works which are read by all ages at all times, and there are very few who have not one time or another felt themselves to be Don Quixote confronting windmills or Sancho Panza at the inn.” (PMM 111) Brunet 1748 Palau 51983 Suñé 10 (PMM 111, being the first edition from 1605)

[Redhill, Love & Malcolmson for His Majesty Stationery Office, 1911]. Large 8vo. Well preserved; sometime machine stitched into a volume, now disbound; from the Patents Department of Manchester Free Library, with stamp in upper margin of the first page, accession date 9 September 1911. 3 pp. [1, blank] + one lithographic plate. The extremely rare propeller patent that constitutes Wittgenstein's first publication, and without doubt the scarcest. It is his work on the propeller presented here and the mathematical problems associated with the development of it that leads Wittgenstein to consider the foundations of mathematics, considerations that directly lead him to philosophy and logic and to an immediate change of career, without which the entire tradition of modern philosophy and logic would have looked completely different. The present publication, published at the mere age of 21, is arguably responsible for catapulting Wittgenstein into his philosophical career. After taking out the patent, Wittgenstein quit his aeronautical career and stopped working on his jet-engine. Not until recently has the great importance of the invention to early aviation been recognized - Wittgenstein's scheme anticipated by three decades developments in which blade-tip jets were used to drive the rotors of hybrid helicopters. Wittgenstein's patent had within it the seeds of the centrifugal-flow gas turbine engine, later to be developed in the 1930'ies by Frank Whittle, the father of jet-propulsion and the inventor of the torbojet engine. About 30 years after Wittgenstein's invention, the engine was reinvented, by Friedrich Doblhoff, this time leading to a completely new concept for a helicopter, which was successfully tested for the first time in 1943. The patent was unknown to all Wittgenstein biographers and scholars, confirming the extreme scarcity of it. Only von Wright mentions Wiggtenstein's work, and only indirectly, probably not knowing about the patent. Wittgenstein apparently told him "the problem on which he worked at Manchester has since become very urgent". Von Wright's assumption was that he was referring to the emergence of reaction engines in modern aircraft.

Madrid, 1906. Folio oblong. Bound in a splendid recent full longgrained burgundy morocco binding in pastiche style, with four raised bands to beautifully gilt spine. Boards with gilt ornamental borders and gilt centre-piece. Gilt line to edges of boards and inner gilt dentelles. Marbled end-papers. All leaves re-hinged. Occasional light brownspotting, but overall very nice. Title-page (the version with the second line (beginning "Colección de Ochenta...) in lower case), 2 pp. of text (dated 1863) + 80 engraved plates (on fine, laid paper measuring 23,4x32 cm.). Plates 17 and 77 have been misbound (the numbers 1 and 7 look almost the same - Harris II:201: "In some sets this plate has been bound out of order where the number hs been read as 77"; II:288: "In some sets this plate has been bound out of order where the number has been read as 17). A beautiful copy of the splendid fourth edition of Goya's magnificent "Disasters of War" - one of the most significant anti-war works of art ever produced - consisting in all 80 plates that were issued. "The Disasters of War" constitutes Goya’s political masterpiece, directly inspired by and documenting the horrors he witnessed during the Peninsular War of 1808-14 between Spain and France under Napoleon Bonaparte, the terrible famine in Madrid in 1811-12, and the disappointment at the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy. As such, it is one of the earliest and most important examples of war documentation and remains to this day one of the boldest anti-war statements ever made. This, however, is also the reason why these groundbreaking etchings were not published during Goya’s life-time. It was both too dangerous and too gruesome. As Alastair Sooke puts it, "[e]ven today it is difficult to look at the Disasters, because Goya catalogues the brutality and fatal consequences of war in such a stark, confrontational and unflinching manner." (See his article for BBC Culture, 2014). In this seminal series of etchings, Goya not only uses art to comment on politics and the atrocities connected with war, he also pioneers a number of artistic tools. Breaking from painterly traditions, he deviates from the heroics of most previous war art to show us how war can bring out the worst in humanity. He abandons colour in order to show us a more direct truth conveyed by the use of shadow and shade. Also, the fact that he presents the 80 works of art as a collection, together with the harsh, realistic nature of the etchings themselves, connect the images more closely to the art of photography that we are now so familiar with, causing the work as a whole to be viewed as one of the earliest examples of actual first-hand war reportage. The work has been extremely influential, perhaps most famously inspiring Pablo Picasso and Ernest Hemingway (For Whom the Bells Toll). "There are many contenders for the most powerful example of war art from the past two centuries: Picasso’s Guernica (1937), painted in response to the bombing of a Basque village during the Spanish Civil War, would be an obvious choice. For me, though, nothing quite matches the originality and truth-telling ferocity of the Disasters of War, a series of 80 aquatint etchings, complete with caustic captions, by the Spanish artist Francisco de Goya (1746-1828)." (Sooke). The execution of the engravings has been dated to a period between 1810 and 1820, but no contemporary edition was made of this spectacular series. "Possibly by the time they were finished, the war and famine scenes were not of great appeal, and Goya was probably unwilling to risk another financial failure such as he had experienced with the "Caprichos". It was a time of stern repression and the publication of the satirican and violently anti-clerical subjects of some of the "caprichos enfánticos" would certainly have been dangerous. These facts would account for a postponement of publication. Also, Goya himself tells us that he fell seriously ill in the winter of 1819... and on his recovery he was planning to leave Spain and settle permanently in France. That Goya did not attempt to make an edition of "Desastres" in Madrid before leaving for France is borne out by the investigations of Catharina Boelcke-Astor, who showed that the copperplates were stored away in safes by Goya's son Javier, where they remained until the latter's death in 1854. Eventually, in November 1862, they were acquired by the Academia de San Fernando from D. Jaimé Machén for 28,000 reales..." (Harris I:141). In 1863, the first edition of Goya's seminal work was issued, under the famous title "Los desastres de la guerra". In all, 500 copies were issued. A second edition followed in 1892, and a third in 1903. Both of these editions were issued in merely 100 copies. In 1906, the fourth edition appeared, in a number of 275 copies. "This edition is excellently printed on very suitable papers" (Harris II: 175) and is considered much superior to the third. A further three editions appeared, in 1923, 1930, and 1937 respectively. "When Goya had engraved all the plates of the "Desastres" he gave his friend, Céan Bermúdez, an album containing a proof set of eighty-five plates, including the eighty plates eventually published as "Los Desastres de la Guerra", two plates numbered 81 and 82, which were prepared for the series but not published with it, and the three little engravings of "prisoners", which were never intended by Goya for inclusion in a published edition of the series." (Harris I:140). The first plate prepares the spectator for the contents of the series and can be seen as a sort of frontispiece, plates 2-47 deal mainly with the horrors of the war, plates 48-64 record the terrible famine in Madrid, and the final plates 65-80 constitute the "Caprichos enfánticos". " "The impact of the scenes is incredible," says the independent art historian Juliet Wilson-Bareau, one of the world’s leading Goya experts. "Each one is a powerful, original work of art in its own right, yet linked to the others with a common theme, including the way their titles - terse comments, questions, or cries of outrage - connect them, and read on from one to another. The grouping of the series into three ‘chapters’ gives the whole a sense of rhythm and purpose." Goya must have hoped that he would live to see the publication of his Disasters, but the despotic rule of Ferdinand VII made this impossible. "Under his repressive and reactionary regime," Wilson-Bareau explains, "there was no way that Goya could have published his set of prints that so clearly denounced all violence and all abuse of power." Still, following their posthumous publication, the Disasters proved enormously influential, inspiring artists including the German Otto Dix as well as Dalí and Picasso - and, more recently, the British brothers Jake and Dinos Chapman, who bought a complete edition of the prints and ‘defaced’ them by adding grotesque, cartoonish faces. Even the war photographer Don McCullin acknowledges a debt: "When I took pictures in war, I couldn’t help thinking of Goya," he has said. The genius of the Disasters is that they transcend particularities of the Peninsular War and its aftermath to feel universal - and modern. Perhaps this is because, as the British writer Aldous Huxley put it in 1947, "All [Goya] shows us is war’s disasters and squalors, without any of the glory or even picturesqueness." So should we consider the series as the greatest war art ever created? Wilson-Bareau certainly thinks so. "For me, yes," she tells me. "I have lived with these prints, which many people consider too shocking, absolutely unbearable, and I find in them - besides the heartbreak and outrage at the unspeakable violence and damage - a great well of compassion for all victims of the suffering and abuses they depict, which goes to the very heart of our humanity." (From Alastair Sooke's BBC-article). Harris II: 175.

Breslau, Wilhelm Koebner, 1884 8vo. Contemporary paper boards. Paper labels over spine. Extremities worn, but tight and fine. A stamp to end-paper and to verso of title-page. Title-page and end-papers with light brownspotting, and some leaves with marginal markings, otherwise very nice and clean. Inscribed to front free end-paper. (10), XI, (1), 119, (1) pp. The rare first edition with a handwritten presentation-inscription from Frege ("Freundschaftlichst/ überreicht vom/ Verfasser.") of this pioneering work of modern logic, which constitutes the starting point of analytic philosophy, of the philosophy of mathematics, and of logicism. This cornerstone of modern logic was pivotal to the development of the two main disciplines: the foundation of mathematics and the foundation of philosophy, and with it, Frege founded the discipline of logicism. The work profoundly influenced Russell and Wittgenstein, who both used Frege's "The Foundations of Arithmetic" as a steppingstone for their own work (e.g. In the preface of the "Principia Mathematica" Russell and Whitehead state that "In all questions of logical analysis our chief debt is to Frege" (p. VIII).).Frege presentation-copies are of the utmost scarcity and hardly ever enter the market. "The Foundations of Arithmetic" arguably constitutes Frege's main work, as it is here that he expounds the central notions of his philosophy while severely and effectively criticizing his predecessors and contemporaries. It is here that he deals with the actual goal of all his thought, namely TO BUILD MATHEMATICS AS AN EXTENSION OF LOGIC. The book represents the first philosophically sound discussion of the concept of number in Western civilization, and it profoundly influenced developments in the philosophy of mathematics and in general ontology.Beginning thus: "When we ask someone what the number one is, or what the symbol "I" means, we get as a rule the answer "Why, a thing". And if we go on to point out that the proposition "the number is a thing" is not a definition, because it has the definite article on one side and the indefinite on the other, or that it only assigns the number one to the class of things, without stating which thing it is, then we shall very likely be invited to select something for ourselves - anything we please - to call one."... ("F.o.A" Introduction), Frege goes on to argue that number is something connected with an assertion concerning a concept - and essential for the notion of number is that of equality of a number. The definition that he settled upon, and which became of fundamental importance to the development of modern logic and the foundations of philosophy and mathematics was "The number which belongs to the concept "F" is the extension of the concept of being equal to the concept "F"."; here, equality of concepts is understood as the existence of a one-to-one correspondence between their extensions. ""Foundations of Arithmetic" (1884) provided an impressive definition of number in logical terms, after having criticized several empiricist, formalist and psychologistic approaches to mathematics. The definition was constructed in terms of properties of concepts rather than through classes. Thus, the number of a class was introduced as the number which applies to a given concept, and this last as the extension of the concept "equinumerous with the given concept", which can be defined in terms of bijective correspondence between sets." (Grattan-Guinness I: p. 621). "The name of Frege has become one of the most honoured in the history of mathematics. The central feature of the book is the development of the definition of number. There can be no doubt about the greatness of this work" (W.H. McCrea - review of the English translation)."Its epochal character in the attempt to put mathematical concepts on a rigorously logical basis has been realized in this country from the beginning of this century, thanks to the writings of Russell and Whitehead." (The Times Literary Supplement - review of the English translation). "The modern philosophy of mathematics is characterized by the fact that various schools have been formed to overcome the difficulties occasioned by the antinomies. The oldest of these schools is LOGICISM and goes back to FREGE, one of the most significant logicians of all times." (Stegmüller, p. 326).

London, Robert Sayer & Jean Bennett, 1777. [Engraved title: London, Sayer & Bennett, 1775]. Folio. Recently bound in a magnificent pastiche-binding of brown half calf with six raised bands and gilt red leather title-label to elaborately gilt spine. Vellum corners and lovely marbled paper over boards. The binding is made over the original one, preserving the original sewn spine underneath as well as the original end-papers. An excellent, beautiful copy. Very clean and fresh. Only minor, light browning to a few maps, and last map with a bit more staining. One map with a small tear to lower margin, far from effecting engraving. Previously in the possession the Danish medieval estate Ravnholt, since the 18th century owned by the noble family of Sehestedt Juul, with discreet stamps from this ownership to title-page: "Sehestedt Juel" and "Rauenholdts Bibliothek". Title-page (French) + 6 pp. of preface (French) + (2) pp. of index (French) + double-page engraved, illustrated title (English) + 36 double-page and 3 single-page engraved maps, all (but one) dated London, Sayer, 1775 (one map - Antigua - without the year, but London, Sayer). Scarce first French edition - consisting in all the original 39 maps of the 1775 English edition (all (but Antigua) dated 1775) and the engraved double title-page in English, preceded by a French title, preliminary discourse (also in French), and index - of Jeffery's seminal West-India atlas, one of the most important works on the West Indies and the work that we have to thank for the introduction of "Carribean" as the designation that was to become standard on maps. The work played a pivotal rôle in the geo- and cartographical denomination of places and areas in this part of the world. In his preface, Jefferys does away with previous terms applied by geographers: "La division des Espagnols, & elle se trouve tout-à la fois physique & politique, fut adoptée bientôt par les Anglois, les Hollandois & queslques autres peuples; la plûpart des navigateurs & des marchands en s'y conformant, ont imposé depuis longtemps à tous les Géographes la nécessité de diviser l'Amerique en trois parties, savoir, "Amerique du Nord", "Indes Occidentales", "Amerique du Sud." Mais les Géographes, surtout les Francois, ont perséveré dans leur ancienne division, probablement parce qu'ils aiment à se répéter, & souvent aussi à se copier l'un l'autre." (From the preface, p.2). (i.e.: "The division of the Spanish, and this is found in both physics & polics, was soon adopted by the English, the Dutch & some other populations; the main part of navigators and merchants have complyed herewith and have long made clear to geographers the necessity to divide America into three parts, namely, "North America", "West Indies", "South America." But geographers, especially the French, have persevered in their old division, probably because they like to repeat, and often also to copy, one another").But not only does Jefferys extend this denominal division of America to geographers and cartographers, he also (re-)introduces the designation that was to become standard of the Caribbean: "Les premier Espagnols l'appellèrent Mer du Nord lorsqu'ils eurent découvert une nouvelle mer au delà de l'isthme de Panama. Quelquefois on lui a donné le nom de "Mer Caribe" ou "Caribenne", qu'il auroit mieux volu adopter que de laisser anonyme un aussi vaste espace." (From the preface, p. 2, §1).- "Although the best-known sea of the New World, the Caribbean remained nameless longest. It was the original Mar del Norte, a term promptly extended to all parts of the western atlantic. Velasco tried to find a proper name for it, saying: "de los Canibales llaman el golfo grande del mar Océano desde de Deseada y Dominica por toda la costa de Tierra Firme, Yucatán, Golfo de Tierra Firme y de las islas del mar del Norte." This compiler in Spain, regarding the maps before him, made the distinction we do between Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico. (Gulf of Tierra Firme was that of Darién.) Velasco remained in manuscript until the nineteenth century, and I do not know that his Gulf of the Cannibals was ever thus known. In the introduction to his "West Indian Atlas", Thomas Jefferys wrote, two centuries later: "It has been sometimes called the Caribbean-Sea, which name it would be better to adopt, than to leave this space quite anonymous"; he did so on his map. North European nations at the time were in possession of the Carib islands (the Lesser Antilles) and it is perhaps thus that Jefferys introduced the designation that was to become standard on maps but was not adopted in Spanish lands." (C.O. Sauer, "The Early Spanish Main", p. 2). As one of the earliest documentations of the West Indies, Jefferys' seminal "West-India Atlas" was informed by prevailing attitudes about the legitimacy of Britain's colonial enterprises and contemporary debates surrounding the abolition and emancipation movements and played a significant rôle in the spreading of knowledge regarding this part of the world. Jefferys himself, one of the most prominent and prolific map publishers and engravers of his day, was opposed to the slave-trade, which unfortunately hinged upon the sugar trade that the atlas was designed to aid, and also spoke out against it. The English cartographer Thomas Jefferys (c. 1719-1771), "Royal Geographer to King George III" was the leading map supplier of his day and as such had access to information that many other cartographers did not. He engraved and printed maps for government and other official bodies and produced a wide range of commercial maps and atlases, most famously of America and the West Indies.Having died in 1771, he did not live to see the publication of his great "West India Atlas", which was published by Robert Sayer, who, in partnership with John Bennett, had acquired his maps. Thus, the West India Atlas was published posthumously, under Jefferys' name. Philips III:p. 570.

London, Edward Blunt, 1620. 8vo. Contemporary full speckled calf, expertly rebacked to style with four raised bacds and gilt line-decoration. Front free end-paper with notes dated 1637. Note station "Lord Bacon" in early hand to title-page. P. 57 with a 20th century stamp ("Library of Washington University"). A bit closely shaved at top, occasionally cropping border. A very nice copy. (8), 222, (4 - 1 blank leaf and 1 leaf with half-title "A Discourse Upon the Beginning of Tacitus"), pp., pp. 223-324, (1 f. with half-title: A Discourse Of Rome), pp. 325-(418), (1 f. with half-title: A Discourse Against Flatterie), pp. 419-(504), (1 f. with half-title: A Discourse of Lawes), pp. 505-542. The very rare first edition of this extremely important collection of essays, three of which have now been proven to have been written by Thomas Hobbes, thus constituting his earliest published work. The work is now widely regarded a highly important source to the understanding of what is arguably the greatest political thinker of all time, providing us with unprecedented access to the early writings and thought of Thomas Hobbes. "Studies of the early Hobbes can be enriched and deepened by a consideration of the formerly anonymous texts now identified as the philosopher's earliest work, namely the essays "A Discourse on Tacitus", "A Discourse on Rome", "A Discourse on Laws", found in a larger collection entitled "Horae Subseciuae: Observations and Discourses". Originally thought to have been the work of the young William Cavendish, who under Hobbes's supervision likely wrote the majority of the "Horae" essays, these three discourses have since been identified... as the work of Hobbes himself." (Butler). "The entire work consists of twelve essays or "observations" reminiscent in style and language of Bacon's essays and devoted to such topics as arrogance, expenses, reading history, religion, and death, and four much longer discourses, three of which we have been able to attribute to Hobbes." (Reynolds & Saxenhouse p. 4). Efforts to identify the author of the "Horae Subseciuae" began almost immediately after its anonymous publication, and the publication has always been a source of speculation about the author. As it would turn out, all twelve essays were not written by the same author, and three of them were written by one of modernity's greatest philosophers. It was Leo Strauss who first provided something resembling evidence that the writings were by Thomas Hobbes. He had come upon the original manuscript and concluded that it was indeed in Hobbes's hand. But handwriting, of course, does not prove authorship. It does prove a connection, with the work, however, and the exact connection with the three essays would be proven some decades later, by Saxonhouse and Reynolds, who famously published the three essays together, under Hobbes's name for the first time. "For the first time in three centuries, this book brings back into print three discourses now confirmed to have been written by the young Thomas Hobbes. Their contents may well lead to a resolution of the long-standing controversy surrounding Hobbes's early influences and the subsequent development of his thought. The volume begins with the recent history of the discourses, first published as part of the anonymous seventeenth-century work, "Horae Subsecivae". Drawing upon both internal evidence and external confirmation afforded by new statistical "wordprinting" techniques, the editors present a compelling case for Hobbes's authorship. Saxonhouse and Reynolds present the complete texts of the discourse with full annotations and modernized spellings. These are followed by a lengthy essay analyzing the pieces' significance for Hobbes's intellectual development and modern political thought more generally. The discourses provide the strongest evidence to date for the profound influences of Bacon and Machiavelli on the young Hobbes, and they add a new dimension to the much-debated impact of the scientific method on his thought. The book also contains both introductory and in-depth explanations of statistical "wordprinting." Saxonhouse and Reynolds met each other at a conference in 1988 and decided to join forces to determine, whether Thomas Hobbes was the actual author of the "Horae Subseciuae", which had often been speculated. "Fortuitously, Reynolds was closely involved with statisticians at Bringham Young University who have done some of the most important work in developing statistical techniques for identifying authorship for disputed texts, or "wordprinting." ...The results relative to the "Horae Subseciuae" were both exhilarating and disappointing. The three discourses published here could definitely be attributed to Hobbes, but the volume's twelve shorter essays or observations which draw heavily on Baconian themes and language, portraying the passionate young aristocrat with all his foibles, and the fourth discourse, were authored by someone else - perhaps Hobbes's tutee, but clearly not Hobbes himself. While it would have been more satisfying to have the entire work match Hobbes's later writings, we thought that the identification of the three discourses as previously unrecognized and unacknowledged Hobbesian works was of great significance and that they were worthy of republication. These three discourses give us direct access to Hobbes's intellectual concerns and motivating interests at a point almost two decades earlier than was possible through his previous recognized writings." (Reynolds & Saxenhouse, pp. VII-VIII). Apart from a poem in his hand, nothing had remained to help us understand the early intellectual development of Hobbes and the early influences upon his thought, before his translation of Thucydides, which appeared in 1627, when he was almost 40 years old. These important early texts give us access to Hobbes's early thought, thereby letting us understand how he developed his political science. Shortly after taking his degree, Hobbes became engaged as a tutor to the Cavendish family, with whom he maintained a close connection for the rest of his life. Hobbes was first hired to serve as a tutor and companion to William Cavendish, later the Second Earl of Devonshire, and subsequently taught William's son and grandson. In 1610, Hobbes and his first charge embarked on a grand tour of the continent, traveling primarily to France and Italy.Hobbes remained with William for the next twenty years, later serving as his secretary and becoming a close friend and confidant. It has previously been thought that Hobbes published nothing during this time, but as it has recently turned out, he did indeed contribute the three essays "A Discourse on Tacitus", "A Discourse on Rome", "A Discourse on Laws" to the "Horae Subseciuae", that was presumably publiahed by William Cavendish, who arguably wrote if not all, then most of the other essays in the volume. Shortly after William died, Hobbes published the first translation of Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War into English (1628). During this period, Hobbes also worked occasionally for the Lord Chancellor and great scientist Francis Bacon, who highly valued him as a secretary, translator, and conversation partner, and to whom the present work has also be ascribed during the centuries. Noel B. Reynolds and Arlene W. Saxenhouse in: "Three Discourses: A Critical Modern edition of Newly Identified Work of the Young Thomas Hobbes", 1995. Todd Butler: Imagination and Politics in Seventeenth-Century England, 2017

[Weimar, Gustaf Uszman] for E.L. Kasprowicz, Lipsk [Leipzig], 1884-[89]. Large 4to. Bound in a very nice recent red half calf with five raised bands and gilt title to spine. Title-page with repair to inner margin and with a few closed tears. Outer margin discreetly reinforced. Verso of title-page with "1942 D. 1513" in pencil. Last leaf also with a couple of closed/repaired tears, with minor loss of text, and reinforced in margin. Apart from the nicely restored flaws to the first and last leaf, this is an excellent, very nice and clean copy. VII, 325, (1) pp. Very rare first edition of the first Polish translation of Marx' revolutionizing main work, "The Capital", which was clandestinely printed in Germany and then smuggled into Poland. The Polish translation, which is much rarer than the first Russian edition, and thus of the utmost scarcity, was illegally printed in Germany, with the mediation of the translator Kasprowicz (who worked for Brockhaus), by G. Uszman in Weimar (far enough from Prussia for the government not to be too concerned with the socialist activities of Polish students) and was then smuggled, mostly via Leipzig and Torún, into Russian Poland. It appeared in three parts, from 1884 to 1889. The translation, which was mainly done from the French, was the work of the hugely influential Polish socialist group, the Krusinsk-ites, which counted Stanislaw Krusinski, Ludwik Krzywicki (who corresponded directly with Marx himself), Mieczyslaw Brzezinski, Kazimierz Plawinski, and Jozef Siemaszko. Ludwik Krzywicki (1859-1941) was the editor-in-chief of this great collaborative work. He is credited with being the leading Marxist of the period and one of the greatest Marxist thinkers of Poland. In 1883 he was expelled from Warsaw University, after which he went to Germany, Switzerland and France, before returning to Poland in 1893, where he continued his political activities and took part in the 1905 revolution. While in Leipzig (from 1883), working on the translation of the Capital into Polish, he began corresponding with Marx, and after Marx died (March 1883), he continued corresponding with Engels, who provided direct suggestions of improvements and corrections.The publication of the first Polish translation of Marx' Capital not only came to influence Polish politics and economics, it also marked an important divide in Polish socialism and constitutes one of the earliest printings within organized Polish Marxism. "In 1882 Ludwig Warýnsk (1856-89) organized in the former Congress Kingdom the first Polish workers' party under the name Social-Revolutionary Party "Proletariat". At the same time in the Russianized Imperial University of Warsaw a circle of young Polish socialists established itself. Its main theoretician was Stanislaw Krusinski (1857-86) after whom the group were called "Krusinski-ites". The most important among them was later to become one of the greatest scholars in the field of the social sciences. In 1884 the Krusinski-ites published in Leipzig the Polish translation of volume one of "Capital".In the ideology of the first Polish Marxists two different tendencies are to be distinguished; a social-revolutionary and a social-democratic one. The first was prevalent in Warzynski's "Proletariat"; after the secession of a social-democratic group named "Solidarity" and led by Kazimierz Puchewicz it was unanimously accepted by this party. The second tendency was dominant in Krusinski's circle. The differences dividing them were profoundly theoretical and not merely tactical. Generally speaking, the social revolutionaries emphasized the important role of the "subjective factor" in history while the social democrats insisted on the necessity of a gradual "ripening" of the economic conditions of the socialist revolution. The social revolutionaries closely collaborated with the Russian populist party, The People's Will, and, under its influence, endorsed political terrorism; the social democrats were resolutely opposed to this. Even more important was the controversy concerning the basic theoretical assumptions of Marxism and their applicability to an economically backward country. The social democrats were convinced that the objective conditions for a socialist revolution would not be ripe until the given country had passed through all phases of capitalist development..." (Walicki, Stanislaw Brzozowski and the Polish Beginnings of "Western Marxism", pp. 41-42).

Basel, [Per Henrichum Petri, 1556 - on colophon]. An absolutely lovely copy of the exceedingly scarce first edition, first printing, of one of the most influential and important works in the history of modern thought. A work that has for a long time been overlooked due to the gross neglect of the history of Renaissance philosophy, but which has nonetheless been seminal to the development of scientific and philosophical thought from the 16th century and onwards. With a purely naturalistic and immanent view of the natural process, Pomponazzi here frees man's thought from the bounds of religion and provides modern thinkers and scientists with pure empiricism and naturalism. "Er will das "Wissen" and die Stelle des "Glaubens" stellen" - "die "dämonische" Kausalität des Glaubens weicht der Kausalität der Wissenschaft" (Cassirer, p. 110 + 111). 8vo. Contemporary full limp vellum, with vellum cords to hinges. Remains of vellum ties to boards. A bit of brownspotting, but all in all a lovely, completely unrestored copy in its first binding. Five large woodcut initials and large woodcut printer's device to verso of last leaf. (16), 349, (3). Adams: P-1827; Wellcome: I:5153; DSB: XI:71-74.A.H. Douglas: "The Philosophy and Psychology of Pietro Pomponazzi", 1910.M.L. Pine: "Pietro Pomponazzi: Radical Philosoper of the Renaissance", 1986.Thorndyke: "A History of Magic and Experimental Science", Vol. V, 1966 (4th printing)P.O. Kristeller: "Eight Philosophers of the Italian Renaissance", 1965.J.H. Randall, in: "The Renaissance Philosophy of Man", 1956 (4th impression).B.P. Copenhaver & C.B. Schmitt: "Renaissance Philosophy", 1992.E. Cassirer: "Individuum und Kosmos in der Philosophie der renaissance", 1969 (3. Aufl. - orig. 1927).See also: Kristeller: "Renaissance Thought and its Sources"; "Medieval Aspects of Renaissance Learning"; "Renaissance Thought II, Papers on Humanism and the Arts". "Pomponazzi's thought and reputation were extremely influential in the centuries after his death. Even before it was printed, his treatise "On incantations" circulated widely in manuscript among philosophers, physicians and early modern naturalists (see Zanier 1975). Due to his mortalist theory of the soul, 17th-century "free thinkers" regarded Pomponazzi as one of their own, portraying him as an atheist (see Kristeller 1968; Paganini 1985). Enlightenment thinkers of the 18th century pushed to extremes his distinction between natural reason and faith, while 19th-century positivists, such as Ernest Renan and Roberto Ardigò, saw in Pomponazzi a forerunner of their own beliefs and a champion of naturalism and empiricism." (SEP). Exceedingly scarce first edition of Pomponazzi's seminal "De Incantationibus", perhaps the most original work of natural philosophy of the Renaissance and arguably the first work of what comes to be the Enlightenment. The work, which is one of Pomponazzi's most important productions (along with his treatise on the immortality of the soul), constitutes a forerunner of Naturalism and Empiricism and could be considered the first true Enlightenment work ever, causing Pomponazzi, our greatest Renaissance philosopher, to be generally considered "The last Scholastic and the first man of the Enlightenment" (Sandy, Randall, Kristeller). The appeal to experience is the main concern of the work, and its strict and completely novel way of treating the subject matter resulted in a hitherto unattained elevated position of philosophy in the Latin West, providing to philosophy a new method that remains dominant to this day and without which we would scarcely be able to imagine modern philosophy. Proclaiming the victory of philosophy over religion, the "de Incantationibus" changed the entire history of philosophy - philosophy being to Pomponazzi the supreme truth and the final judge of all phenomena."Pomponazzi's conclusion [in the "De Incantationibus] results from a dramatic change in method which in turn is based on a profoundly new attitude toward philosophical inquiry. Medieval theologians and philosophers as well as most Renaissance thinkers were content to limit the role of reason in nature because they sincerely believed that the Christian God intervened in the natural order to create miraculous occurrences. As we have seen, this belief prevented their scientific convictions from destroying Christian doctrine by exempting central Biblical miracles from natural process. Even those who held that Christian revelation and Aristotelian science were irreconcilable maintained a sincere fideism which allowed each universe to remain intact, each standing separate from the other. But once Pomponazzi applied the critical method of Aristotelian science to all religious phenomena, Christian miracles were engulfed by the processes of nature. Absorbed by the "usual course of nature", the miracle could no longer be the product of divine fiat. Indeed Christianity itself became merely another historical event, taking its place within the recurring cycles of nature, and destined to have a temporal career within the eternal flow of time." (Pine, p. 273)."De Incantationibus" constitutes one of the single most important works of the Renaissance. Bringing everything in the world under the general laws of nature, the history of religion as well as all other facts in experience, "De Incantationibus" gives us, for the first time in the history of philosophy an outline of a philosophy of nature and of religion, an outline that came to be seminal in the history of philosophy and science throughout the following centuries. With the main aim of the work being to determine the fact that there is no such thing as "supernatural", no magic, no omens, no witchcraft, no divine intervention, no apparitions, etc., etc. - all marvelous events and powers observed in experience or recorded in history have their natural, scientific explanation, they are all within the scope of principles common to all nature -, it is no wonder that it was placed on the index of forbidden books immediately upon its publication, as the only of Pomponazzi's works ever. The analysis of the history of religions and the theory of the nature and use of prayer that Pomponazzi here develops is hugely interesting and so far ahead of its time that one hardly believes it. E.g. the notion that religious doctrines all aim, through fables and myths (which he disproves), to preserve the social order rather than to discover the truth, is not something you will find in any other work of the Middle Ages or the Renaissance. "[H]e brings the whole phenomena of religious history - the changes of religious belief, and the phases of thaumaturgic power - under certain universal laws of nature. Of these facts as of all others, he suggests, there is a natural and a rational explanation; in them the powers that are at work in all nature are still operative; and they are subject to the laws and conditions that govern nature generally - the laws of change, of development, of growth and decay, and transformation in decay." (Douglas, p. 299)."In regard to the religious issue, I have tried to show that he makes a claim for the absolute truth of philosophy and relegates religion to the purely practical function of controlling the masses. Religious doctrines contain a kind of truth because they can persuade men to act so as to preserve the social order. But religious doctrine has social value rather than speculative veracity. [...] rational truth is the only truth. It is really compatible only with complete disbelief. And I think that this is the statement that Pomponazzi makes. The only doctrines that he accepts are those of philosophy. Philosophy rejects the personal Christian God acting within history and eliminates the miracles of religion. Philosophy reduces to the absurd the notion of a life after death. And finally philosophy destroys revelation itself by viewing it as the product of heavenly forces rather than the act of divine will." (Pine, pp. 34-35). The work was originally written in 1520, but was not published in Pomponazzi's life-time. It circulated in manuscript form, however, and was also as such widely noted. In 1552, 27 years after Pomponazzi's death, the manuscript was brought to Basel by Pomponazzi's student Guglielmo Gratarolo, who had had to flee Italy due to his anti-religious views. Here, in Basel, he had the book printed for the first time, with a foreword written by himself, in 1556. This was the very first time that the book was published, as it had also not been included in the standard edition of Pomponazzi's collected works, published at Venice the year after his death, 1525 - presumably due to its dangerous and revolutionary views.In his preface, Gratarolo expresses fear that someone may think him either over curious or less Christian for publishing this book. He furthermore explains that he had purchased the manuscript 20 years earlier and brought it with him North when leaving Italy 6 years previously. "Granting, however, that there may be something in the work which does not entirely square with Christianity, Gratarolo thinks that it should not be suppressed or withheld from the scholarly public, since it contains more solid physics and abstruse philosophy than do many huge commentaries of certain authors taken together." (Thorndyke, V, p. 99-100). Come the Renaissance, the idea of eliminating demons and angels and attempts at a showdown with magical transformations and the like were not completely novel in themselves. Much scientific thinking of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance carried such beliefs that had in some form or other been current for a long time. But up until Pomponazzi's treatise, these ideas had always been surrounded by hesitance and a clear aim at still protecting the miraculous nature of Christianity itself, not leading the theories forward and not letting them bear any relevance. "Let us pause here a moment to estimate the place of this radical treatise [i.e. "De Incantationibus"] in the history of European rationalism. [...] It was Pomponazzi's achievement to go beyond these earlier hesitations and qualifications, particularly in regard to the astrological determination of religious belief. By dramatic shifts of emphasis and the extension of certain ideas to their logical limits, Pomponazzi utterly transformed the context in which these earlier views occurred. In their newly radicalized form, they challenged the supremacy of revelation by elevating philosophy to a position hitherto unattained in the Latin West". (Pine, p. 268)."[...] Even this brief sketch makes clear that Pomponazzi came at the end of a long scientific tradition which had absorbed, and to some degree, subordinated Aristotelian-Arabic science and astrology to the Christian universe. But if we look at each strand of this tradition, we can see how Pomponazzi carried these concepts to their furthest limits." (Pine, pp. 268-72). Pomponazzi clearly sought to explain all miraculous cures, events, etc. through natural powers. All sequences and concoctions which could seem magical or supernatural are within the same framework as other observed sequences and concoctions in nature. We may not be able to explain all of them (although Pomponazzi does attempt in the treatise to provide specific and elaborate natural, physical explanations of a large number of "magical" and "supernatural" events), but that is merely a lack in our intellect or understanding and by no means because these occurrences or events are not governed by nature and the physical laws of nature. "This whole mode of explanation of the marvelous in nature and history is constantly pitted against the orthodox theory which attributed magic and miracles to the agency of angels or demons. The book "De naturalium Effectuum Causis" is a uniform polemic against that theory, as essentially a vulgar superstition. It is the tendency of the vulgar mind, he says, always to ascribe to diabolic or angelic agency events whose causes it does not understand." (Douglas, p. 275). "These fictions are designed to lead us to truth and to instruct the common people who must be led to the good life and turned away from evil just like children, that is to say, by the hope of reward and the fear of punishment; and it is by these vulgar motives that they are led to spiritual knowledge, just as children pass from delicate nourishment to more solid nourishment. Hence it is not far from my concept or from the truth that Plato taught the existence of angels and demons not because he believed in them but because it was his aim to instruct the ignorant." (Pomponazzi, "De Incantationibus", 10, pp. 201-202).In order to understand the monumental accomplishment of Pomponazzi's "De Incantationibus", one must realize which tradition he is inscribed in, namely that of Italian Aristotelianism (as opposed mainly to the Renaissance Platonism). It is within this long tradition that he effects a revolution. "In the Italian schools alone the emerging science of nature did not mean a sharp break with reigning theological interests. To them it came rather as the natural outcome of a sustained and co-operative criticism of Aristotelian ideas. Indeed, that mathematical and mechanical development which by the end of the sixteenth century produced Galileo owes very little to the Platonic revival but received powerful stimulus from the critical Aristotelianism of the Italian universities." (Ren. Phil. of Man, p. 12).Pomponazzi stood at a crossroad in the history of Aristotelianism. He still studied the great logicians and natural philosophers of the 14th century, which his Italian humanistic colleagues had given up (focusing instead on "man" and his place in the universe), but at the same time he had a highly original approach to the teachings of Aristotle and a unique uninhibited approach to the nature of the universe, and he responded philosophically to the achievements of humanism, always seeking the truth and the "naturalist" explanation. Of that critical Aristotelianism which sought to find the true meaning of the works of Aristotle, lay them bare, and develop them further to find the true nature of the universe, to explain how the world functions without any preconceived notions (like the belief in Christ, etc.), Pomponazzi was a forerunner. With his "De Incantationibus", this "last scholastic and the first man of the Enlightenment" paved the way for the Enlightenment of the centuries to come, for rational free thinking. His quest against the theologians and "his scorn for all comfortable and compromising modernism in religion, and his sober vision of the natural destiny of man" (Randall, p. 268) combined with his refusal to leave the bounds of the Aristotelian tradition, his meticulous use of the medieval method of refutation, and his thorough rationalism, enabled him to revolutionize the Aristotelianism of the 16th century - and indeed the entire trajectory of philosophy of the ages to come - and invoke the period of scientific free-thinking that breaks free of Christian doctrines and which later comes to be the Enlightenment. "Against Pico's denial of astrology as incompatible with human freedom, he tried to make an orderly and rational science of the stars, opposed to all superstition - the naturalist's answer to the Humanist". (Randall, p. 277)."During the twelve decades or so between Pomponazzi's arrival (1484) and Galileo's departure in 1610, the learned community that Shakespeare called "fair Padua, nursery of arts", achieved a distinction in scientific and medical studies unmatched elsewhere in Europe. Thus, Pomponazzi's career in northern Italy brought him close to the most exciting advances of his time in science and medicine. In keeping with the nature of his university appointments, he approached Aristotle from a perspective quite distant from Bruni's humanism or Lefèvre's theologizing. [...] Pomponazzi's Aristotelianism developed entirely within the framework of natural philosophy". (Copenhaver & Schmitt, p. 105). "With this final explanation, Pomponazzi has discovered natural causes for all miraculous events and hence has eliminated the miracle as a category for understanding the process of nature. [...] As we have seen, Pomponazzi's theory offers three fundamental natural explanations of events which Christianity ascribes to the miraculous intervention of angels and demons. [...] Here Pomponazzi's method takes its most radical turn. Biblical miracles are now also found to have natural causes. Moses, we learn, performed his task by natural means. The "dead" revived by the prophets were not really dead. And the acts of Christ and the Apostles can be explained "within natural limits"." (Pine, pp. 254-56)."The histories of other religions record miracles similar to those of Christianity, and Pomponazzi justifies his frequent citation of historians in a philosophical work as authorities for past natural events of rare occurrence. Such is the most detailed and carefully worked out, the most plausible and at the same time most sweeping expression of the doctrine of astrological control over the history and development of religions that I have seen in any Latin author." (Thorndyke V, pp. 108-9).FULLER DESCRIPTION AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST-

Berlin u. Libau, Lagarde und Friederich, 1790. 8vo (204 x 135 x 60 mm). Near contemporary marbled paper binding with gilt green title-label to spine. Hinges and capitals neatly restored. Old ownership-stamp to title-page. Mid-nineteenth-century Viennese bookseller's label to pasted-down back end-paper. Occasional light foxing in some margins, otherwise clean and bright. Printed on special, heavy paper, making the volume nearly double the thickness of regular copies. LVIII, 476 pp., (1) f. (errata). Extremely rare copy, printed on special paper, of the first edition of Kant's seminal "Critique of Judgment", the third and last of his critiques, which "Kant himself regarded [..] as the coping-stone of his critical edifice; it even formed the point of departure for his successors, Fichte, Schelling and Hegel, in the construction of their respective systems." (J.H. Bernard in the introduction to his translation of "Critique of Judgment). THIS MAGNIFICENT COPY IS UNLIKE ANY OTHER WE HAVE SEEN - ONE OF ONLY FOUR OR FIVE PRESENTATION-COPIES PRINTED ON SPECIAL PAPER THAT KANT HIMSELF REQUESTED FROM THE PRINTER, TO BE GIVEN TO A HANDFUL OF NAMED RECIPIENTS. From a letter to Lagarde from January 21st 1790 (see "Briefwechsel von Imm. Kant", ed. Fischer, Müller, 1912, pp. 110-11), we know that Kant had requested 20 author's copies, four of them to be printed on special paper. While the book was in the press, Kant sent Lagarde a list of presentees to whom copies on special paper should be sent. He now named five recipients, so we assume that five copies were printed on special paper, instead of the original requested four copies. The recipients were: Count J.N. Windisch-Grätz, F.H Jacobi, K.L. Reinhold, L.H. Jacob and J.F. Blumenbach (see letter to Lagarde, March 25th, 1790, "Briefwechsel von Imm. Kant", ed. Fischer, Müller, 1912, pp. 126-7). As far as we know, none of these five presentation-copies have been traced and we have never seen one of them before. Neither do we know which of the five recipients received the present copy.Together with his two other critiques, the "Critique of Judgment" arguably constitutes the most important contribution to philosophy since Aristotle and Plato. Kant's seminal third critique was extremely influential from the time of its appearance - Goethe said said it was the first philosophical book ever to move him, and Fichte called it "the crown of the critical philosophy"; "...not only did Goethe think highly of it, but it received a large measure of attention in France as well as in Germany on its first appearance. Originally published at Berlin in 1790, a Second Edition was called for in 1793; and a French translation was made by Imhoff in 1796. Other French versions are those by Keratry and Weyland in 1823, and by Barni in 1846." (J.H. Bernard). In the "Critique of Judgment", Kant develops philosophical aesthetics and teleology that comprises nature and art. This aesthetics fulfills an essential systematic function in the Kantian architectonic. It bridges the gap between reason and nature, thus serving as a complement to practical reason of which Kant had proposed a critique two years earlier.The third critique is essential to an understanding of Kant's project of a critical philosophy. It is here that he seeks to join the dimensions of human experience which he had laid bare in the two previous critiques. A number of the conceptual foundations he had laid from 1782 break down, as he tries to demonstrate that aesthetics mediates between the realm of sensibility and that of reason.In order to do so, he sets out to show that aesthetic intuition ranges over both realms. The key to this demonstration is the claim that the two realms are isomorphic. However, as Kant considers the aesthetic judgment of the products of man's artistic invention, he cannot fit them into the format of a teleology of nature. Instead, he develops a conceptual framework for aesthetic judgment which explains why the first section on the faculty of aesthetic judgment swelled to the point of dwarfing the section on the teleology of nature.In the third critique the tension which inhere in the project of a critical philosophy rises to the surface. The third critique thus provides us with an invaluable glimpse into the actual workings of the mental faculties that Kant attempted to chart in his philosophy. For this very reason, the third critique provided the point of departure for much of later idealist philosophy, especially that of Hegel whose speculative philosophy can be seen as an articulation of the topics which Kant had uncovered in the third critique. "...the Critique of Judgement completes the whole undertaking of criticism; its endeavour is to show that there are a priori principles at the basis of Judgement just as there are in the case of Understanding and of Reason; that these principles, like the principles of Reason, are not constitutive but only regulative of experience, i.e. that they do not teach us anything positive about the characteristics of objects, but only indicate the conditions under which we find it necessary to view them; and lastly, that we are thus furnished with an a priori philosophy of pleasure." (J.H. Barnard). Warda: 125.

London, Joannis Haviland, 1623 [later altered in manuscript to 1624]. Small folio. Bound in a lovely early 19th century full vellum binding with gilt borders to boards and gilt ornamentations and gilt title-label to spine.Lower front hinge cracked, but bindning still tight. A bit of edge wear, but overall very nice. Woodcut title-vignettes (burning heart) and woodcut initials in beginning. Text within single woodcut borders. (18), 493, (1 - errata) pp. Complete with both title-pages (no final blank). Old owner's name to title page (along with the dates 1624 and 1648), unlegible scribbles to second title-page, and "collated e perfect" in old hand to last leaf. A very nice and clean copy with good margins. The extremely rare first edition of what is arguably Bacon's main work "De Augmentis Scientiarum", in which he sets out to lay the foundations of science entirely anew and reform the process of knowledge for the advancement of learning. Bacon believes that the advancement of learning will ultimately relieve mankind from its miseries and needs, and as such he not only reformed the foundations of science, he also laid the philosophical foundations for the dawning of the Industrial age. His proposed change of the collective thought of mankind completely reshaped the entire course of science in history. The aim of the present work - to investigate and re-classify philosophy and the sciences - marks a turning point in the rhetorical and theoretical framework for science, which is still essential for our conceptions of proper methodology today.The "De Augmentis Scientarum" constitutes a greatly expanded and completely re-written version of the "Advancement of Learning" (1605). The Latin is by William Rawley, in close collaboration with Bacon himself, who oversaw the entire process. When speaking of "De Augmentis Scientiarum" one never refers the incomparable English forerunner of the work (which was only in 2 books as opposed to the 9 of the "De Augmentis Scientiarum"). The first English translation of the "De Augmentis Scientiarum" appeared in 1640 and is translated by Gilbert Wats as "Of the Advancement and Proficiencie of Learning".The "De Augmentis Scientiarum" was intended as Part 1 of Bacon's proposed, but never completed "Instauratio magna" (PMM 119). "Bacon conceived a massive plan for the reorganization of scientific method and gave purposeful thought to the relation of science to public and social life. His pronouncement "I have taken all knowledge to be my province" is the motto of his work... [His] proposal was "a total reconstruction of sciences, arts and all human knowledge... to extend the power and dominion of the human race... over the universe". The plan for this was to be set out in six parts: (1) a complete survey of human knowledge and learning; this was expounded in the "De Augmentis Scientiarum", 1623 (a greatly extended version of "The Advancement of Learning", 1605)... Of parts (3) to (5) only fragments were ever published; part (6) remained unwritten." (PMM 119 - the header being "The Advancement of Learning"). Francis Bacon's Great Instauration for learning and the sciences was thus to be introduced by his most important work, the "De Augmentis Scientiarum", which he himself considered the most fundamental for the project that caused him to be considered one of the fathers of modern science. "In "De augmentis scientiarum", which is concerned primarily with the classification of philosophy and the sciences, Bacon develops his influential view of the relation between science and theology. He distinguishes in traditional fashion between knowledge by divine revelation and knowledge by the senses, and divides the latter into natural theology, natural philosophy, and the sciences of man... Having placed his project within the complete framework of knowledge in true Aristotelian fashion, Bacon proceeds to demolish all previous pretentions to natural philosophy. His aim is to lay the foundations of science entirely anew, neither leaping to unproved general principles in the manner of the ancient philosophers nor heaping up unrelated facts in the manner of the "empirics" (among whom he counts contemporary alchemists and natural magicians). "Histories," or collections of data, are to be drawn up systematically and used to raise an ordered system of axioms that will eventually embrace all the phenomena of nature."... (D.S.B. I:374-75). For Bacon, this proposed reformation would lead to a great advancement in science and a progeny of new inventions that would relieve mankind of its miseries. His demand for a planned procedure of investigating all things natural marked a turning point in the rhetorical and theoretical framework for science, much of which still surrounds conceptions of proper methodology today.It is due to his "De Augmentis Scientiarum" that Bacon is referred to as the creator of empiricism. With this work and the work intended as the second of the Great Restauration project, the "Novum Organum, Bacon established and popularized inductive methodologies for scientific inquiry, that which we now call the Baconian method, or quite simply "the scientific method". With his belief in the possibility of the advancement of learning of relieving mankind from its miseries and needs, Bacon is furthermore considered the philosophical influence behind the dawning of the Industrial age. He continually proposes that all scientific work should be done for charitable purposes, as matter of alleviating mankind's misery, and that therefore science should be practical and have the purpose of inventing useful things that will improve the conditions of mankind. This proposed change of our collective mind changed the entire course of science in history. The state was no longer merely contemplative; it became a practical and inventive state - one that would have eventually led to the inventions that made possible the Industrial Revolutions of the following centuries.It is furthermore to be noted that it is in the present work that Bacon presents his cipher method for the first time. He had first mentioned the Biliteral Cypher in a brief paragraph of his "Advancement of Learning" in 1605, but it is in the present work that he details with illustrations how to write and use the Biliteral Cypher. As most will know, Bacon's Cypher has had the greatest of impact on modern Bacon-Shakespeare scholarship. Almost all theories of Bacon as the true author of the Shakespearian corpus can be traced back to the cipher that is presented in 1624 in the "De Augmentis Scientiarum"."The system has been recognized, and used, since the day that "De Augmentis" was published, and has had its place in every translation and publication of that work since, but the ages have waited to learn that it was embedded in the original books themselves from the date of his earliest writings (1579 as now known) and infolded his secret personal history." (Elizabeth Wells Gallup, The Bi-Literal Cypher of Sir Francis Bacon Discovered in His Works and Deciphered, p. 48).As is known, since the 19th century, many people have suggested that the plays attributed to William Shakespeare were in fact written by Francis Bacon, and that the published plays contain enciphered messages to that effect. Both Ignatius L. Donnelly and Elizabeth Wells Gallup attempted to find such messages by looking for the use of Bacon's cipher in early printed editions of the plays.For roughly a century from 1850, Bacon's Cypher set the world of literature on fire. A passion for puzzles, codes, and conspiracies fuelled a widespread suspicion that Shakespeare was not the author of his plays. Professional and amateur scholars from all places all over the world have spent extraordinary amounts of time, energy, and money combing Renaissance texts in search of signatures and other messages that would reveal the true identity of their author. Also great authors and thinkers have been convinced that Shakespeare's works contained a secret message. These include Mark Twain, Walt Whitman, Sigmund Freud, Henry James, Henry Miller, etc. Francis Bacon, with his biliteral cipher -Renaissance England's first and clearest statement about how to hide texts within texts - became the leading candidate for the holder of the key to the puzzle.The cipher, which consists in an alphabet, was first printed in the present first edition, in 1623. It is to be found in Book 6, Chapter 1. It was reprinted in all the later editions of the work (2nd ed. Paris, 1624; London, 1638; English translation, Oxford, 1640) and the alphabet in all are substantially the same. Bacon devised this ingenious code in the late 1570s (when he spent three years in the entourage of the English ambassador in France), but he did not describe its workings until 1623. "Bacon gives both mathematics and analogy which he considers a science and calls "grammatical philosophy," a high place in his Great Instauration; which, when used together help to unlock the doors to that which Bacon has deliberately concealed-- including certain mysteries hidden in the Shakespeare plays. For instance, the two great books published in 1623 were the Shakespeare's Folio "Comedies, Histories & Tragedies" and Bacon's "De Augmentis Scientiarum" {the philosophical background and purpose of the Shakespeare plays} two masterpieces published together, since they are as twins, each being a key to unlock hidden treasures in the other-- two relating to the twin faculties of the mind--imagination and reason--and both drawing upon the third faculty, memory." (Peter Dawkins, "Francis Bacon Herald of the New Age"). Bacon's Cypher, however, has not only been used as the key to the Shakespearian puzzle. It was in fact a highly important cryptographical invention, which constitutes on the the very first English works on the subject (predating Both Wilkins' "Mercury" And Falconer's "Cryptomenysis"). This is one of the earliest illustrations of a cipher intended to hide a text within a text.Not only is this the first edition of "de Augmentis Scientiarum", it is also the most correct, and in addition the most beautiful. "First edition, exceedingly scarce, and according to Archbishop Tenison, the "fairest and most correct edition." A copy is in the British Museum." (Lowndes I:95). Gibson 129a. With the date on both title-pages altered in manuscript, adding a "I", as in some copies (as also noted in the description of e.g. the copy in the Huntington). This was presumably done by either the printer or publisher to those copies that remained unsold at the end of 1623. A second edition of the "De Augmentis Scientiarum" appeared in Paris in 1624. The first English translations of "De Augmentis Scientiarum" appeared in 1640.We have not been able to locate a single copy of this first edition in auctions within the last 40 years.

Kiøbenhavn, Høppfner, (16. Martius, 1792). 4to. The entire volume of "Forordninger...", 1792 bound with the entire volumes of 1790 and 1791 as well in a very nice strictly contemporary brown full calf binding with four raised bands, gilt title-label and lovely gilt ornamentatiions to spine as well as the gilt, crowned monogram of King Chritian the VII to top of spine. Light wear and a closed tear to top capital. Otherwise in splendid condition, in- as well as ex-ternally. Stamp from the Danish Royal Military Library to front free end-paper. Pp. 69-71. [Entire volume: 146, 12 pp., 1 f. blank + 288, (8) pp., two folded tables + 323, (13) pp. woodcut vignettes of the Danish Elephant-order to title-pages]. Extremely rare first printing of the very first law anywhere in the world to abandon slave trade. From the library of King Christian VII, who passed the law, with his crowned gilt monogram to spine. With the completely groundbreaking "Forordning on Neger=Handelen" ("Decree about the Negro-Trade") of 1792, under King Christian VII, Denmark became the first country in the world to forbid slave-trade. Although the first law against slavery as such, not just slave-trade, would follow half a decade later, this first decree forbidding trading in slaves was a major milestone towards equality and freedom for all of mankind, in fact the very first of its kind in the entire world. Britain would be the next country to follow lead, and their first law against slave-trading was passed in 1807, 15 years after the Danish. After the British followed The US, Spain in 1811, Sweden in 1813, Netherlands in 1814, and France in 1817.From the 1660'ies until the end of the 18th century, about 111.000 slaves were sent from the Gold Coast in Danish Guinea to the Danish colony on the West-Indian islands St. Thomas, St. Jan, and St. Croix, this slave trade being part of a larger three-way trade between The Gold Coast, The West-Indian Islands, and Denmark. Weapons and alcohol were shipped from Denmark to Africa to buy slaves, and the slaves were transported to The West-Indies, from where other goods, especially sugar, were shipped back to Denmark. During the last decades of the 18th century, many Europeans were having concerns with the continuation of trading with slaves. One of these was the Danish Minister of Finance, himself a plantation owner, Ernst Schimmelmann (1747-1831), who was instrumental in the Royal Decree against slave-trade being formulated and passed. He was clearly affected by the general tendencies and the new Enlightenment view of mankind, the freedom and rights of man, and the question of the decency of trading in human beings. There was also a financial aspect of the wish to forbid slave trade, as it was beginning to become clear that society was moving towards a more humanistic view of all of mankind that would eventually make slave trading difficult. And apart from that there was also the question whether it was even profitable to transport slaves all the longs way over the Atlantic Ocean. Whatever the bearing arguments might have been, the present decree is a groundbreaking document that catapulted Denmark into a modern, humane world, 15 years before any other country, helping to spark a world-wide legal movement that was absolutely essential in order for the world to evolve into one that is free, humane, and equal for all of mankind.

1870-1872. Folio-oblong (395 x 320 mm). Original brown half calf, recased - the original cloth (with gilt lettering to the front) has been expertly mounted on to the new boards, and most of the original gilt leather spine has been preserved over a perfectly matching new lovely brown half calf. "Tordenskjold / 1870 - 1873" in gilt lettering, partly worn of, to front board. End-papers renewed. 71 albumen print in various sizes and by various photographers (see below) mounted on 59 contemporary white cardboard leaves (measuring 370 x 310 mm), all re-hinged. The album was water-damaged at some point, but has been expertly and neatly restored and appears in overall very good condition with good tones. 1, Oval photo of Tordenskjold (205 x 60mm) 2, Photo of Tordenskjold (190 x 143 mm) 3, Crew aboard Tordenskjold (200 x 14 mm) 4, Crew aboard Tordenskjold (157 x 128 mm) 5, Crew and equipment aboard Tordenskjold (228 x 176 mm) 6, Naval officers about Tordenskjold (167 x 130 mm). 7, 8 small photos of various places on one plate (274 x 190 mm) 8, The harbor of Port Said. By Hippolyte Arnoux (247 x 190mm) 9, Muddigging machines in the channel of Port Said. By Hippolyte Arnoux. (245 x 190mm) 10, Port Said. By Hippolyte Arnoux. 11, Malta (262 x 207 mm) 12, Two photos of Malta (each measuring 134 x 120 mm) 13, Two photos of Gibraltar (Each measuring 148 x 114) 14, Deep Water Bay, Hong Kong (194 x 130 mm). 15, Two photos depicting telegraph-house and ships in Deep Water Bay (each measuring 150 x 112) 16, Boat with people. By Felice Beato, coloured (294 x 235 mm) 17, House next to river. By John Thomson, December 1870 (278 x 225 mm) 17, Seamen’s hospital in Hong Kong. (261 x 190 mm) 18, Hong Kong. (270 x 195 mm) 19, Hong Kong, by Floyd (270 x 192 mm) 20, Hong Kong, by Floyd (240 x 190 mm) 21, Two photos of sites in Hong Kong (each measuring 165 x 127 mm) 22, Five Persians in Hong Kong (215 x 244 mm) 23, Group of women in Hong Kong, (326 x 215 mm) 24, Two photos of Hong Kong harbour, one photo depicting “Cella” (182 x 105; 130 x 98 mm) 25, Villa at Canton. (264 x 190 mm) 26, Pagode in Xuexiu Park, Guangdong. By William Pryor Floyd. (195 x 246 mm) 27, Boats in Canton. William Pryor Floyd,(270 x 223 mm) 28, Pou-Ting-Qua’s Garden, Canton. By John Thomson. (289 x 230 mm) 29, Fields in Canton. (205 x 155 mm) 30, Houses in Canton. (267 x 210 mm) 31, Canton harbor. By John Thomson. (245 x 202 mm) 32, Boat on the Canton river. (274 x 204 mm) 33, Wall around Canton. (260 x 200 mm). 34, Boats in Canton (293 x 225) 35, Telegraphstation in Woosung. (150 x 110 mm) 36, Boats in Foochow. (287 x 232 mm) 37, Temple in Foochow. By John Thomson (190 x 237 mm) 38, Pagode in Foochow. Presumably by John Thomson. (287 x 220 mm). 39, Tomb of Fou Tcheou. By John Thomson. (290 x 225 mm). 40, Temple in Shanghai. (237 x 188 mm). 41, Shanghai. (232 x 176 mm) 42, Chaochow bridge, Kwangtung. By John Thomson. (266 x 204 mm). 43. Panorama of Nagasaki consisting of two photos. (371 x142 mm) 44, Two photos of Nagasaki. Felice Beato. (Each measuring 169 x 119 mm). 45, Two photos from Nagasaki. Presumably by Felice Beato. (Each measuring 165 x 118 mm) 46, Two photos from Nagasaki. Presumably by Felice Beato. (Each measuring 165 x 118 mm) 47, Temple in Nagasaki. Presumably by Felice Beato. (169 x 118 mm). 48, Photo of Japanese woman in kimono. By Felice Beato. (205 x 255 mm). 49, Two photos of officers in house in Yokohama. (162 x 125 mm). 50, The Abbot and Monks of Kushan Monastery. By John Thomson. (287 x 204 mm). 51, Wooden structure, presumably Nagasaki. Presumably by Felice Beato. (270 x 208 mm) 52, Pagode, presumably Nagasaki. Presumably by Felice Beato. (234 x 185 mm) 53, Cityscape with lake, presumably Nagasaki. Presumably by Felice Beato.. (280 x 228 mm). 54, Two photos, cemetery and stairs to temple. By Felice Beato. (Each measuring 168 x 118 mm). 55, People standing outside house, presumably Hong Kong. By John Thomson. (185 x 155 mm) 56, Guangzhou Great Norh Gate, Canton. By John Thomson (245 x 156 mm). 57, Two photos, one of the building of a telegraph station (presumably in Wladivostok) and a view of Wladivostok from the sea (154 x 123; 130 x 99 mm). 58, Seascape of two ships. (130 x 140 mm). 59, Ship laying for anchor. (170 x 123 mm) Exceedingly rare photo-album documenting the Danish vessel Tordenskjold’s mission in laying the very first telegraph cables in East Asia thereby connecting China and Japan to the global telegraph system. The album consists of photos taken aboard the vessel Tordenskjold, of Tordenskjold itself along with its crew, by an unknown photographer, and of photographs of the visited cities and surrounding areas by some of the finest photographers operating in East Asia at the time, such as John Thomson, William Floyd, Felice Beato and, in Egypt, Hippolyte Arnoux - all photographs presumably brought home by William Lund, Captain on board Tordenskjold. Through some of the earliest photos taken in China, Japan, and of the excavation of the Suez Canal, the present album depicts a pivotal moment in international relations and communications. Submarine telegraph cables were first brought to China by Danish magnate Carl Fredrick Tietgen (1829-1901), who in 1870 set up the Great Northern China and Japan Extension Company. The company was created to build and operate a telegraph cable connecting Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Japan, continuing on to Vladivostok on Russia's East coast. From Vladivostok, a cable ran along the Trans-Siberian Railway, linking Hong Kong to telegraph networks in Britain, Europe, and America. Tietgen fought off strong competition - primarily English-, and eventually won the concession to lay and operate new telegraph cables connecting Russia, China and Japan. Tietgen and his partners had embarked upon a grand and risky project. Undersea cables would need to be laid in waters that had not been sounded, cables were to be brought ashore on coasts where the prevailing conditions were not known, and it was uncertain whether the respective governments would grant permission. Everything – cables, stations, wire, and apparatus – was to be brought from Europe and had to function as a coherent system. Two chartered English steamships ‘Cella’ and ‘Great Northern’ were to transport and lay the cables, and the propeller-driven Danish frigate ‘Tordenskjold’ was to sound the waters near Nagasaki and Vladivostok, it had to also carry a relatively small amount of cables, and it was to keep away uninvited guests (of which there were plenty in the South China Sea). “As a small nation with negligible military resources, Denmark could provide a useful – politically neutral – centre for telegraph links to major European powers such as Britain, Russia and the emerging new power of Prussia. The Danes were able to utilize the technical know-how which had been accumulated with great difficulty, and occasionally heavy economic losses, in the preceding decades by British and American entrepreneurs. The competition between the Danish and British groups of telegraph entrepreneurs for first access to the Chinese market was preliminarily resolved when the directors of the two companies negotiated a secret agreement in May 1870. The Danish group had acquired an advantage in terms of timing by winning the Russian concession in 1869, and had to cover shorter distances by sea cables from Vladivostok to Nagasaki and Shanghai. But the British group had the advantage of better access to capital and a more extensive technical experience with submarine cable manufacture and operation. The essence of the agreement was that the line between Hong Kong and Shanghai should be established and operated by the Great Northern; the companies would share the income for telegrams which passed this section of the line and they would run offices in Hong Kong and Shanghai jointly. The agreement provided the Danes with assured landing rights in Hong Kong and with British diplomatic support for attempts to secure landing rights in China. Permission to bring submarine telegraph cables into Chinese treaty ports was obtained in 1870 from the Chinese Government (i.e., the office of foreign affairs, known as the Zongli Yamen) by the British Minister in Peking, Thomas Wade. At the same time, the Danish government had dispatched a diplomatic envoy, Chamberlain Julius Sick, at the Great Northern’s expense to China and Japan to obtain the necessary concessions. The cable between Hong Kong and Shanghai was laid in 1870–1871 with the assistance of the frigate Tordenskjold, which the Danish government had generously allocated to the task. The Great Northern had a great deal of technical problems with the cables they had bought from the British manufacturer since the quality of the insulation was not as good as expected. Therefore, the official opening of the line between Shanghai and Hong Kong was delayed until April 1871. During the remainder of that year the company struggled to finish cable sections from Shanghai to Nagasaki, and from Nagasaki to Vladivostok. Communication between Shanghai and Europe via these cables and the Russian Siberian lines was officially inaugurated on 1 January 1872.” (Erik Baark: Wires, Codes and People The Great Northern Telegraph Company in China 1870–90) The album covers and illustrates one on the most fascinating periods in the process of internationalization in the late modern period: The Suez Canal had just opened and ‘Tordenskjold’ was the first Danish ship to sail through it. The submarine cables linked the major hubs in East Asia to the Western world and helped facilitate an unprecedented growth in the region. Overall, the laying of the submarine cable in 1870-71 was a transformative event for East Asia in general. It played a critical role in the area's economic and social development, helping to make it the global commercial center it is today.

Strassburg, Johann Pruss, 1502. 4to (195 x 137 mm). Bound in a beautiful 19th-century full calf binding with gilt lettering and ornamentation to spine, elaborate gilt borders to boards, inner gilt dentelles, gilt ornamentation to edges of boards. All edges gilt. Ex-libris to both front and back pasted-down end-papers and front and back free end-papers (see below). Title-page reinforced at inner margin and with loss of paper, slightly touching the woodcut illustration. Last leaf with marginal repair and a closed tear. 33 lines to a page. 24 ff. (A4, B6, C-D4, E6). Withbound are 33 blank leaves in the back. A very nice copy. 7 Woodcut illustrations in the text inspired by (but not an adaptation of) Brant's 'Das Narrenschiff'. Provenance:John William Beaumont Pease, 1st Baron Wardington (1869–1950)Christopher Henry Beaumont Pease, 2nd Baron Wardington (1924–2005)Lucy Anne Paese (1966 - ) Rare second edition - considered more attractive than the first, as it contains a short preface (on the verso of the title) by J. Wimpheling of Schlettstadt – of Badius’ ‘Ship of Female Fools’, a supplementary work to Sebastian Brant’s Ship of Fools, which Badius had translated into Latin. In his address to Marnef, the publisher of the original Latin edition of Brant’s work (1500), Badius explains that this book, ‘Ship of Female Fools’, serves to fill a gap left by Brant - specifically, the omission of satirical chapters on the faults and follies of women. The work consists of six chapters written in both Latin verse and prose, accompanied by seven woodcut illustrations (including the one on the title-page) that closely follow the Parisian original. These depict the Ships of Eve and the vessels representing the five senses. The ship of fools is an allegory, first appearing in Book VI of Plato's Republic, about a ship with a dysfunctional crew. The allegory is intended to represent the problems of governance prevailing in a political system not based on expert knowledge. The Basel humanist Sebastian Brant described in his famous ‘Narrenschiff’ (1494) a sea journey of 112 individuals representing the follies of human weakness and vice to 'Naragonia' the paradise of fools: 'The first original work by a German which passed into world literature, and helped to blaze the trail that leads from medieval allegory to modern satire, drama and novel of character' (PMM). “The Flemish humanist and publisher, Jodocus Badius Ascensius (Josse Bade van Asche), composed an additional text in Latin to Sebastian Brant’s Ship of Fools, in verse and prose addressed to an elite audience, entitled Stultifera navis sensus animosque tractans Mortis in exitium (The Ship of Female Fools and the Five Senses... drawn toward death and ruin). In the preface to his additamentum, Badius notes that he decided to complete the Brantian fleet by adding "a small boat, but with enormous capacity" dedicated to perilous female folly, since, "As I have remarked, the first blemish of mortals came more from the folly of woman than of man."” (Pinson, Led by Eve. The Large Ship of Female Fools and the Five Senses). ”In late medieval and early modern written and visual culture, woman, in the guise of Eve/Venus/Lust, incarnates danger and is conceived as a powerful temptress. The biblical story of the temptation casts the first woman as the deceiver of man, determining his fate. For the Fathers of the Church, Eve, the wicked temptress and devil’s accomplice, became the prototype of the powerful and fatal women whose sexual charms were irresistible to men. This nexus of ideas, particularly influential in northern humanistic circles, especially among the cultivated urban milieu, was incisively imagined as a train of perilous ships of female fools incarnating the senses by Jodocus Badius toward the end of the fifteenth century, elaborated by Jehan Drouyn to include female fools embodying the vices. Badius thus made plain his misogyny by regarding the "additional skiff" in the convoy of ships of fools. The small boat of foolish women, now annexed to Brant’s vision, completes the picture of the folly of mankind.” (Pinson Led by Eve. The Large Ship of Female Fools and the Five Senses) Badius’ work not only extends Brant’s satirical allegory but also reflects the deeply entrenched misogynistic perspectives of the late Medieval and early modern periods. By attributing the origins of folly to women and depicting them as the driving force behind moral corruption, Badius underlines the prevailing theological and humanistic views that saw female nature as inherently dangerous and deceptive.'Ship of Female Fools' serves as both a literary expansion of Narrenschiff and a fine testament documenting the anxieties and gendered biases of its time. Adams B-24.Brunet I, 607. BM STC German, 1455-1600, p. 62.

Kiøbenhavn, Andreas Seidelin, 1820. 8vo. In contemporary brown half calf with lighter brown leather title-label with gilt lettering. All edges coloured in blue. In: "Dansk Litteratur = Tidende for Aaret 1820". (The entire volume 1820 present, comprising all 52 issues, numbered 1-52). Light wear to extremities, spine with a few scratches. With occassional brownspotting, primarily affecting first and last leaves, but generally nice and clean. (Entire volume:) X, 822 pp. (Oersteds paper's in issue no. 28:) pp. 447-448. The exceedingly rare very first announcement of H. C. Ørsted’s landmark discovery of electromagnetism, predating his famous “Experimenta”-paper by at least a week. Publishing the present brief note allowed him to quickly claim priority for his discovery, which ensured that his work would be recognized and attributed to him before others potentially stole his discovery. The importance of the discovery of electromagnetism, one of the most pivotal moments in the history of science, can hardly be overestimated. Here, Ørsted laid both the theoretical and practical foundation for future works of Faraday, Maxwell, and Hertz. The offered paper was published in the 28th week of July, 1820 (No. 28 of the periodical), which means that it was published some time between July 11 and July 16, probably the 11th or 12th. The paper which made Oersted famous all over Europe was his Latin pamphlet "Experimenta circa effectum conflictus electrici in acun magneticam. Hafniæ, 1820", dated July 21, 1820. The Latin “Experimenta” was sent on the same day (according to Kirstine Meyer in "Scientific Life and Works of H.C. Ørsted") to learned bodies and scholars in all European countries. The communication offered here (in Danish) was published at least a week before "Experimenta". The essence of Oersted's discovery is detailed in the paper offered here, where he describes how the magnetic effect of an electric current-carrying wire was initially observed using an incandescent platinum wire. He then extended his experiments to non-incandescent wires made from various materials noting that the magnetic effect was influenced by the wire's dimensions. Among Oersted's papers (now in the holding of the Danish Royal Library), we have both a draft written in his own hand on acid-stained paper and a nearly identical version in another handwriting. These experimental notes form the basis of the present paper (which Kirstine Meyer refers to as "Supplement II"). In Supplements III and IV (dated July 15 and 21), Oersted further elaborates on his experiments with the wire in different positions relative to the magnet which became his “Experimenta”-paper. “Electromagnetism itself was discovered in the year 1820, by Professor Hans Christian Oersted, of the University of Copenhagen. Throughout his literary career, he adhered to the opinion, that the magnetical effects are produced by the same powers as the electrical. He was not so much led to this, by the reasons commonly alleged for this opinion, as by the philosophical principle, that all phenomena are produced by the same original power. … His researches upon this subject, were still fruitless, until the year 1820. In the winter of 1819–20, he delivered a course of lectures upon electricity, galvanism, and magnetism, before an audience that had been previously acquainted with the principles of natural philosophy. In composing the lecture, in which he was to treat of the analogy between electricity and magnetism, he conjectured, that if it were possible to produce any magnetical effect by electricity, this could not be in the direction of the current, since this had been so often tried in vain, but that it must be produced by a lateral action. This was strictly connected with his other ideas; for he did not consider the transmission of electricity through a conductor as an uniform stream, but as a succession of interruptions and reestablishments of equilibrium, in such a manner that the electrical powers in the current were not in quiet equilibrium, but in a state of continual conflict.… The plan of the first experiment was to make the current of a little galvanic trough apparatus, commonly used in his lectures, pass through a very thin platina wire, which was placed over a compass covered with glass. The preparations for the experiments were made, but some accident having hindered him from trying it before the lecture, he intended to defer it to another opportunity; yet during the lecture, the probability of its success appeared stronger, so that he made the first experiment in the presence of the audience. The magnetical needle, though included in a box, was disturbed; but as the effect was very feeble, and must, before its law was discovered, seem very irregular, the experiment made no strong impression on the audience [“Thermo-electricity,” in Edinburgh Encyclopaedia (1830), XVIII, 573–589; repr. in Oersted’s Scientific Papers, II, 356]. “We have now reached the spring of 1820. Ørsted understood that the “feeble” disturbance of the compass needle seen in his lecture demonstration was a genuinely important discovery. Other duties prevented a more detailed and quantitative investigation of this effect until the beginning of July 1820. Ørsted had new laboratory facilities and a more powerful galvanic apparatus that facilitated his measurements. Confident that his experiments would have a successful outcome, he gathered a group of six distinguished observers who would serve as witnesses of his experiments. (Their names and credentials were duly noted in the written description of his investigations.) He set about an exhaustive series of measurements aimed at documenting how the distance and orientation of a current-carrying wire affected the deflection of a compass needle. He made copious notes and drawings, many of which can be seen in Det Kongelige Bibliotek in Copenhagen. ” (Karen Jelved & Andrew D. Jackson, H. C. Ørsted and the Discovery of Electromagnetism, 2019). But before the above mentioned Latin paper was published - which within the same year was reprinted in England, France, Germany and Italy - Oersted made sure to secure his discovery and consequently eternal fame by publishing the present paper.OCLC only list three copies (Danish Royal Library, Houghton, Harvard, USA & British Library). Bibliotheca Danica IV: 535 (The periodical was published from 1811-36). Erslew "Almindeligt Forfatterlexicon", Bd. III, p. 688. (Dibner 61, PMM 282, Horblitt 3 b, Sparrow 152, Norman 1606 - all 4 only recording the later "Experimenta").

Riga, Hartknoch, 1781. 8vo. Comtemporary - possibly the original! - beige cardboard-binding with contemporary handwritten paper title-label to spine. Spine relaid, preserving the paper-label, with front hinge neatly reastored, perfectly matching the original paper. Smaller, hardly noticeable, restorations to back hinge and upper capital. All edges coloured in red. Front free end-paper with restorations to upper outer corner. Library-stamp (Stadt-Bibliothek Homburg) to recto and verso of title-page as well as blank part of f. a2r, all with deaccession-stamps over. Internally exceptionally nice, clean, and fresh, with hardly any spotting of any kind. Overall an excellent copy. (24), 856 pp. Rare first edition of Kant's monumental main work, arguably the most important work in the history of philosophy since Aristotle.The "Critique of Pure Reason" took Kant about a decade to write, and the work is of the utmost scarcity. It is due to this work that Kant became world famous as one of the three or four greatest philosophers of all times, and the work fundamentally changed the face of philosophy. With this work philosophy is finally provided with a new and comprehensive way of dealing systematically with the problems of philosophy. "In 1770 Kant became professor of logic and metaphysics, and at this point there is a sudden falling off in number of his publications. The cause of this became clear eleven years later when "The Critique of Pure Reason" appeared; and with it Kant became famous. Kant's great achievement was to conclude finally the lines on which philosophical speculation had proceeded in the eighteenth century, and to open up a new and more comprehensive system of dealing with the problems of philosophy... The influence of Kant is paramount to the critical method of modern philosophy. No other thinker has been able to hold with such firmness the balance between speculative and empirical ideas. His penetrating analysis of the elements involved in synthesis, and the subjective process by which these elements are realized in the individual consciousness, demonstrated the operation of "pure reason", and the simplicity and cogency of his arguments achieved immediate fame." (PMM 226). Hook & Norman 1197.PMM 226.Warda 59.

Königsberg, Friedrich Nicolovius, 1793. 8vo. In the original bluish cardboardbinding, with handwritten title to spine. Binding very neatly restored at spine and extremities. Previous owner's inscriptions to front free end-paper and title-page as well as pasted-down front end-paper. One leaf with a tiny closed tear to blank outer margin and some leaves with a single hole to the blank outer margin. Light pencil-underlinings and -markings to a few leaves. Internally clean and fresh. Printed on very heavy paper (about three times the thickness of the normal paper) and with wide margins. XX, (2), 296, (2, -errata) pp. Housed in a beautiful marbled half calf box in pastiche-style, with splendidly gilt spine and gilt morrocco title-label. Extremely rare presentation-copy inscribed by the recipient, a close friend of Kant, Johann Gottfried Hasse, to whom Kant gave the present copy. The copy is one of no more than perhaps five copies printed on special paper of the first edition of Kant's "Religion Within the Boundaries of Mere Reason", the seminal work in which he develops his religion of reason and most fully accounts for his philosophy of religion.This magnificent copy is completely unique. Not only is one of only four or five presentation-copies printed on special paper - perhaps less - that Kant himself requested from the printer, to be given to a handful of recipients; we also know to whom it was given, namely his close friend and professor of religion Johann Gottfreind Hasse. And Hasse has not only put his ownership signature in the book, he has also noted that it was given to him by Kant in the year of publication ("Donum auctoris 1793").We have not been able to find information anywhere about the presentation-copies of "Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen Vernunft" specifically. There is nothing in the Kant-correspondence about that at all, and no letters to/from the publisher about them have been preserved. But we know that Kant commissioned four or five copies of "Critik der Urtheilskraft" on special paper and four copies of "Critik der reinen Vernunft". The present copy is clearly on special paper as well (about three times the size of copies on normal paper), so even though it is not mentioned anywhere, it is fair to assume that Kant also ordered about a handful copies of "Religion..." to be printed on special paper as well. However, this number might be smaller. As opposed to the other two books that we know he commissioned these copies of, the publication of "Religion..." was caught up in a controversy over censorship, and Kant was given a reprimand in the name of the Prussian emperor, Friedrich Wilhelm II. Kant was forced to pledge not to publish on matters of religion. Furthermore, copies of the "Religion..." on special paper seem not to have appeared anywhere, as opposed to the very few copies of the two other works that have surfaced; so all in all, there is absolutely no reason to think that he should have commissioned more than four or five copies of this book either. The inscription to the front free end-paper is in Hasse's hand and reads "(Donum auctoris 1793.)/ J.G. Hasse". The name of Hasse has been crossed out by the later owner, who has written his name underneath "N. Grosch...(?)/ stud. Theol./ Som[mer]. Semest[er]. [18]05" and on the title-page.The Königsberg professor J.G. Hasse (1759-1806) was a close friend of Kant and a frequent guest at his dinner table. He was a then famous German evangelist theologian and orientalist. After having graduated from the University of Jena in 1784, he became assistant professor at the faculty of philosophy there. Due to his very respected publications within science of religion, he became professor of oriental languages and later professor of theology, which is the position he possessed, when Kant gave him the present copy of his own main work on religion. A few years later, in 1801, he took over Kant's position at the academic Senate, after Kant retired from academic life. And in the last years of Kant's life, Hasse grew even closer to him. He was a frequent guest in his home and a close friend. Hasse was furthermore one of the first to publish a biography of Kant. This biography became particularly famous, because it was written by someone in the inner circle of friends. There is no doubt that Kant had tremendous respect for the renowned professor of religion, to whom he gave one of the only four or five copies printed on special paper of his own definitive work on religion. This is presumably the best presentation- or association-copy of a Kant-book that one can hope to come across. Warda: 141.

Paris, Gosselin, 1835-40. Lex 8vo. Bound in two excellent contemporary uniform black half calf bindings with blindstamped ornamentation and gilt lettering to spines. Only the slightest signs of wear to extremities. Some browning and brownspotting due to the paper quality, but overall in very nice condition. A few leaves in volume one with marginal markings. (4), XXIV, 365, (3) + (4), 455 pp. + folded, coloured map + (2), V, (3), 333, (1) + (4), 363 pp. An excellent set of the first edition of Tocqueville's monumental "Democracy in America", one of the most important texts in the history of political thought. Being the founding treatise of conservative liberalism and democracy in the 19th century, and generally "one of the most important texts on political literature" (PMM, p. 217), ""De la démocratie en Amérique"" is a classic of social sience, an analysis on the nature and institutions of American society. Beside the "Federalist Papers", it is considered one of the most significant works ever written on American political and civil life" (Books that made Europe p. 206). It is rare to find all four volumes contemporarily bound, and especially in as nice condition as here. Goldsmiths 28902-3.

Frankfurt a. M., 1845. 8vo. Contemporary black half calf. Professionally rebacked. Title-page somewhat dusty and re-hinged. VIII, 335, (1) pp. Incredibly scarce first edition of one the most significant political publications of the 19th century, the first joint work of Marx and Engels, leading to a life-long association that would change the world. "The Holy Family" is one of the most fundamental works in the history of communism and contains the first formulations of a number of fundamental theses of dialectical and historical materialism. For instance, it is here that the idea of mass/the people as the actual maker of the history of mankind is put forth for the first time and here that Marx shows that communism is the logical conclusion of materialistic philosophy.The work became incredibly influential and caused great uproar. Lenin claimed that it was this work that laid the foundations for scientific revolutionary materialist socialism.At the end of August, 1844, Engels passed through Paris,on his way to Manchester. It was here that he met Marx (then for the second time).Marx suggested that the two of them should write a critique of Young Hegelian trend of thought then very popular in academic circles. They decided to co-author the foreword and divided up the other sections between them. Engels had already finished his chapters before leaving Paris after 10 days. Marx had the larger share of work, which he completed by the end of November 1844.The general title, "The Holy Family", was added at the suggestion of the publisher Lowenthal, being a sarcastic reference to the Bauer brothers and their supporters." "The Holy Family, or Critique of Critical Critique. Against Bruno Bauer and Co." is the first joint work of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels. At the end of August 1844 Marx and Engels met in Paris and their meeting was the beginning of' their joint creative work in all fields of theoretical and practical revolutionary activity. By this time Marx and Engels had completed the transition from idealism to materialism and from revolutionary democratism to communism. The polemic The Holy Family was written in Paris in autumn 1844. It reflects the progress in the formation of Marx and Engels's revolutionary materialistic world outlook.In "The Holy Family" Marx and Engels give a devastating criticism of the subjectivist views of the Young Hegelians from the position of militant materialists. They, also criticize Hegel's own idealistic philosophy: giving credit for the rational element in his dialectics, they criticize the mystic side of it.The Holy Family formulates a number of fundamental theses of dialectical and historical materialism. In it Marx already approaches the basic idea of historical materialism - the decisive role of the mode of production in the development of society. Refuting the idealistic views of history which had dominated up to that time, Marx and Engels prove that of themselves progressive ideas can lead society only beyond the ideas of the old system and that "in order to carry out ideas men are needed who dispose of a certain practical force." (See p. 160 of the present edition.) The proposition put forward in the book that the mass, the people, is the real maker of the history of mankind is of paramount importance. Marx and Engels show that the wider and the more profound a change taking place in society is the more numerous Me mass effecting that change will Re Lenin especially stressed the importance of this thought and described it as one of the most profound and most important theses of historical materialism.The Holy Family contains the almost mature view of the historic role of the proletariat as the class which, by virtue of its position in capitalism, "can and must free itself" and at the same time abolish all the inhuman conditions of life of bourgeois society, for "not in vain does" the proletariat "go through the stern but steeling school of labour. The question is not what this or that proletarian, or even the whole of the proletariat at the moment considers as its aim. The question is what the proletariat is, and what, consequent on that being, it will be compelled to do." (pp. 52-53.)A section of great importance is "Critical Battle against French Materialism" in which Marx, briefly outlining the development of materialism in West-European philosophy, shows that communism is the logical conclusion of materialistic philosophy.The Holy Family was written largely under the influence of the materialistic views of Ludwig Feuerbach, who was, responsible to a great extent for Marx's and Engels's transition from idealism to materialism; the work also contains elements of the criticism of Feuerbach's metaphysical and contemplative materialism given by Marx in spring 1845 in his Theses on Feuerbach. Engels later defined the place of The Holy Family in the history of Marxism when he wrote: "The cult of abstract man, which formed the kernel of Feuerbach's new religion, had to be replaced by the science of real men and of their historical development. This further development of Feuerbach's standpoint beyond Feuerbach was inaugurated by Marx in 1845 in The Holy Family." (F. Engels, Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy.)The Holy Family formulates some of the basic principles of Marxist political economy. In contrast to the Utopian Socialists Marx bases the objective inevitability of the victory of communism on the fact that private property in its economic motion drives itself towards its downfall.The Holy Family dates from a period when the process of the formation of Marxism was not yet completed. This is reflected in the terminology used by Marx and Engels. Marxist scientific terminology was gradually elaborated and defined by Marx and Engels as the formation and development of their teaching progressed." (Introduction to the work by Foreign Languages Publishers)"The book made something of a splash in the newspapers. One paper noted, that it expressed socialist views since it criticised the "inadequacy of any half-measures directed at eliminating the social ailments of our time." The conservative press immediately recognized the radical elements inherent in its many arguments. One paper wrote that, in The Holy Family, "every line preaches revolt... against the state, the church, the family, legality, religion and property." It also noted that "prominence is given to the most radical and the most open communism, and this is all the more dangerous as Mr. Marx cannot be denied either extremely broad knowledge or the ability to make use of the polemical arsenal of Hegel's logic, what is customarily called 'iron logic.'Lenin would later claim this work laid the foundations for what would develop into a scientific revolutionary materialist socialism." (Marx Archive).