Timothy B. Wilder
Rare Books
Return to Home Page
AZAÏS, H. Des Compensations dans les Destinées Humaines. Paris:
Garnery & Leblanc, 1809. 1st ed. 8vo. [6], xvi, 335 pp. Later half cloth
and marbled boards. Some damp-marking of top margin of early leaves, not
affecting text, otherwise very good, fore- and bottom margins uncut. $125.00 "In 1809
[Azaïs] published his great work, Des Compensations dans les destinées
humaines (5th ed., 1846), which pleased Napoleon so much that he made its
author professor at St. Cyr.... In the Compensations he sought to prove
that, on the whole, happiness and misery are equally balanced, and therefore
that men should accept the government which is given them rather than risk the
horrors of revolution."-EB (13th ed.). It is not difficult to see
how Azaïs' views could be used to buttress the Ultramontanism of Maistre and
Lamenais. Moreover, the pseudo-science which underlay those views and the
fantastic conception of human progress they foretell, anticipate Positivism.
"Azaïs' philosophy is interesting in that he founds a highly optimistic
ethics upon a consistent materialism."--Boas, French Philosophy of the
Romantic Period. "It is certain, in spite of the shame with which
Frenchmen mention his name, that he was considered seriously by some men of
letters and by many amateurs of philosophy. He was the public philosopher of
the Empire. Under a Napoleonic régime, one could expect little more." (ibid.).
The RLIN database records a single copy of this 1809 edition, at Stanford. The Widener
Shelflist and the catalogue of the Hoose Library record only later
editions.
CARRIERE, MORITZ. Die philosophische Weltanschauung der
Reformationszeit in ihren Beziehungen zur Gegenwart. Stuttgart und Tübingen:
J.G. Cotta, 1847. 1st ed. 8vo. xi, [1], 750, [1 (errata)] pp. Mid-19th century
¾ green morocco and marbled boards, spine elaborately gilt (bright), marbled
edges. Joints a little rubbed, some spotty foxing on title and occasionally in
text. Very good. Early (Hungarian?) owner's label on front pastedown. $145.00 Steinhauer, Hegel
Bibliography 1603; Carriere is said to have been one of Hegel's last
students. Erdmann (III, pp. 205-206) states that the present work "was the
result of a sympathetic and profound acquaintance particularly with the
mystical notions of that time [i.e. the Reformation]. The fact that some
thought they could discover pantheistic touches in this work is easily
explained by its subject.... Carriere declared even at that time that he
wished...to reach a position above pantheism and dualistic theism; and he
subsequently indicated that his position was allied to that of Weisse, or that
of the younger Fichte; and besides these, he further referred to Ulrici and
Wirth...." Includes long chapters on Bruno (pp. 365-494), Campanella
(522-608) and Böhme ((609-725) and shorter ones on Cordano, Telesio and Vanini.
Carriere is credited with, among other things, the first use of the phrase
"comparative literature" in German (in Das Wesen und die Formen
der Poesie, 1854).
[CUREAU] DE LA CHAMBRE, [MARIN]. Le Systeme de L'Ame. Paris: Chez
Jacques D'Allin, 1665. 2nd ed. 12mo. [44], 554 pp. Cont. sheep, sprinkled edges,
spine gilt in panels with raised bands. Minor wear to corners, small gouge
along edge of spine. A very good, tight copy. $450.00
Cureau de la Chambre (1594-1669), a contemporary of
Descartes, was an influential figure in French letters. He served as physician
to Louis XIII and Louis XIV, and was elected to both the French Academy and the
Academy of Sciences. He published numerous medical, scientific and
philosophical treatises, the most famous in the latter category being Charactères
des Passions (1645). The present work, which first appeared in quarto the
previous year, was one of several by the author bearing upon the issue of the
animal soul, a question which permeated French philosophy in the 17th century.
"Cureau de La Chambre was [like Gassendi] another noteworthy predecessor
of the empirical view. He applied the adjective 'rational' to the mental
processes of animals. Thus...he resembled the Gassendists in refusing sharply
to sever, as had Descartes, the nature of animals from that of man. He may be considered
a link between Peripateticism, from which movement he sprang, and Gassendism,
with which system his name is associated. In a sense he was a forerunner of
Locke, through his restoration of the Scholastic distinction between particular
and universal ideas. The former he identified with the objects of sense and
allowed to beasts; the latter he saw as the result of the faculty of
abstraction, man's unique privilege among created beings. In brief, Cureau de
La Chambre helped pave the way toward the empirical judgment of animals,
according to which they are not far below man in capacity for sensory knowledge
and inferior reasoning about particulars."--Rosenfeld, From
Beast-Machine to Man-Machine. Elsewhere Rosenfeld notes that Locke may
indeed have been directly familiar with Cureau de La Chambre's works through
several translation that were quite popular in England at that time. Also,
through their pronounced influence upon Bayle, Cureau de La Chambre's views
affected the debate well into the 18th century. The RLIN database records one
copy (at the National Library of Medicine) of the 1664 edition together with
copies of this 1665 edition at NLM, Yale, Stanford, and Michigan, plus a
variant 1665 d'Allin imprint at Brown.
FEUERBACH, LUDWIG. Das Wesen des Christenthums. Zweite vermehrte
Auflage. Leipzig: Otto Wigand, 1843. 8vo. xxiv, [2], 522 pp. Modern
cloth-backed boards, title direct-lettered in gilt on spine. Title and last
page lightly dust-soiled, text moderately foxed throughout. A good, sound copy.
$200.00 A
seminal critique of Hegel's philosophy of religion which galvanized the
"Left Hegelians" and helped pave the way for the revolutionary views
of Marx and Kierkegaard. First published in 1841, the work "burst like a
bombshell on the German intellectual scene in the early 1840s…it became like a
Bible to a group of revolutionary thinkers, including Arnold Ruge, the Bauers,
Karl Marx, Richard Wagner, and Friedrich Engels. David Friedrich Strauss…wrote
that Feuerbach’s book ‘was the truth of our time’; and Friedrich
Engels…reported that ‘at once we all became Feuerbachians.’"--Harvey, Feuerbach
and the Interpretation of Religion. (Cambridge 1995). Kierkegaard had a
copy of this edition in his library (Rohde 488) and George Eliot used it as the
basis for her 1854 English translation (see below). This second edition
contains a new foreword (pp. iii-xxiv) in which Feuerbach responds to his
critics.
HUME, DAVID. Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion. To which is
Added, Divine Benevolence Asserted; and Vindicated from the Objections of
Ancient and Modern Sceptics. By Thomas Balguy. Dublin: printed by John Exshaw,
1782. 1st ed. 8vo. (22.8 cm.) [4], 175, [1], v, [1], 125, [1 (blank)] pp.
Contemporary drab wraps with printed paper label (a little rubbed), small additional
paper label on spine. Light wear to head of spine and extremities. Some light
browning and a few spots of foxing, but internally fine, largely unopened with
large margins, fore- and bottom margins untrimmed. A very well-preserved copy. SOLD Rare, this edition
not in Jessop. Chuo I-76. ESTC online records 4 copies: Seabury-Western
Theological Seminary (Evanston, Ill.); Central Belfast Library; Cambridge
University; and National Library of Scotland. There is also a copy in the Hume
collection at McGill (22 cm.). This is the third "edition" (1779,
1780) of the Dialogues and the first to contain the work by Balguy.
(which first appeared separately in 1781, DNB to the contrary
notwithstanding).
(HUME.) PRIESTLEY, JOSEPH. Letters to a Philosophical Unbeliever.
Pt.1: Containing an examination of the principal objections to the doctrines of
'natural religion', and especially those contained in the writings of Mr. Hume.
Bath : Printed by R. Cruttwell..., 1780. [Bound with:] PRIESTLEY.
Additional letters to a philosophical unbeliever, in answer to Mr. William
Hammon [i.e. Matthew Turner]. Birmingham : Printed for Pearson and Rollason...,
1782. 1st eds. 8vo. xxviii [i.e.xxx], [2], 212, [4 (ads)]; xiv, [2], 71, [9
(ads & errata leaf)] pp. Original leather, upper cover detached. $200.00 Jessop, p. 55
(1st title). Chuo III-179 (1st title only): xxviii, ii, 212, [4] pp., with
"ii" being errata. See DNB for Turner (d. 1788?), brilliant
chemist, classicist, surgeon and atheist: "he attacked Priestley's
argument from design with considerable cogency."
HUTCHESON, F. A System of Moral Philosophy in Three Books;...
Published from the Original Manuscript, by his Son, Frances Hutcheson, M.D. To
which is Prefixed, Some Account of the Life, Writings, and Character of the
Author, by the Reverend William Leechman, D.D. Glasgow: Printed and sold by R.
and A. Foulis, Printers to the University. London: Sold by A. Millar...and by
T. Longman..., 1755. 1st ed. 2 vols. 4to. [12], xlviii, 358; [4], 380 pp.
Recent linen with leather spine labels, endpapers renewed. Small shelf number
stamp on verso of each title with similar date stamp (1929) on following leaf.
Some minor worming in bottom margin of title and first few leaves of vol. I,
not affecting text. Outer margins of title and last leaf of vol. II a little
browned from original turn-ins. Text lightly browned but very good, clean and
unfoxed and with good margins. $3,750.00 Jessop, pp. 145-46. Gaskell 297. Kress 5445. Chuo I: 3-129
(with the list of subscribers apparently bound at end of vol. II). Hutcheson
was Adam Smith's teacher and Palgrave notes that in this, Hutcheson's
"principal work...there are many passages which foreshadow the theories
subsequently developed...in the Wealth of Nations." The six page list
of subscribers includes many Scottish notables, including Ferguson and Smith
but not, oddly, Hume.
KANT, I. Critique der Urtheilskraft.
Berlin & Libau: Lagarde & Friederich, 1790. 1st ed. 8vo. lviii, 476,
[1 (errata)] pp. Old paste-paper boards with leather spine (lacking labels).
Edges and spine extremities worn, hinges tender. Bottom margin of title with
some trifling worming, scattered underlining in pencil on a few early leaves,
otherwise text generally quite fresh. Old private stamp and early owner's
signature on title. A good copy. $2,250.00 Warda 125. Adickes 71. The third and final critique. "The
Critique of Judgment contains some fresh ideas of remarkable power,
but it constitutes a series of appendices or addenda to Kant's earlier work
rather than something wholly new. It should really be seen as three or four
separate essays whose connecting link is the concept of purpose."--W.H.
Walsh, in EP.
(KANT.) BOUTERWEK, FRIEDRICH. Immanuel Kant. Ein Denkmal. Hamburg:
B.G. Hoffman, 1805. 1st ed. 8vo. vi, 127 pp. Original plain blue wraps (small
wear to spine ends), very faint stamp on verso of title An excellent copy. SOLD Very rare "memorial" to Kant, not among the more
than 50 books and articles by Bouterwek noted by Adickes, nor among the 25+
Bouterwek titles in the extensive collection of contemporary Kantiana at the
Hoose Library (U.S.C.). The RLIN database records copies at Harvard, Berkeley
and Northwestern.
(KANT.) BUHLE, J.G. & F. BOUTERWEK (Eds.). Göttingisches
philosophisches Museum. Vol. I [-II] (all published). Göttingen: Johann
Christian Dieterich, 1798 [-1799]. 4 parts in 2 volumes. Small 8vo. 208, 190;
190, 174 pp. Contemporary marbled boards with leather titling and number labels
on spine. Bindings rubbed, with some wear at corners and spine extremities, but
very sound. Text lightly browned with occasional foxing. $600.00 All published
under this title, a rare "post Kantian" periodical. Both Buhle and
Bouterwek began as Kantians, but by this time had come increasingly under the
influence of Fichte and, in the case of Bouterwek, at least, Jacobi. Adickes
2077-2080 (Bouterwek) and 2098 (Buhle). The collection of Buhle's Ideen der
Rechtwissenschaft, Moral und Politik (1799) includes two of the essays
here. Bouterwek's work here includes essays which were later incorporated into Dialogue
(1798), Populär Prüfung (1798), and his "chief work"
(Erdmann), Idee einer Apodiktik (2 vols., 1799).
(KANT.) [REINER, G.L.] Kants Theorie der reinmoralischen
Religion mit Rücksicht auf das reine Christenthum. Cöln: Haas und Sohn, 1797.
12mo. 190 pp. Cont. ¾ mottled calf and decorative boards, spine elaborately
gilt with contrasting labels, edges stained red. Internally fresh. A lovely
copy. $250.00 Adickes
1629: "The work has no originality; but is very well adapted for its
purpose,--to spare the public which desires to obtain no more than a general
and superficial notion of the contents of the Rel. [Religion
innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen Vernunft (1793)] the reading of the book
itself. That, indeed, is shown by the number of pirated editions. The author
gives an easily understood account of the contents of the Rel. in short,
clear sentences, arranged in paragraphs; and endeavors to meet any possible
confusion of Kant's favorite symbolical-moral interpretation or translation of
the historical facts of Christianity with a dogmatic setting of them."
Adickes records 5 printings between 1796 and 1798, all of which seem to be
scarce. The RLIN database, for instance, records no printings before 1798.
There is a copy of the first edition (Leipzig/Frankfort 1796), however, at the
Hoose Library, University of Southern California.
(KANT.) SCHMID, CARL CHRISTIAN ERHARD. Versuch einer
Moralphilosophie. Jena: Cröker, 1790. 1st ed. 8vo. [8], 520 pp. Contemporary
boards with leather spine label, (light shelfwear, rear cover faintly
dampstained). Text with scattered underlining in blue pencil, some light
browning and stains. $175.00 Schmid (1761-1812) was one of the circle of Kantians at Jena
that included Reinhold and C.G. Schütze which was instrumental in promoting the
new Critical Philosophy. Schmid's most important works in this regard are a
commentary on the first Critique and a Kantian Wörtenbuch
(published together in 1786 and subsequently issued separately), but the present
work also "attracted attention at the time of its publication, as being
the first system of moral philosophy elaborated on a Kantian
basis."--Adickes 832. Its influence is indicated by the three subsequent
editions (1792, 1795 and 1802) that expanded the work to more than 1,000 pages.
Kant had this edition (as well as the 2nd edition) in his library (Warda, Kant's
Bucher §X:109).
LAURIE, SIMON S. Notes Expository and Critical on Certain British
Theories of Morals. Edinburgh: Edmonston & Douglas, 1868. 1st ed. 8vo.
viii, 156, [1 (ad leaf)] pp. Orig. cloth, printed paper label quite darkened
and rubbed. Wear to spine ends, inner hinges starting, uniform toning of
sheets. $60.00 Uncommon,
early book by "that highly idiosyncratic Scot" (Passmore), comprising
chapters on Hobbes, Shaftesbury, Hutcheson, Butler, Hume, Bentham, Mill, and
Bain.
LEIBNIZ. Otium Hanoveranum, sive, Miscellanea, ex ore & schedis
illustris viri, piæ memoriæ, Godofr. Guilielmi Leibnitii,..nec non à scribenda
historia, qvondam notata & descripta, cum ipsi in colligendis &
excerpendis rebus ad historiam Brunsvicensem pertinentibus operam; navaret,
Joachimus Fridericus Fellerus. Additæ sunt coronidis loco epistolæ gallicæ
amoebeæ Leibnitii & Pelissonii de tolerantia religionum & de controversiis
quibusdam theologicis, jampridem editæ, nunc recusæ. Quibus præmissum est
supplementum vitæ Leibnitianæ. Lipsiæ: Impensis Joann. Christiani Martini,
1718. 1st ed. 8vo. [28], 441, [23] pp. Index. Frontis. portrait. Title printed
in red and black. Contemporary full vellum (slightly sprung), title stamped in
gilt on spine. Light, uniform browning of text block, a few brief marginal
notes or corrections in an early hand, faint dampstains to edges of title and
first few leaves front and back. A very good copy. With signature of one Gl.
Hosmann[?], Hanover 1718, on front pastedown. $600.00
Ravier 337. Bibliothèque Nationale, Catalogue
des Ouvrages de Leibniz, p. 42. RLIN records copies Binghampton, Michigan,
Library of Congress, Berkeley, Univ. of Southern California, and Harvard (with
errata on recto of final leaf). Collection of letters, fragments and
miscellanea, including "[h]itherto unprinted matter" (Erdmann II, p.
175), edited with a biographical "supplementum" by Leibniz' secretary
(from 1696 to 1698). The correspondence with Pellisson on religious toleration
and reunification of the church, first published in 1692, occupies pages 235
through 408 here.
[LOCKE, JOHN.] Some Thoughts Concerning Education. London: Printed
for A. and J. Churchill, at the Black Swan, in Pater-[N]oster Row, 1693. 1st
ed.. 12mo. [8], 262, [2 (contents leaf)] pp. Modern boards with spine label.
Title page very soiled, and mounted with loss to upper corner and along bottom
margin, especially at gutter, with loss of part of double-rule border and one
letter of text, following leaf a little soiled and with corners creased. Top
margin cropped a bit close, a few minor stains, tiny chip in margin of contents
leaf, otherwise text very good. Attractive modern bookplate on front pastedown.
"By Mr. Jnº Lock Gent." written in a contemporary hand on title. $600.00 Yolton 165: this
copy has all the first edition points given by Yolton on page 210, with four
out of five of the "stop-press" corrections to the first edition
noted on page 211 ("hearden" at line 19 on page 121 uncorrected) and
with all the first edition textual readings given on page 213.
LOCKE, JOHN. Some Thoughts Concerning Education. Intro by Rev. R.H.
Quick. Cambridge University Press, 1880. 1st ed. Small 8vo. lxiv, 240, [7] pp.
Orig. cloth. $65.00 First of this, "the best 19th century edition"
(Yolton), and for more than fifty years the standard scholarly edition.
MENZEL, WOLFGANG. Die Deutsche Literatur. Zweite vermehrte Auflage.
Stuttgart: Hallberger, 1836. 1st ed. 4 volumes bound in 2. Square 12mo. [2],
339, [1]; 287; 387; 408 pp. Index. Contemporary patterned cloth, spines gilt,
marbled edges. Small oval stamp on bottom margin of first title in each volume.
Some spotty foxing throughout, one signature browned, but a fairly attractive
set, complete with half titles to all four volumes $175.00
Menzel (1798-1873) was a widely-read poet, historian
and literary critic The first volume here includes sections surveying Religion
and Philosophy (pp. 117-258; 259-339) while the second is devoted to Geistwissenschaften
(History, Pedagogy and Political Science). The third volume opens with a review
of Natural Science and the balance of the work is devoted to belles lettres.
Kierkegaard, deeply influenced by German Romanticism in all its forms, is known
to have owned this edition (Rohde U 79).
NIETZSCHE, FRIEDRICH. Die Geburt der Tragödie. Oder: Griechenthum und Pessimismus. Neue Ausgabe mit dem Versuch einter Selbstkritik. Leipzig: Verlag von E.W. Fritzsch, 1886. 2nd edition, 2nd issue. 8vo. xviii, iv, 144 pp. Contemporary dark brown boards with hand-lettered spine label. Headband chipped away, small wear to foot of spine. Light, uniform browning of prelims, marginal chip in last leaf (xvii/xviii) of prelims with no loss of text. SOLD The definitive edition of Nietzsche's most popular work, containing an important new introduction. Schaberg, The Nietzsche Canon #42. Thanks to Schaberg's fine work, the complicated publishing history of The Birth of Tragedy can be summarized, as follows: 800 copies of the first edition were issued by Fritzsch in 1872; 750 copies of a slightly altered second edition were printed for Fritzsch in 1874 and issued (with printed slip pasted over imprint) by E. Schmeitzer of Chemnitz in 1878; at this time Schmeitzer also purchased 175 remaindered copies of the first edition which apparently remained unsold; these 175 copies were repurchased by Fritzsch, along with 576 remainders of the second edition, in 1886; sheets of both the first and second edition were re-issued that year by Fritzsch with a new titlepage and a new preface by the author; 80 copies (issues unknown) of these 1886 editions remained unsold as of October 1893; a third edition was published in 1894.
RIEHL, ALOIS. The Principles of the Critical Philosophy: Introduction
to the Theory of Science and Metaphysics. Translated by Dr. Arthur Fairbanks.
London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., Ltd., 1894. 1st ed. in English.
8vo. [iii]-xvi, 346 pp. Orig. cloth, small wear to extremities. Endpapers
browned and brittle, text fine. Collector's bookplate on front pastedown. $65.00 Comprises a translation of the third and concluding volume
of Riehl's Der philosophische Kritizismus (1876-1879-1887), the first
volume being "[a] profound study of Kant" which "marked an
important date in the history of the new Kantianism."--EP. The
later volumes sought to reinterpret Kant in the light of the immense scientific
progress of the 19th century; there is a chapter here, for example, on
"Darwinism and Transcendental Philosophy." Riehl has contributed a
brief Preface to this translation, part of the English & Foreign
Philosophical Library series.
STEPHEN, JAMES FITZJAMES. Liberty, Equality, Fraternity. Second
Edition. London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1874. 8vo. xlix, [3], 370 pp. Orig.
beveled cloth. Binding a little rubbed and shelfworn. Collector's bookplate on
front pastedown and later owner's signature on front fly. Faint (barely
visible) stamp on margin of title. Withal, entirely sound. Good+. $150.00 Valuable edition
of perhaps the most important contemporary criticism of Mill's social and
political philosophy. It "was very influential...bringing together and
elaborating many of the earlier criticisms, and stating them colorfully and
energetically (indeed too vigorously for some who, like Henry Sidgwick, found
its style too often 'offensively loud and overbearing')."--Nicholson,
"The Reception and Early Reputation of Mill's Political Thought" in Cambridge
Companion to Mill. This second edition contains a lengthy new Preface
responding to the criticisms of Mill supporters, in particular John Morley and
Frederic Harrison. Stephen's critique from within, as it were, greatly
stimulated interest in Mill's work. "The most remarkable point is that the
book is substantially a criticism of Mill's from the older Utilitarian point of
view. It shows, therefore, how Mill diverged from Bentham."--Leslie
Stephen, The English Utilitarians III:244.
STIEBELING, GEORGE C. Naturwissenschaft gegen Philosophie. Eine
Widerlegung der Hartmann'sche Lehre vom Unbewussten in der Leiblichkeit nebst
einer kurzen Beleuchtung der Darwin'schen Ansicht über den Instinct. New York:
L.W. Schmidt, 1871. 8vo. viii, 151 pp. Contemporary cloth. SOLD Very
scarce philosophical tract by a German-American physician and otherwise obscure
Marxist, save for the fact that his critique (1890) of Marx' theory of surplus
value was dealt with harshly by Engels in the Preface to volume III of Capital
(1894). RLIN records only the University of Minnesota copy of the present work,
the earliest of about 10 publications by Stiebeling listed. Egbert &
Persons, Socialism & American Life have little to say about
Stiebeling except to list his Socializmus und Darwinismus (NY 1879) as
the earliest of only a handful of works by "American Marxian
socialists" on "the controversy over natural and social
evolution..... [n]otable...for their use of biological evidence against social
Darwinism...." (II:216).
STUMPF, CARL. Über der psychologischen Ursprung der Raumvorstellung.
Leipzig: S. Hirzel, 1873. 1st ed. 8vo. viii, 324 pp. Cont. cloth-backed marbled
boards with title direct lettered in gilt on spine. Small private owner's stamp
on front endpapers, neat shelf number in white ink on spine. Sheets lightly
browned, some spotty foxing on title, rear blank removed. Withal, a sound,
tight copy. $175.00 Scarce, the "first psychological work" (Boring) of
Stumpf (1848-1936), a student of Brentano and Lotze who "contributed
greatly to the development of psychology from a branch of philosophy into an empirical
science."--Encyclopedia of Philosophy. He exercised considerable
influence on Phenomenology through Husserl (who dedicated Logical
Investigations to Stumpf) and on Gestalt Psychology through another
student, Wolfgang Kohler. The present work, premised on a nativistic conception
of perception, "argued that both color and extension are equally primitive
part-contents of visual sensation."--Boring, History of Experimental
Psychology.
[TSCHIRNHAUS, E.W.G. von.] Medicina Mentis, sive Artis Inveniendi Præcepta
Generalia. Editio Nova, Auctior & Correctior, cum Præfatione Autoris. [With,
as issued:] TSCHIRNHAUS. Medicina Corporis, seu Cogitationes Admodum
Probabiles de Conservanda Sanitate. Lipsiae: J. Thoman Fritsch, 1695. [Bound
with:] DE LA FORGE, LUDOVICO. Tractatus de Mente Humana, eijus Facultatibus
& Functionibus, nec non de ejuisdem Unione cum Corpore fecundùm Principia
Renati Descartes. Emendatus & Auctus...par J.F. [i.e. Johann Flender].
Amsterdam: Blau, 1688. Together, 2 vols. in 1. Small 4to. [28], 296, [4], 64;
[22], 241, [6 (Index)]. With the half title to Part I and separate title to
Part 2 of first work. Contemporary vellum (lightly soiled), edges stained blue,
hand-lettered title on spine. Small circular stamp on first title, sheets
lightly browned. A handsome copy. $1,000.00 Early editions of two significant works:
1. Tschirnhaus.
Second, definitive, edition. Tschirnhaus was a mathematician of some note who
was acquainted with many of the leading scientific figures of the day,
corresponding with, among others, Huygens, Spinoza and Leibniz. "His Medicina
corporis et mentis ([1st ed.] 1686-87) was of considerable philosophical
importance and was influential in the early stages of the
Enlightenment."--Concise DSB. Wolf 732 (1st ed., 1686-87): "Extremely
scarce and unknown to v.d. Linde. Tschirnhaus (born 1651) [was] one of
Spinoza's visitors and correspondents and was largely influenced by his ideas.
It was Tschirnhaus who introduced Leibniz to Spinoza's philosophy and thus
caused the meeting between the two philosophers." Kant owned a copy of the
first edition (Warda, Immanuel Kants Bücher §III:30). Beck treats
Tschirnhaus, and the present work, in some detail (see especially pp. 189-194),
noting that "Tschirnhaus' correspondence with Leibniz is of some
importance in mathematics, and his correspondence with Spinoza is
philosophically important for understanding both his and Spinoza's philosophy.
The influence of Descartes and Spinoza is obvious in all his work. On most
point he agreed with Descartes rather than Spinoza, but in many details he
tried to mediate between the two.... The opening chapter of Medicina mentis
is a hybrid of Spinozistic and Cartesian ideas." According to Erdmann (II,
289:2), "The Medicina mentis frequently agrees almost word for word
with Spinoza's Tract. de emend int., and yet never expressly refers to
it; in fact, Spinoza is often tacitly censured." (This practice of
borrowing ideas without acknowledgment soured most of Tschirnhaus'
relationships with fellow scientists.) The RLIN database records copies of this
1695 edition at Harvard, Minnesota, Stanford and Rochester (and copies of
1686-87 edition at Minnesota, Berkeley and Penn.).
2. De
la Forge. Third edition (1669, 1673) in Latin of a work first published
in French (1665?). A physician, La Forge was personally acquainted with
Descartes and (with Clerselier) edited D.'s Traité de l'homme (1664). La
Forge is considered one of the originators of the theory of Occasionalism. In
this, his most important work, "de La Forge represented himself as
continuing the work that Descartes left unfinished in his Treatise on Man
and undertook to explain and develop the notion of a mind or soul distinct
from, yet united to, the body."--EP II:41. La Forge was
"unique among Cartesians of his century" in conceding an immortal
soul to animals: "La Forge's aim...is not to reproduce Descartes'
reasoning, but rather to argue from his own convictions in defense of the same
principles..... His relations with other Cartesians--Clerselier, Clauberg...Jacques
Gossuet of Holland, and the Swiss Robert Chouet--make of Louis de La Forge a
by-no-means unimportant link in the chain of thinkers springing from René
Descartes."--Rosenfeld. Locke had a copy of the 1669 Latin edition in his
library (Harrison & Laslett 1156). The RLIN database records copies of this
1688 edition at Yale, National Library of Medicine, and the Linda Hall Library
(there are 7 copies of the 1669 edition located and 2 of the 1673.)
WUNDT, WILHELM. The Facts of the Moral Life. Translated by Julia
Gulliver and Edward Bradford Titchener. [With:] WUNDT. Ethical Systems.
Translated by Margaret Floy Washburn. London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co., Lim.
New York: The Macmillan Co., 1897. Together, 2 vols. 1st editions in English,
British issue. 8vo. xii, 339; viii, 196 pp., plus ad leaf. Index in each
volume. Uniform straight-grained brown cloth. Endpapers lightly browned, as
usual, neat owner's signature dated 1898 on each title. About fine. $150.00 Being the first
two parts (of three), complete in themselves, of Wundt's Ethik (2nd ed.
1892); a translation by Washburn of the third part, The Principles of
Morality and the Departments of the Moral Life, appeared in 1901. All three
of the translators here studied with Wundt at Leipzig. Titchener and Washburn
were distinguished psychologists while Gulliver became a professor of
philosophy at, and later president of, Rockford (Ill.) College.