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BURKE, Edmund.
A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful.
First edition, published in what Todd calculates to have been "a rather small edition, possibly limited to 500 copies". The Philosophical Enquiry is Burke's first truly successful work, winning praise in many quarters: Dr Johnson, "an example of true criticism"; Hume, "a very pretty treatise"; Reynolds, "the admirable treatise"; and Kant describing Burke as "the foremost author" in "the empirical exposition of aesthetic judgments" (Writings and Speeches, 1.187-8). "His enduring achievement was to have tackled a difficult subject in a fashion accessible to any educated reader" (ODNB).
Small octavo (170 × 102 mm). Contemporary sheep dyed in imitation of tree calf, smooth spine ruled across in gilt, red morocco label, marbled endpapers, yellow edges. With the half-title. The author's name supplied in early manuscript to the title page. Extremities rubbed, neatly restored at head and tail of spine, a very good clean copy.
