Philosophy & History of Ideas (all items)
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LOCKE, John.
An Essay concerning Humane Understanding. 1690
£50,000
First edition, the Holt issue (traditionally considered the first), with two emendations in the author's hand. Locke worked for nearly two decades on his investigation of "the...
Folio (317 × 193 mm). Contemporary mottled calf, red morocco label, spine gilt in compartments with intersecting semicircles infilled with flower tools, etc.... Read more
MACHIAVELLI, Niccolò.
Nicholas Machiavel's Prince. 1640
£37,500
First edition in English of Machiavelli's famous handbook for rulers (1513, published Rome 1532), dedicated to Lorenzo de' Medici, ruler of Florence from 1513. The Prince appears to...
Duodecimo (146 × 82 mm). Contemporary limp vellum, spine titled in old manuscript, upper portion of front cover repaired to style, recased and relined, lacks... Read more
![Ars Moriendi [Inspiration Against Despair].](/content/store/products/17988/2/19813.jpg)
(BLOCK BOOK.)
Ars Moriendi [Inspiration Against Despair]. c. 1470–80]
£37,500
An extremely rare block book leaf, one of only two known to survive from this edition of the Ars Moriendi (The Art of Dying). Block books were a short-lived book format that...
Quarto (248 × 188 mm). Single leaf from a block book, contemporary hand-coloured woodcut printed on one side of the leaf only. Mounted and framed. A few small... Read more
EMERSON, Ralph Waldo.
Fortune of the Republic. 1878
£30,000
First edition, presentation copy to Thomas Carlyle, inscribed by the author on the blank preceding the title: "Thomas Carlyle, with entire affection of R.W.E. Concord, August 26,...
Octavo, pp. [ii], 44. Original brown cloth, front cover lettered in gilt, covers blocked in blind with frame and central ornament, chocolate brown endpapers. Custom... Read more
[QUR’AN]
Western Iran or Ottoman Turkey. Circa 1600
£27,500
Safavid and Ottoman manuscript illumination was highly eclectic in the sixteenth and seventeenth century, reflecting the interactions of artists from all over the Islamic world. The...
Arabic and Persian manuscript (36.8 x 24 cm) on thin cream paper with 10 alternating lines of fine naskh and nasta'liq script in black ink per page, illuminated double... Read more
LOCKE, John.
An Essay concerning Humane Understanding. In Four Books. 1690
£25,000
First edition, Basset issue (traditionally considered the second) with the "ss" of Essay reversed, and with the typographical ornament unaligned. John Stuart Mill described Locke as...
Folio (320 × 194 mm). Contemporary mottled calf, red sprinkled edges, red morocco label added to style. Housed in a dark brown cloth slipcase. Armorial bookplate... Read more
TRESSELL, Robert.
The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists. [1914]
£15,000
First edition, first impression. Robert Philippe Noonan (1870-1911) was the illegitimate son of an inspector in the Royal Irish Constabulary. He settled in South Africa for ten...
Octavo. Original black cloth, titles to spine and front board gilt. With the printed dust jacket. Housed in a green quarter morocco solander box made by The Chelsea... Read more
BLACKSTONE, Sir William.
Commentaries on the Laws of England 1765
£15,000
First edition. "Blackstone's great work on the laws of England is the extreme example of justification of an existing state of affairs by virtue of its history … Until the...
4 volumes, quarto (269 × 209 mm). Contemporary tan calf, skilfully rebacked and relined to style, red and green morocco labels, boards with gilt rope-roll border,... Read more
![[Queen Mab, A Philosophical Poem, with Notes …]](/content/store/products/23321/2/31085.jpg)
SHELLEY, Percy Bysshe.
[Queen Mab, A Philosophical Poem, with Notes …] 1813]
£14,500
First edition, one of only approximately 70 copies of the first issue, the so-called "mutilated" state of the text. Queen Mab was Shelley's first important poetic work, preceded only...
Octavo (179 × 112 mm.), pp. 240, with title-page and dedication leaf removed and imprint torn from foot of last leaf Q8 by Shelley, as issued; the dedication leaf... Read more
THOREAU, Henry D.
Walden; or, Life in the Woods. 1854
£12,500
First edition. Following the failure of his first book A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, Walden was not a runaway success. The edition of 2,000 took five years to sell...
Octavo. Original brown ribbed cloth, title gilt to spine, large decorative device within blind panels to the boards, pale yellow endpapers. In a custom blue quarter... Read more
PUGIN, Augustus Welby Northmore.
Autograph letter, with original captioned ink sketch, to Henry Ridgard Bagshawe. 1841
£12,500
A wittily satirical sketch by Pugin, the Roman Catholic architect, sent to his friend Henry Ridgard Bagshawe (1799-1870), a prominent Catholic lawyer. Bagshawe sat on the committee...
Single leaf, hand-torn along one edge (225 × 182 mm); on recto, address panel with one-penny stamp (the famous Penny Black) with red cancellation, franks, red wax... Read more
BRACTON, Henry de.
De Legibus & consuetudinibus Angliae Libri quinque 1569
£12,000
First edition of a classic of English law, "incomparably the best work produced by any lawyer in the middle ages" (Encyclopaedia Britannica), "a formulation of principles which have...
Folio (293 × 195 mm). Contemporary calf, rebacked and recornered with old gilt spine laid down. Housed in a dark brown cloth solander box. Rubbed, front joint a... Read more
![[Das Kapital, in Russian] Kapital. Kritika politicheskoi ekonomii.](/content/store/products/4000/2/5434.jpg)
MARX, Karl.
[Das Kapital, in Russian] Kapital. Kritika politicheskoi ekonomii. 1872
£10,000
First edition in Russian, the first foreign translation, of "the Bible of Marxism." This is the first translation to appear in any language, and the impact of it was greatest on the...
Octavo (236 × 153 mm). Contemporary Russian black half calf, blue pebble-grain cloth sides, spine with double gilt rules. Housed in a black quarter morocco... Read more
PLACE, Francis.
Illustrations and Proofs of the Principle of Population: 1822
£10,000
First edition of the foundation work of the modern birth-control movement, of great significance in economics, social history, and population theory. The book is rare on the market;...
Octavo (202 × 132 mm). Near-contemporary dark green watered (moiré) cloth, spine lettered in gilt. Cloth a little faded in the grain, occasional foxing and... Read more
![[Traité des trois imposteurs]](/content/store/products/7928/2/9421.jpg)
(SPINOZA, Baruch) [LUCAS, Jean Maximilien, attrib.]
[Traité des trois imposteurs] 1711]
£9,750
An early manuscript example of the earliest version of the most radical text of the first half of the 18th century, known under several titles but principally as the Traité des...
Octavo (192 × 130 mm), manuscript on paper, pp. 64, [4] bl.; 134, [6] bl. A fair copy all in the same neat scribal hand, brown ink, c.18 lines to a page, original... Read more
CONFUCIUS.
Confucius sinarum Philosophus, sive Scientia Sinensis latine exposita … 1687
£9,500
First European edition of Confucius: the first three parts being Latin translations of the Ta Hsüeh, the Chung Yung, and the Lun Yü or Analects; and the fourth, Philippe...
Folio (322 × 220 mm). Contemporary sprinkled calf, sides with gilt roll border, spine gilt in compartments, hand-lettered title label in third compartment,... Read more
SHELLEY, Percy Bysshe.
Autograph letter signed ("Mr. Shelley." in the third person) to Christopher John Pike. 1813
£8,500
Shelley writes in the third person: "Mr. Shelley requests that Mr. Pike would give the Bearer the copy of the Settlement in his possession. Mr. S. will return it in the course of the...
One page, 12mo, with Shelley's red wax seal, red cloth portfolio. Provenance: A. Edward Newton (his sale Parke-Bernet, pt III, 30 October 1941, lot 247; bookplate in... Read more
BLOME, Richard.
The Gentleman's Recreation. 1686
£7,500
First edition of the book containing some of the earliest published illustrations of British field sports. Richard Blome (1635–1705) was a London cartographer, arms-painter, and...
Folio (450 × 250 mm). Contemporary panelled brown calf, 6 raised bands, brown morocco label. Engraved frontispiece and 84 plates of which 10 display subscribers'... Read more
FERGUSON, Adam.
An Essay on the History of Civil Society. 1767
£7,500
First edition of Ferguson's masterpiece, a key text of the Scottish Enlightenment. "The Essay touched a chord in its British readers because it offered a detailed, colourful,...
Quarto. Contemporary Scottish pale tan sprinkled calf, red morocco label, double gilt rules, red sprinkled edges. Engraved bookplate of Sir Henry Hay Makdougall Bart... Read more
[WILSON, Bill].
Alcoholics Anonymous. 1939
£7,500
First edition, first printing of the founding text of Alcoholics Anonymous, hugely influential through its mutation into the wider Twelve Steps movement. The first edition is a...
Octavo. Finely bound by The Chelsea Bindery in scarlet morocco, titles and decoration to spine gilt, raised bands, single rule to boards gilt, title block to front... Read more
GODWIN, William.
An Enquiry concerning Political Justice, 1793
£7,500
First edition of one of the most radical and far-reaching books of the years of revolution at the end of the 18th century, by the founder of philosophical anarchism. Published just...
2 volumes, quarto. Attractive contemporary half calf, flat spines with wide bands stained black and Greek-key rolls in blind, gilt-lettered direct, compartments... Read more
ELIOT, T. S.
The Holy Bible and Book of Common Prayer. [c.1938]
£7,425
Presented by T. S. Eliot to his godson Tom Faber (son of Geoffrey Faber) at the age of 11, each book with the inscription, "Thomas Erle Faber from his godfather Thomas Stearns Eliot...
2 volumes. Publisher's black morocco. Both volumes somewhat rubbed but in very good condition. Read more
CROWLEY, Aleister.
The Equinox. 1909–13
£6,750
First editions, first impressions of all ten issues of volume I of Crowley's semi-annual journal of occultism.
10 volumes, quarto. Original white boards printed in black, green, and red. Rubbed, worn, and tanned, with chips and creases to bindings, spine of number IV split but... Read more
(HOLY BIBLE; English) MACKLIN, Thomas.
The Old and New Testament. 1800
£6,750
"The Macklin Bible endures as the most ambitious edition produced in Britain, often pirated but never rivalled" (ODNB).
Folio, 6 volumes. Contemporary green morocco, spines gilt in compartments with sun-in-splendor tools, elaborate greek key roll and cornerpieces to boards, marbled... Read more
PRIEUR, Claude.
Dialogue de la Lycanthropie ou transformation d'hommes en loups, 1596
£6,500
First edition of the one of the key discussions of lycanthropy in the latter stages of the European witchcraft panic. The author, a French Franciscan monk, steers the middle ground...
Small octavo (146 × 92 mm). Early nineteenth-century polished calf, covers with thick-and-thin gilt rules and gilt arms at centre, smooth spine with gilt bands... Read more
