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(SPINOZA, Baruch) [LUCAS, Jean Maximilien, attrib.]

[Traité des trois imposteurs]

La vie de Sp[inoza] … par Mr. de Boulainvilliers. [with:] L'esprit de Sp[inoza].

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 trois imposteurs: a threefold attack on the great monotheistic religions and the integrity of their founding figures: Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad. The text goes beyond the challenge to the substance of revealed religions to the legitimacy of all authorities founded thereupon, ascribes man's religious impulses solely to fear, and proclaims nature as the only god acting in the world. As such, it has been widely interpreted as one of the key intellectual documents of the early Enlightenment. The text was first printed in the Low Countries in 1719 as La vie et l'esprit de Spinoza but was immediately suppressed and is now exceptionally rare. It was reprinted numerous times in the later century as interest in its message spread, but even then copies were the subject of frequent interception and destruction. It is clear that the printed editions were preceded by a vigorous circulation of the text in manuscript, its very existence often a matter of rumour and debate, and copies were keenly sought across Europe. As in the case of other clandestine texts, manuscript copies continued to be made after the first printing. However, it is demonstrable from internal textual evidence that the present example is from the earliest phase, prior to the printed text. The variant manuscript versions have been grouped into families by the interrelated studies of Françoise Charles-Daubert, Silvia Berti and Miguel Benìtez. Three (or four by other reckonings) pre-edition families have been identified. The main distinguishing feature is the account of Moses, which in our text is essentially the relatively short story of a cunning leader intent on moulding the will of a credulous people. This identifies the present manuscript as belonging to the first family, the earliest form of the clandestine work (or distinct works, the Vie and the Esprit) written probably by J. M. Lucas, described by contemporaries as a "friend and disciple" of Spinoza and his earliest biographer, following the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 and the exacerbation of religious intolerance in France. The earliest dated version of the manuscript is Ms Sloane 2039, dated 1709. The association of the French sceptic Boulainvilliers with the clandestine Vie and Esprit began with the appearance of his Spinozian Essai de métaphysique in 1712, originating a family of manuscripts in which versions of the Vie and Esprit were combined with the Essai. The use of his name in the title of the present manuscript therefore likely dates it after 1711, but from other evidence before 1719. The contemporary English bookplate ("Ex libris D. Anthonii Thompson") in this copy is particularly interesting, suggesting its distribution in England from an early date. Spinoza's thought met violent opposition in England, but he also had influential supporters, as Justin Champion has shown while advancing the case of John Toland's involvement in the construction of the text.

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 pagination and index. Contemporary full calf, probably English. Custom brown cloth folding case. Contemporary engraved armorial bookplate of Anthony Thompson to front pastedown; later bookplate of the Irish-born writer and translator Edward Mangin (1772-1852) to the blank facing the first text page. Covers worn, especially at extremities, joints exposed and spine cover perished, but holding.

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