RELIGION

A Manual for Confessors

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•  Tamburini (1591–1675) was an Italian Jesuit who published his Methodus expeditae confessionis, tum pro confessariis tum pro poenitentibus for the first time at Milan in 1648. It enjoyed considerable success with at least ten editions in the 17th century and six in the 18th. This is the first New World edition.

An interesting work on confession and Christian ethics, this was written for confessors, covering a multitude of topics from the general concept of confession to superstition, sacrilege, adultery, lying during confession, and on to absolution. Tamburini also addresses condemned propositions and speculations.

Searches of NUC Pre-1956 and WorldCat locate fewer than eight copies of this edition in U.S. libraries.

•  Medina, Mexico. 4745; this edition not in DeBacker-Sommervogel.   Contemporary Mexican sheep binding, gilt spine extra, all edges red; covers with wear and abrasions, spine tips pulled with loss of leather and a small area of old, red, transluscent staining at base. Lacks half-title (half-titles are rare in Mexican books of this era). Small worming to lower inner margin throughout, most often only pinhole but occasionally into the text and touching letters. Generally, a nice and clean little book.  (29855)

Tamil PRIMER

•  Advanced primer with in-text wood-engraved cuts.  "New Edition --5,000 Copies," but scarce in U.S. libraries. Text entirely in Tamil.

•  Publisher's wrappers, but clearly removed from a bound volume. (15126)

Gentle Prayers for the“Infant Pilgrim”

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•  Early printing of this collection of Christian-themed verses, taken (without attribution) from Ann and Jane Taylor's Hymns for Infant Minds. The Taylor sisters were, both together and separately, exceptionally popular children's authors; this example of their work featuresa preliminary alphabet and eight woodcut illustrations.

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 44408.   Plain blue-green paper wrappers, much worn and creased, sewing loosening. Lower corners bumped; pages age-toned and lightly spotted. Much worn but not written or scribbled on; this copy easily imaginable as a critical element of some respectful child's nightly bedtime ritual.  (30253)

“ChristiansUnjustly Accused of Polytheism” — On the Unity of Jehovah

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•  First edition. The ostensible conversion of the title was actually an excuse to attack the Athanasian creed; written by the controversialist Rev. Henry Taylor and addressed to Elisha Levi, these letters “espoused the restrained Arianism of Samuel Clarke . . . and embraced the Apollinarian heresy which questioned the human nature of Christ's person” (DNB).

Letters II–IV and V–VII have separate title-pages, dated 1773 and 1774 respectively.

•  ESTC T101252; Allibone 2344; Lowndes 2581–82. On Taylor, see: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography online.   Recent quarter calf with marbled paper–covered sides, leather edges tooled in blind, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label and gilt-stamped decorations in compartments. Outer (closed) edges institutionally rubber-stamped; title-page and one other pressure-stamped in an old style. Very clean and with wide margins.  (25083)

Anglican Moral Theology from“the Shakespeare of Divines”

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•  First edition: Important philosophical treatise on conscience, casuistry, and Christian ethics, written by the Bishop of Down and Connor. The controversialist Taylor, crowned “the Shakespeare of divines” by Ralph Waldo Emerson, was the subject during his career of a number of accusations of crypto-popery, but the present work — the first of its kind — was designed as a “complete protestant answer to the many Roman Catholic manuals of casuistry” (according to the Oxford DNB online) and intended to provide an authoritative Anglican reference on the subject.

The portrait of the author was engraved by Pierre Lombard, while the added engraved title-page is unsigned. Each of the four books here (in two volumes) has a separate title-page; the main title-pages are printed in black and ruled in red. The text is in English, Greek, and Latin. A printed addenda slip is affixed to the final text page of vol. II, above the catalogue of books sold by Richard Royston. Leaf L6 in vol. II is a cancel (and separated).

Provenance:  Vol. I added title-page recto with inked ownership inscription dated 1781 (“T. Moore”); vol. II front fly-leaf with inked ownership inscription dated 1696 (“Guilel. Rayner”) and another (of “T. Moore's”) dated 1781.

•  ESTC R20123; Wing (rev.) T324; Allibone 2348. On Taylor, see: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography online.   Recent quarter calf and marbled paper–covered sides, leather edges tooled in blind, spine with gilt-stamped title and volume labels and gilt-stamped decorations between raised bands. Ownership inscriptions as above. First few leaves of vol. I (including regular and added title-pages) with tiny spots of worming; slightly larger sections of same to inner margins of some subsequent leaves; a number of pages in both volumes with scattered spots of worming, touching letters but not affecting sense. Light waterstaining to outer margins of some leaves. One leaf in vol. II separated. Significant and attractive.  (24889)

A HandsomeVictorian Edition

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•  Attractive set of these two enduringly popular works by the Bishop of Down and Connor (1613–67), here well printed with half-titles and title-pages in red and black, and a steel-engraved frontispiece in the first volume.


Binding:  Prize binding from King Edward VI's School: Contemporary walnut-brown calf, framed and panelled in blind double fillets with blind-stamped corner crosses and gilt-stamped English Royal coat of arms (with the quarter of France and dragon supporter) as central medallions; spines with gilt-stamped leather title-labels and blind-stamped crosses in compartments.

Provenance: Front fly-leaf of vol. I with inked inscription dated 1863, noting this set's presentation to R.K. Rodwell as an “Extra Prize for the best English Essay.”

•  NSTC 2T3717.   Bound as above, spines and extremities rubbed. Endpapers and frontispiece lightly spotted. All edges stained red.  (21923)

The One Necessity

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•  Second edition of the Unum necessarium, following the first of 1653, followed by the first edition of the Further Explication. Jeremy Taylor (1613–67), a High Church divine and chaplain to Charles I, was well known as a theologian and one of the school of Caroline Divines who brilliantly systematized Anglican theology in the 17th century. The first of these present works caused him some difficulty, as some of its arguments were widely considered unorthodox and antidoctrinal; the Further Explication was Taylor’s attempt to clarify his position.

The engraved frontispiece by P. Lombart depicts Jesus in shepherd guise, and is followed by a title-page printed in red and black. An oversized, folding plate shows a contrite heart accompanied by scriptural figures and allegorical images; this is also signed, Lombart. Both works came off the press with incorrect pagination, the latter with apparent page count being thrown significantly off.

Provenance: Front pastedown with armorial bookplate of Charles Grave Hudson.

•  ESTC R203751; Wing (rev.) T415. Contemporary speckled calf, framed in blind, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label; leather cracked over joints and spine. Occasional pencilled bracketing.

Controversial Apocalyptic “Analysis”
   [“Controversial” being ONE Word for It!]

•  Uncommon second, expanded edition: Ananti-Catholic examination of biblical prophesy, written by a minister of Larbert who claimed that much of Revelation had been fulfilled by the actions of the king of Prussia, and who predicted the total destruction of Turkey (to the delight, it was rumored, of Catherine the Great). The Monthly Review, expressing doubt over the “new and amazing explications” contained in the first edition, concluded that “you will find in [this book] such things as eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered the heart of any man, except the heart of Mr. Lauchlan Taylor . . . or of that other wonderful Decypherer, who discovered the Cherokee Indians in the prophecies of Ezekiel” (Vol. XXVIII, March 1763). Click the image for an enlargement.

Leaf containing pp. 109–10 is a cancel.

•  ESTC T115642.   Removed from a nonce volume. Title-page with inked numeral in upper outer corner. Occasional light staining or dust-soiling; one outer margin with inked annotation. A nice, neat book.  (27637)

Loving the Sinner, Hating the Sin — SLAVERY

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•  First edition: Thoughts on Methodist church fellowship for Christian slaveholders, and on abolition in general. Although arguing here at length that slavery is immoral and unchristian, Taylor also posits that the Church as an organization cannot take an official stand on its legality due to the necessity of maintaining separation between religious and civil matters.

•  Not in Library Company, Afro-Americana (rev. ed.); not in Sabin.   Publisher's brown cloth, covers framed in blind, spine with gilt-stamped title and elaborate decorations; spine and edges moderately sunned, extremities rubbed, front joint with small spot of insect damage. Back pastedown with pencilled calculations. Foxed, with a few lower outer corners bumped.  (30358)

MuchFunereal Detail . . .

•  Zachary Taylor's sudden death (possibly from eating a bowl of bad cherries) was a shock to the nation. His funeral took place in Washington on July 12th, 1850, with an estimated 100,000 people attending the funeral procession. The presidential hearse was drawn by eight white horses accompanied by grooms dressed in white and wearing white turbans. Behind the hearse were military units, pall-bearers (drawn from the ranks of Congress, the military, and the Supreme Court), the president's beloved horse "Old Whitey," his family, and a long line of citizens. The procession stretched over two miles. This book has a detailed account of the procession as well as speeches by many Washington dignitaries

•  Not in Sabin. Quarter buckram over paper-covered sides. Without the original mourning wrappers. "Mercantile Library Co." blind-stamped on both sides. Paper call number label on spine. Edges and corners worn, tips of spine pulled, with loss. Ownership signature on front fly leaf, and charge pocket and card on rear free endpaper. Dog-eared. (3722)

The Scottish Church Divided

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•  From about 1820 through 1843 the Church of Scotland was in turmoil over the question of lay patronage and its implications regarding civil authority over the church; in 1843, after the “Ten Years’ Conflict” between the evangelical and moderate branches of the church, the issues were temporarily resolved by “the Disruption,” in which close to a third of the ministers of the Church of Scotland separated to form the Free Church of Scotland. The upheaval prompted the publication of numerous pamphlets and treatises on the controversy, and its effects continued to be felt in Scotland for many years afterward.

The collection contains works by many of the principal voices of the conflict. The vast majority of the publications are from ca. 1840.

A good research collection. 

•  All items are in good to very good condition, disbound, a few with library markings (stamps) but a few only. The strange glossy effect in our “group photo” is the pamphlets' archival mylar folders, reflecting light — nothing worse, and nothing stranger!  You can CLICK HERE for a list.   Do note, please, that this gathering is being sold as a collection only.

Early American Edition: German Reformed Hymnal

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•  Gerhardt Tersteegen (1697–1769) was a pillar of German pietism, a popular and innovative poet noted for his use of free verse, and (along with Joachim Neander) one of the two most significant German hymnographers of the 18th century. First published in 1729, his “Spiritual Flower Garden for Ardent Souls” contains “end-rhymes,” “meditations,” and hymns. The first American edition appeared in 1747; this is the fourth.

•  Evans 23823; ESTC W21016; Arndt & Eck 805.   Contemporary mottled sheep, covers framed in blind, with remnants of original clasp, spine with later gilt-stamped leather title and publication labels; leather mildly rubbed, spine leather with small cracks, spine and joints unobtrusively repaired. Front free endpaper with pencilled ownership inscription dated 1835; afterwards, ex–theological library: Old-fashioned bookplate on front pastedown, title-page pressure-stamped, pocket on back pastedown. Pagination erratic; several pages appearing out of order. A few corners bumped or dog-eared; a good many sections moderately browned and stained as is commonly seen with these Germantown imprints.  (27905)

Nihil obstat — Documents from the Vatican Archives
A Bit of Skullduggery in the Background

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•  A compendium of letters and documents from the Vatican Library concerning the ecclesiastical history of Hungary in the years 1216–1352 and 1352–1526, respectively — primary sources in Latin and Italian, listed in a table of contents at the beginning of each volume and indexed “virorum et locorum praecipuorum” at the end.

The Catholic canonist Augustin Theiner (1804–74) went to the Vatican Archives in 1850 at the invitation of Pius IX, who five years later appointed him Prefect. During his tenure at the BAV, Theiner published numerous collections of primary source material, including the present set. In 1870, however, he was dismissed from his esteemed post for sharing documents related to the Council of Trent with opponents of the Curia during Vatican Council (1869–70).

Provenance:  Bookplates of Madison University Library and Colgate University Library on the front pastedown of each volume, and Madison again on the half-title.

•  NCE, 14, 9 (Theiner); A. Mauri, “A. Theiner”, in ArchStorIt 21 (1875), pp. 350–91; H. Gisiger, “Theiner und die Jesuiten,” in Bilder aus der Geschichte der katholischen Reformbewegung, 1.5–6 (1875), pp. 213–314; ADB 37, pp. 674–77; LTK 10, pp. 27–28.   Half roan and green cloth over boards with marbled edges and gilt to spines, a bit rubbed and with evidence of onetime shelf-labels; offsetting from leather turn-ins visible at edges and internally on some leaves. Very minor foxing to a few leaves in vol. I, and scattered small inkstains in both volumes. Title imprint in vol. II smudged in printing.  (29409)

An Incunable Thomas à Kempis — A Collection of 23 Works
A Lovely Initial Gracing the Incipit

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•  First collected edition of 23 works including the De imitatio Christi and six other celebrated compositionsenlarging the first, less extensive collected edition printed at Utrecht ca. 1473. The group begins with the De imitatio, explicitly identifying Kempis, and not John Gerson, as the author of that immensely popular devotional manual written anonymously ca. 1420. Gerson's own De meditatione cordis follows, then the series of previously unpublished works by Kempis, inter alia, Soliloquium anim[a]e (f. LXX), De disciplina claustralium (f. LXXVII), and D[i]alogus novi[t]iorum (f. CXXVII).

Together these sermons, dialogues, epistles, and ascetic guides represent prevailing doctrine in the 15th century, compiled by “the most complete and outstanding representative of Devotio Moderna” (NCE 14, p. 121). Kempis studied in Deventer with Florentius Radewijns, a follower of Gerhard Groote, fratres all of the Brothers of the Common Life. He pays tribute to Groote in a chapter on that educator's life, one of the new works included in this volume (ff. XXIX–XXXIX). The mystic overtones of the Soliloquium animae reaffirm Kempis's affiliation with Radewijns and the Windesheim school he co-founded.

The Opera is introduced by two letters. In the first, dated 14 Feburary 1494 at Nuremberg, Georg Pirckheimer opens a debate on the virtues of studia humanitatis with the young humanist Peter Danhausser, whose reply and dedication follow in the second. Both letters praise Kempis, as well as Sebald Schreyer (1446–1520), a local patron.

The text is in double columns printed in gothic type with 53 lines and a headline to a page.

Hand-embellishment: A green and redpainted ten-line initial with patterned infill and delicate flourishes into the margin decorates the incipit; this is shown twice, above, once on its own leaf alone and once with the facing leaf also imaged. The printer left numerous three- to eleven-line spaces for additional painted initials elsewhere, some with guide-letters and others without; some of these have indeed been lettered in black or red, sometimes with the guide-letters still interestingly visible, and there is at least one capital stroke in red.

Evidence of Readership: Owners' notes in pencil and ink to title. Sparse ink annotations, manicules, and underlining in at least two early hands (one note dated 1518, f. CXVIIv). Pressed flowers between ff. LXXV and LXXVI.

Binding:  Old wooden boards with later quarter vellum overlaid; evidence of two clasps, the rear one having had a remnant from an early vellum manuscript as part of its structural support.

•  ISTC it00352000; Goff T352; BMC, II, 475; HC 9769; IGI 9636; Die deutsche Literatur des Mittelalters: deutscher Humanismus 1480 –1520 (I, p. 552); NCE (14, p. 121); Graesse, IV, 10.   Binding as above, with contemporary vellum ms. used as part of the sewing structure visible at the center of most quires in the gutter; vellum fore-edge tabs, partially intact with some painted black or red. Wood lightly wormed and bumped with chip to lower corner of the front cover, the rear board cracking and joints starting. Light worming in text diminishing after the first few quires; light waterstaining to upper corners in some sections, with darker, more extensive staining to last dozen-plus leaves; small circular pin-prick pattern never actually piercing the paper, in margins of k1–l4; and a few contemporary ink smears — from the press itself? With, otherwise, but a few minor edge chips, marginal tears (one from loss of tab), and natural paper flaws, this is in facta very well preserved copy.  (29185)

Thomas à K forAmerican Methodists
    Ownership Marks to Dream On?

•  Early American printing of John Wesley's abridged version of the Imitatio Christi, following the London first edition of 1741. This was one of a series of works published by John Dickins, an early Methodist preacher, for the use of Methodist Societies in the U.S.; Dickins's publishing operation eventually became the Methodist Publishing House, still in business today as the United Methodist Publishing House.

Provenance: An interesting array of ownership inscriptions: “Abigail Davis Book Given her By her Friend [Master?] Vaughan” — “Abigail Davis Book”— “Abigail Davis” — “Abigail Vaughan, Her Book,” this last written largest of all.  (“Reader, I married him”?)

•  Evans 27179; ESTC W33646.   Contemporary sheep, binding overall showing scuffs and small cracks. Endpapers and fly-leaf with early inked ownership inscriptions; title-page verso institutionally rubber-stamped. Pages age-toned and spotted, with intermittent pencilled bracketing; a few leaves starting to separate. (20808)

An American Scots Pastor Edits “Kempis” — A Glaswegian Writes the Preface

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•  “Rendered into English from the original Latin, by John Payne. With an introductory essay, by Thomas Chalmers, of Glasgow. A new edition: edited by Howard Malcolm, Pastor of the Federal Street Baptist Church, Boston.” A Protestant edition, without the fourth “book” (i.e., chapter).

This has an engraved title-page with vignette incorporating David as harpist, and a steel-engraved frontispiece signed by J. Eddy as engraver, “W. Heath, del.”

Provenance:  Inked ownership note to blank of “Charlotte Russell / July 14th — 1831.”

•  Publisher's brown cloth shelfback with paper-covered boards; binding fragile, showing considerable wear with tears in the cloth. Foxing and age-toning; page edges lightly chipped and worn. Ex-library: call number on binding, bookplate, pressure-stamps and other identifications, pencilling. Uncut copy.  (23938)

The Soul     Thuemming, Ludwig P., praeses. Demonstratio immortalitatis animae ex intima eivs natvra dedvcta; Oder: grundlicher beweitz bon der unsterblicheit der seele... Marpvrgi: Rec. A. O. R., 1773. Small 4to.
$75.00

•  Diss. Hale (Conrad Heinrich Mensching, defendant), 1721. This edition not in NUC.

•  Removed from a bound volume.

For more 18TH-CENTURY GERMAN, LATIN LANGUAGE
LEGAL DISSERTATIONS — many on
religious subjects — click here.

Have You Seen the Light? If Not, Let Mary Help You

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•  Sole New World edition, following the Peninsular editions of 1751 and 1757; on Mary and the religious aspects of light.

Also present in this edition are an “extracto de una carta, respuesta á la en que se pidiò informe de lo sucedido en Sicilia sobre la practica de esta devocion, y un triduo para celebrar la fiesta de la Madre Santissima de la Luz.”

Searches of NUC Pre-1956 and WorldCat locate only six copies in U.S. libraries.

A scarce Mariology work.

•  Palau 32786; Medina, Mexico, 4856.   Original limp vellum; faded red shelfmark at base of spine. Clean, crisp copy.  (29847)

Printed in London — (Re-)Bound inTrenton

•  Second edition of this ambitious (if, necessarily, much-abridged) timeline of British history, originally published in 1826. Toone, who seems to have been greatly interested in the organization and summarization of information, also published The magistrate's manual, or, A summary of the duties and powers of a justice of the peace and A glossary and etymological dictionary, of obsolete and uncommon words, antiquated phrases, and proverbs illustrative of early English literature.

Binding: Mid- to late-19th-century binding, with binder’s ticket of the True American Bindery of Trenton, NJ.

•  Half morocco with marbled paper–covered sides, spines with gilt-stamped titles and blind-stamped decorative devices; edges and sides moderately rubbed with a bit of paper skinned from cover of vol. II. Most pages with some degree of foxing.  Handsome on shelf, solid in hand.

For more SETS,  click here.

The Lost Andrade Copy? — Dedicating a School for Girls

•  The charming parochial church in Tlaxcala was where Dr. Torres preached this sermon on the occasion of the dedication of the new building of the “Colegio de Niñas,” i.e., a secondary school for girls. The tie-in to St. Rita is that she was herself the patron of a school for girls.

In his sermon, Torres discusses the need for and goodness that comes from schools for girls. The text is printed in roman with side- and shouldernotes in italic, and contains two woodcut initials.

Rare: Medina knew of this only from the Andrade copy. WorldCat finds no copies, nor does COPAC; no copy was found via the OPACs of the Spanish National Library and the Mexican National Library. We must wonder if this IS the Andrade copy that was seen by Medina.

•  Medina, Mexico, 1260; Andrade 763.   Modern full red morocco, gilt extra on covers and spine; gilt roll of a chain design on the turn-ins. Partial, unidentified marca de fuego on top and bottom edges. A two-digit number in ink in margin of title-page; an old waterstain curving across the bottom outside page corners, light in front and heavier towards the back. In a neat cloth slipcase.  (25764)

Grammar Dictionary & Religious Texts in Quichua/Quechua

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•  Interest during the Enlightenment in “the noble savage” helped to reawaken interest in the study of New World languages and that in turn resulted in some long out-of-print works of the early 17th century being reprinted or revised and reprinted.

Torres Rubio (1547–1638) was a native of Spain and a Jesuit: He arrived in Peru in 1579 and devoted himself to the study of both Aymara and Quechua, publishing an Aymara grammar in 1616 and his Quechua grammar in 1619. The latter work was reprinted in 1701 at which time Juan de Figueredo (1646–1723), another Jesuit, made some revisions and added a section, “Vocabulario de la lengua chinchaisuyo, y algunos modos mas usados de ella” being the “first work known to include a section on the grammar and vocabulary of the dialect [of Quechua] common to Lima. The earlier Quechua grammars and dictionaries were based on Quechua as spoken in Upper Peru and in and around Cuzco.” This third edition includes that added material.

In addition to the grammar and dictionary the work includes in Quechua a confessionary, the questions asked during the wedding ceremony, the Litany of Blessed Virgin Mary, and “the hymn and prayer devoted to the taking out of the Holy Scripture that is sung in various of the churches of this diocese every day.”

Provenance:  In an 18th-century hand, “Es de . . . Dn. Mariano Navia de Bolaño. On rear pastedown, “Collated perfect. May 22d / [18]94 J.J.”

•  Medina, Lima, 1068; Medina, Lenguas quechua y aymará, 39; Viñaza 336; Sabin 96271; Leclerc, Bibliotheca Americana, 2409. Not in DeBacker-Sommervogel.   Contemporary limp vellum with remnants of ties, yapp edges. Very limited, rather neat pinhole worming; occasional spots of soil and paper somewhat browned in some sections due to nature of water in manufacture; inscriptions as above and one page of the vocabulary with contemporary annotation. A very nice, crisp copy.  (28399)

The Rules CONFORMED to byElizabethan Non-Conformists

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•  First edition of this English translation, generally attributed to Thomas Cartwright, of the “Disciplina Ecclesiae sacra.” Content is both dry and not, e.g., the entire section “Of Holidaies” reads, “Holidaies are conveniently to be abolished”; a paragraph speaking to the proper naming of children also notes that a woman may not alone present a child for baptism; and we learn that “him that shall Preach” shall not preach from the Apocrypha.

This is partly in black-letter.

•  ESTC R212376; Wing (rev.) T2066.   19th-century half morocco over textured cloth-covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped title; corners and edges showing moderate rubbing, front cover with small unobtrusive scuff. Title-page darkened and with old perforation- and pressure-stamps, old paper adhesions, inner margin reinforced, and small label in lower inner margin; perforation-, pressure-, and rubber-stamps (these last being numbers) to other leaves also. Age-toned, with dust-soiling and the odd spot or marginal tear.  (19584)

A Big Book Documenting a Big Era

•  “Three themes dominate the period covered by this book . . . the consolidation of the new nation-states . . . religious persecution and the wars between Catholic and Protestant . . . the expansion of Europe over the whole world” (from the dust-jacket). The volume is extensively illustrated in color and black-and-white; this is a work of art reference as well as historical reference.

•  Publisher's terra-cotta cloth, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped title, corners bumped yet cloth pristine, in dust-jacket; wrapper with wear at corners and spine extremities, one short edge tear to upper front edge. Pages age-toned; clean and unmarked.  (26183)

EarlyCöthen Imprint, in Syriac

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•  Syriac in the classical Edessene literary form is still the sacred language of several Eastern Churches and is the language of this lexicon. The dialect in ancient times was spoken in the north of Syria and in Upper Mesopotamia around Edessa.

Trost (1588–1636), a professor of theology at Wittenberg, compiled this dictionary and issued it two years after publishing his much-praised edition of the Syriac New Testament with an accompanying Latin translation; the Lexicon was likewise lauded, primarily for its completeness.

This and Trost's Syriac New Testament are among the earliest books printed in Cöthen, Upper Saxony. This is the sole edition of the dictionary and it is uncommon in commerce.

•  Graesse, VII, 103; VD17 12:128565E.   Period-style calf, framed in blind; spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label, blind-tooled decorations in compartments, blind- and gilt-ruled raised bands with blind-tooling continued onto boards, ending in trefoils; signed in blind on lower rear turn-in by Grace Bindings. Title-page institutionally pressure-stamped, dedication with numeral rubber-stamped in lower margin. Pages age-toned; title-page and last two index leaves with moderate staining and spotting (in part from old binding). A strong, handsome book.  (25212)

Influential Anti-Mormonism

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•  First edition.  Illustrated with a frontispiece engraving of Joseph Smith's account of taking the “Golden Bible” from Mormon Hill, and portraits of Martin Harris and Brigham Young. Pomeroy Tucker, a native of Palmyra, edited a newspaper there and knew Joseph Smith during his early years.

Includes 10 pages of publisher's advertisements.

•  Flake & Draper 9036.   Publisher's grey cloth, covers bumped at corners; spine split down middle and rebacked with black cloth tape, a small piece of which has been cut away to reveal the original gilt title. Hinge inside open in places, with pp. 3–22 and pp. 75–94 detached from binding; tiny edge nicks to fore-edge of pp. 9–16. Ex-library with bookplate on front pastedown, remnants of a paper label on rear free endpaper, and charge card and pocket on rear pastedown; pressure-stamps on title-page and other library notations on p. [3]. Text clean, with no marks or soiling; definitely “used” but a worthwhile keeper nonetheless.  (24427)

Tupper for Auburn'ians

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•  Early American edition: Excerpts from one of the most popular poetic works of the 19th century, a best-selling set of extremely earnest moral ruminations in blank verse.

Binding: Publisher's olive cloth, covers blind-stamped in strapwork pattern; front cover with gilt-stamped center medallion presenting a casket of wisdom in vignette with other high-minded emblems. Spine with gilt-stamped title and decorative motifs; all edges gilt.

•  Spine lightly sunned, edges and extremities mildly rubbed (spine extremities more so). Front pastedown with Albany bookseller's ticket of Joseph Lord. Moderate foxing as expectable. A pretty book, and a pretty copy.  (27330)

United BCP with aWestminster Abbey Fore-Edge View

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•  There were minor differences between the Prayer Books of the Church of England and the Church of Ireland up until 1801, the year that the churches merged; the various 1801 BCPs were the first to use the “United Church” designation. John Reeves had been appointed king's printer in 1800, and edited his own version of the BCP, of which this is the second edition; the separate title-page following the preliminary matter is dated 1801. (That preliminary matter, offering historical and liturgical commentary, is extensive and interesting.)

Fore-edge: This beautiful example bears a subtly shaded (and therefore hard to photograph)fore-edge painting showing Westminster Abbey in the background behind a waterfront view with sailboats.

Binding:  Full straight-grain dark olive green morocco, covers framed in elegant feather and pearl twist gilt roll, turn-ins with floral gilt roll. Stone-pattern marbled endpapers. All edges gilt.

•  Griffiths, Bibliography of the Book of Common Prayer, 1802/1.   Binding as above, mild rubbing overall with some abraded areas consolidated, joints and extremities subtly repaired, aesthetically appropriate endbands supplied. Title-page with inked ownership inscription dated 1803, “The gift of my beloved husband.” Intermittent faint spots of foxing, mostly confined to early leaves. One inked marginal annotation in an early hand, three psalms (145–47) with small inked emphasis marks, pages otherwise clean.  (28715)

Laws of Oxford

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•  18th-century edition of this collection of selected statutes of the University of Oxford, originally compiled by Thomas Crossfield of Queen's College and printed in 1638 under the title Statuta selecta è corpore statutorum Universitatis Oxon. The section Statuta Bibliothecae Bodleianae is of special interest to book people, though the notes on disturbing the peace and de nocturna Vagatione cannot but please the Latinate.

That this is a volume of “selections” is trumpeted on the title-page. However, both usefully for the seeker of context and at points confusingly for the actual reader, its table of contents seems to be not for what's present as selected but for the text in full extent — so the table announces, for example, that “Titulus XVII” comprises nine sections and lists these even unto the subsections, though the body of the book itself sets forth sections five and six only.

The title-page offers a handsome vignette of the Theatre, not one of the commonest ones.

•  ESTC T118673; Madan, Oxford Books, 17.   Period-style calf, framed and panelled in blind with blind-tooled corner fleurons and rather elaborate additional decorations in blind; spine with gilt-stamped title and publication information and different blind-tooled decorations. Endpapers a little smudged and title-page mounted, with edges darkened. Early inked ownership inscription in upper margin of first text page mostly torn away, with loss of a few words. Pp. 227–30 lacking, being the last bit of the printing of the Church of England's 39 Articles and the first part of the section, “De Eligendis Publicis Lectoribus.” Pages faintly age-toned, with occasional light spotting; mostly clean.  (25553)

A Poor Clare from aWealthy & Loving Family

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•  Sole edition of this Descalced Franciscan's extensive biography of Sebastiana Josepha de la Santíssima Trinidad (1709–57, née Sebastiana Josefa de Maya), a Poor Clare and native of Mexico. Valdés details her life before entering religious life, her motives for taking the habit, and her life, piety, devotions, achievements, and charities as a nun. He includes quotations from her writings and interestingly details her confessors, who included Father Margil. Her family commissioned the work and paid publication costs.

The work is illustrated with a fine full-page engraving by Jose Morales of the biographee kneeling in devotion before an elegant shrine to the Christ Child in her book-graced cell. A woodcut of the Trinity appears at the top of the dedication page, and there are a few nice initials and head- and tailpieces.

Provenance:  Marca de fuego in upper edges of the Convento de San Cosme of the Franciscans of Mexico City, and another marca de fuego in the lower edges.

•  Medina, Mexico, 5022; Puttick & Simpson, Bibl. Mej., 1703.   Contemporary limp vellum with remnants of green silk cord ties, with title, cross, and old red shelfmark inked to spine; text block loose, held by threads. Light waterstain across early leaves and the occasional spot or soiling elsewhere; worming in lower margins, extending into text beginning on p. 355, touching or costing letters but not whole words (some appropriately repaired). A nice book.  (29522)

The JOYS of Hard Work in aDeluxe Edition

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•  First illustrated edition of this poem — based on the lines “Raise the stone, and thou shalt find me; cleave the wood, and there am I” — about finding Christ through selfless manual labor. Printed on heavy, deckle-edged paper within wide Art Nouveau-style borders, the text is additionally decorated with mounted chromolithographed painted illustrations by Herbert Moore.

Provenance:  Front free endpaper with inked inscription reading “A Thanksgiving Appreciation to Miss Alta Anderson from the Parents and Pupils of the Emerson St. Presbyterian S.S. Nov. 28, 1917.”

Signed binding: Publisher's deep violet-blue cloth, front cover with wide gilt border of floral and vine design, spine with gilt-stamped title and fleurons. Signed “EE,” with the second E reversed: Edward B. Edwards, who also designed the interior frames.

•  Binding as above, spine slightly dimmed. Pages and plates clean. A lovely copy.  (28954)

“Complete” Evangelical Response tothe Whole Duty

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•  Revised edition, “carefully corrected, and divided into fifty-two chapters, one for each Lord's Day in the year” according to the title-page. The Rev. Venn (1725–97), an acclaimed preacher, wrote the Complete Duty as a response to the Whole Duty of Man, a classic devotional work but one which many eighteenth-century evangelicals felt wanting in the doctrine of justifying faith. The Complete Duty was first published in 1763 and went through numerous editions; John Henry Overton calls it “deservedly one of the most popular of all the practical and devotional works of the Evangelical school.”

Uncommon: OCLC and ESTC locate only four U.S. institutional holdings of this edition, one of which has since been deaccessioned.

Provenance: Old inked signatures of “John R. Brown,” “Tho. Smith,” and “Rev. Thos. Smith.”

•  ESTC N028205; Overton, Evangelical Revival in the Eighteenth Century, 103–04.   Contemporary treed sheep, rebacked with complementary speckled calf, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label and raised bands ruled in gilt; corners and edges rubbed, sides scuffed, lower outer portion of back cover discolored. First preface page with rubber-stamped numeral, first and last text pages with institutional rubber-stamp in lower margins. Front fly-leaf, upper outer corner of title-page, and verso of title-page with inked ownership inscriptions as above. Four pages of contents bound in at back of volume. Pages age-toned, a few with light to moderate foxing; outer edge of title-page browned. A solid, in fact pleasant book.  (25929)

A Manual for Inquisitors withInterrogation Questions

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•  A theological and legal treatise on confessors and confession and the sacrament of penance with the emphasis on abuse of the confessional by priests. Telling a priest one's moral and legal transgressions empowers the weak or corrupt priest to then blackmail the parishioner for money or sex or other “favors.”

Father Vilaplana (1712–63), a native of Benimarfull, Valencia, Spain, was a Franciscan, a university lecturer in theology, and an “examiner” for the Inquisition. His handbook gives examples of abuses, lays out the pertinent canon laws and papal edicts, and has a section of questions to be asked of accused priests during court proceedings. The work also discusses punishment and other disciplines that the crimes demand.

Since abuse of the confessional fell under the authority of the Inquisition, this work is de facto a manual for Inquisitors.

This is the “Editio secunda locupletior in paucis.” The Bibliotheca Mexicana was the private press of the great bibliographer, writer, and secular cleric Juan Jose de Eguiara y Eguren.

•  Medina, Mexico, 5026; Palau 365782.   Contemporary limp vellum, rodent-gnawed along several edges with a small loss of vellum. Front endpapers with loss to silverfish. Text unwormed and clean.  (29773)

A Fundamental WorkHandsomely Printed

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•  The distinguished historian and bibliographer Don Guillermo Tovar de Teresa writes extensively of this work, but here we will quote only a small portion of what he says. “El Teatro Americano es una obra fundamental para todos aquellos estudiosos interesados en formarse una idea de la poblaciones de la Nueva España: su ubicación geográfica — longitud y latitud — con la descripción de los lugares circunvencinos; clima, aguas,y vegetacion; gobierno eclesiástico y civil, familias de indios, españoles y castas, templos y, sobre todo actividades económicas: comercio, ganadería, obrajes, minería, etc.”

Don Guillermo wrote that in his bibliography of works illuminating colonial Mexican art — and these two large volumes also have much to say, not noted above, about architecture, arts, sculpture, etc.!

The volumes are from the famous press of the widow of José Bernardo de Hogal, the Baskerville of Mexico, and they retain all of the fine characteristics that are associated with the Hogal name, including handsome black and red title-pages, great typography (here in double-column format), and use of good quality paper.

The author was general accountant of the Treasury's office of mercury accounting (the element was important in silver refining) and one of the most illustrious Cosmographers of New Spain. He wrote this treatise at the insistence of the viceroy, who was greatly pleased by it.

•  Sabin 99686; Medina, Mexico, 3802; Tovar de Teresa, Bibliografía novohispana de arte, II, 86/87.   Recent full dark brown calf, round spines, raised bands accented with gilt rules; green and red leather spine labels; gilt center devices. Covers with elaborate gilt roll at edges, concentric center compartments and gilt corner devices. Lacking the engraved title, only. Present are intermittent touches of limited worming and, in vol. II, the occasional old stain to a top margin's edge. This is a clean and indeedBEAUTIFUL SET.  (26378)

A Risqué Look at Jeanne D'Arc — Lushly Illustrated by les Meilleures Artistes

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•  One of the last great 18th-century illustrated editions of Voltaire's best-selling, ribald burlesque on the importance of Joan of Arc's virginity — an irreverent epic poem banned by the Roman Catholic Church in 1767.

This is two volumes in one, with the half-title versos giving “de l'imprimerie de Crapelet.” The frontispiece portrait of Joan was done by Goucher and the 21 plates by Ponce and others after designs by Monsieau, Marillier, and Monnet. In some editions of this work, the illustrations were actually pornographic; in this case, they are often erotic (many featuring bare breasts or vigorous Action), but not quite explicit. (The frontispiece portrait of Joan with perky hat, hand on hip, head cocked, expression at once coy and come-hither, and nipples just perhaps slightly showing, rather presages what's to come.)

•  Bengesco, Voltaire, 514; Cohen & de Ricci 1035; Graesse 393. Not in Ray, Art of the French Illustrated Book.   Mid-19th-century half dark green morocco and marbled paper–covered sides, leather edges with gilt fillet, spine with gilt-stamped title; spine faintly sunned, minor wear to corners and spine extremities. Top edge gilt. Front pastedown with unidentified dolphin and anchor bookplate. Tissue guard present following frontispiece but not elsewhere. Original ribbon bookmarker present and intact. A very few instances of small, light spots, most pages and certainly the “figures gravèes”) clean and fresh.  (28347)

TO Part XIV

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